A short story
For Paul
And the rest of the Gilpin County Road and Bridge crew, 2005
I was always partial to fairy tales; and as I grew older fantasy books, then novels. The long complicated plots full of beautiful people in strange lands fed my mind and imagination. They altered my thoughts and allowed me to forget the harsh reality that made up my life. I am, and never will be, the princess in those stories. Even if I could shrink my Viking bone structure and melt off the excess pounds to fit their clothing, the grace with which they move, speak, and live is attainable only by the words of authors and poets.
That is reality…a reality that engulfed me like the fog that finally swallowed the green expanse of the mountains filling my view. I was cold even though I was wearing two pairs of jeans, a t-shirt, two sweatshirts, my winter coat, and my giant raincoat, not to forget my wool socks and wool hat. I could feel the temperature dropping as my arthritic hands fumbled to turn the page in my newest novel.
The plot was thickening as the chapter came to a close. Allies had finally started to come together, pooling their honor and ideals in hopes of saving a land, and her princess, from the darkness of corrupted power! I would like to have blamed the earplug that deadened the sounds around me, but I was so absorbed in my book that I didn’t even notice a man approach me until he said something. It startled me enough that he felt it necessary to apologize before repeating his comment.
Like all people who are just meeting or passing, he commented on the weather – guaranteeing that I was going to get wet. I politely responded, keeping the sarcasm out of my voice, as I looked at my surroundings. I could see the flashing yellow lights of the yellow road Grader in front of me. In front of him, a truck was probably dumping more rock and root-filled dirt which, after being spread around, I was to roll. My roller – YES, my roller – was a big diesel-powered Cat that, extremely loudly (hence the earplug), crushed anything below it. Smashing it down on its slow trek to finishing the dirt road we were reconstructing.
I was waiting to roll the next section, so my roller was pulled to the side and turned off. I was regally perched upon a padded black seat, positioned between the giant tires that almost reached my 5’9’’ height. The enormous silver, brown, and white speckled cylinder moved or vibrated at different rates with the slightest stir of my noble hand. No cab obstructed the world’s view of me or staled the fresh air that graced my lungs.
The short laugh of the man as he further guaranteed me that I was going to get wet brought me out of the flowery world that my head was still drifting in. I waved a polite ‘good by’ and further hunched my back into my warm clothing. I was not perched. I was squished as far down into the seat as possible to stay warm. The roller did not belong to me and my hands were not so special. Anyone could make the roller work with minimal instruction, and the lack of cab was not a boost to my ego. It was the reason for my chills and raincoat. I finally got the page turned just as the first fat raindrop distorted the silver color of the cylinder showing its true dirty yellow identity. It had smelled like rain all day. In fact, for most of the summer, all I could remember was the smell of rain.
I glanced at the road Grader, still too close to make the amount of road in front of me worth my time to roll, and sunk back into my fantasy land. The chapter ended too quickly as a raindrop blurred the edges of the next chapter’s heading. I wrinkled my nose at the opening paragraph where, once again, the perfect elegance of the princess’ character was described as small, delicate, graceful, beautiful, and intelligent. Men were fighting to be at her side and lived just to catch a glimpse of her radiance. My uncontrollable wandering mind immediately compared her to me, and unsurprisingly, I fell far short. This did not help soothe the fact that my boyfriend had not returned my phone calls for the last week, which was suddenly a painfully present fact.
I could feel my mood slipping as if it was sand through my fingers. To make matters worse, I had been sick the last few days, and my sister and I had gotten into a fight and had not spoken since. I pressed the book to my face as if the words could erase the downward spiral that my mind had slipped into. The rain was really coming down now. The two-foot square of somewhat dry space, my last haven. I clung to it, washing my depressing thoughts away as I read about the princess and her sickly purity. She would in the end be saved by a man who lived by a code of honor in a place where they called their girlfriends back and paid for things on dates.
Lightning flashed, its ridged edges smoothed through the clouds. I pulled the book away from my face and squinted through the rain. My roller was grounded, very grounded, and lightning would force me out of my small, semi-dry haven. I waited as little bits of the rain formed into small white balls of hail. Another flash grazed my peripheral vision, and I cursed and stuffed my book into my coat pocket. My haven was lost, and with it any positive thoughts I had mustered. I could feel my hands protesting as I gripped the metal poles that were positioned on either side of the three wet stairs. With all the grace of a two-year-old, I flopped down the stairs, narrowly avoiding the gutter just starting to run with water. I began to trudge down the road, tripping every now and then as was usual in clunky steel-toed boots.
The rain pounded down on my shoulders and hat. Although the rain was light compared to what it would be, my black mood made it seem like a downpour. I began to despair at the lack of shelter. This brought out my sarcastic side, which easily began its path of ripping on everything that was me and tearing apart my hopes and wishes. For I was not a princess… not even close.
I managed a few steps further, the rain coming harder with each step, further blurring the lines of reality and turning the world into a grey-scaled 8-bit photo. I looked at the photo, still trying to banish my thoughts, when out of the dull lifeless colors a bright orange light, truck engine roaring emerged. I couldn’t help the smile that spread over my lips as the driver, his orange shirt in perfect sync with his truck, lifted up his arms and enthusiastically gestured before pulling up next to me; the bottom of the passenger door was not two feet from my nose. It took two steps to reach the water truck, and each step further lifted the black self-imposed clouds that had surrounded me for most of the day. I could no longer feel the wet pounding on my rain jacket or my hat as I climbed into the truck, struggling because of my many layers of clothing.
The driver made an off-handed stab at teasing me about my troubles, a friendly stab which I had come to laugh at and enjoy. The cold melted from my body as I shut the truck door on the wet gray world and entered the messy, colorful, and distinct smell of the truck that offered me shelter. A few seconds later it began to rain and hail in earnest. A few hail balls reached the width of my fingernails and the windshield was blurry again before the wipers had even finished their pass. The grumpy old driver began to complain about the rain and management as I stuck my fingers as far into the heater vents as I could. I felt my mood lighten as heat and companionship filled my ears, along with my own laughter.
For I am not a princess, the orange water truck is not a shining coat of armor, and its driver is not a handsome prince. But despite all the facts of life, I was rescued by a knight in shining armor.
It’s the little things in life that we have to rejoice in and appreciate. Although I don’t have a prince, my boyfriend and I will work it out. My sister and I have never stopped talking for long, and my cold was already almost gone. And in that moment, despite the rain, all I could feel was the sun as this act of friendship and kindness lifted my day and brightened my world.
We are all surrounded by knights in shining armor, by princesses, and the tools to save each other.
