The streetlamps ended as soon as the road turned into highway and snaked around and over the evergreen dense mountains.  Alan gripped the steering wheel of the old Ford sedan with two hands and drove at a pace adequate enough to keep up with the luminescent road signs, which slipped past his headlights one after the other.

He wiped his thick, gray mustache and stubby chin with one hand and looked at the passenger seat, where Simon slept with his mouth open.  He had a blanket curled snugly around his fists and a closed bottle of arthritic medication in his lap.

The car approached the top of a steep mountain and on that horizon the sky glowed faintly.  Alan wiped his mouth and mustache again.  The old Ford sedan rocked suddenly and the front tire blew out jerking the front end of the car to the right.  Meanwhile the glow over the mountain road intensified and formed into a definite concentration of light. Read more…