The Date (Part 2)
Chapter 11: The Date (Part 2)
The snow that had been falling in scattered showers when we got to the restaurant was coming down in earnest by the time we had left and fell almost sideways with a biting wind. But we hardly noticed the cold as we dashed through the weather, still hand in hand, and climbed into the truck. With me opening the door for the lady first, of course. It was only with her hand not in mine that I noticed a late winter storm was rolling in and we needed to get on the freeway if we didn’t want to potentially be trapped in Idaho Falls. As we rounded the on ramp, I switched the transmission into 4X4 mode with the press of a switch on the dashboard causing the engine to become somewhat louder as it was working harder.
“Is there something wrong?” Rarity asked with just a touch of concern in her voice.
“Nah.” I reassured her, “I switched it into four by –“ I stopped myself realizing that she likely had no idea what I was talking about.
“I made it so all four wheels get power from the engine instead of just the rear two.” I corrected myself.
Rarity gave me a blank look anyways.
“I made it safer to drive.” I ventured and she nodded either that she understood, or that she understood enough and was letting it go. Or that I was an idiot and she was playing along. Either way it worked for me.
It was not, however, working out for other people who were on the road. The now blizzard like conditions were making it impossible to go the freeway speed limit and as it was 35mph felt like it was almost too fast, and that feeling about the conditions was only heightened when the gray minivan a ways in front of us began to oscillate to and fro a moment before it spun a full circle and slid off the right side of the road, and into the median where it stopped safely. During all of this I had been gently applying the brakes while veering to the right so I also came to a stop outside of the lane of traffic – not that there was any save a long hauler here and there – so after checking the side mirror I moved or slid my large truck forward until I was a little closer to the minivan. Though the windows I confirmed what I had suspected that they were not only stuck, but had a van full of kids. Likely a family.
“What are you doing?” Rarity asked as I undid the seatbelt and opened the door.
“They’re stuck, my truck’s got the power to get’em going again.” I said simply and flashed a smile, “You’ll see.”
Rarity blinked and gave a nod as I closed the door. She would see. I trudged through the slush and ice as the cold wind whipped at my face until I had made it to the gray minivan – whose front tires were spinning off and on, heedless of the lack of traction underneath them – and waved to the man in the window, who let off the gas and rolled down the window slightly.
“Do you got any chains for the tires?” I yelled over the wind and the semi truck that was driving by.
“Yeah…I didn’t think I needed them so I left them at home.” He laughed sheepishly.
While he had stopped the tires from spinning I gave the traction a glance, seeing that it had sufficient tread left to be able to get through this kind of muck and ice meaning the entire spin out must have been driver error. But I wasn’t going to tell him that.
“No worries.” I inspected the front of the van and just under the bumper found two tow hooks built into the frame, and praised whatever vehicle gods were watching that this was included in the design.
“I can pull you out if you’d like. My truck’ll do it.” I offered and the man behind the wheel emphatically nodded, and I just noticed that there was a woman about the same age had been glaring daggers at him from the passenger seat, though I didn’t know for how long.
I gave the man a thumbs up as another semi lumbered by at a much slower pace than the last and hurried back to the truck, hopping in the driver’s seat.
“What’s going on?” Rarity asked immediately.
“I’m doing a good deed.” I explained the situation to her as I merged back into the lane just enough to get past the van and pulled halfway back into the median, coming to a stop with a slight bump.
“Do you need me to do anything?” She offered.
“In a moment, yeah, just wait here for now.” I gave another grin that hopefully told her ‘I got this’ and hopped back out of the car after turning on the hazard lights.
The next several minutes could have been out of a commercial, to be honest everything I did was a tad cliché, but that didn’t make me feel any less manly about it. I hopped up on the rear wheel and into the bed of the truck and after fumbling with the key a moment, opened one end of the tool box that was sprawled across the section closet the cab, and produced a length of chain, a longer length of nylon straps and two of my own general purpose tow hooks. Hopping from the bed, I immediately attached the end of the Chain around the tow hitch and threw the rest behind me into the snow. I then crossed tied off one end of the nylon strap to the chain as best I could and dropped it in the snow as well, shoving my now freezing, bare hands, into my jacket pocket. The hooks and rest of the nylon straps were around my shoulders and bounced a little as I jogged quickly to the front of the van – who had also turned on their hazards having followed my lead.
Snow and wind stung at my face, hands and knees as I made quick work of dropping to my knees in the so I could attach the hooks to the frame, and the straps to the hooks, before rising and running back to the driver’s window of the van.
“Keep the wheels turned until you start to straighten out! I can’t pull you into the road until you’re facing the other direction!” I yelled and he gave me the thumbs up, so I jogged through the growing snow – running was becoming difficult since I wasn’t wearing snow boots – and hopped back into the cab.
“Holy crap its cold out there.” I complained and turned to Rarity, “Okay Rarity, I need you to do one thing, once the van straightens out look out the back window and give them the signal to stop.”
I made the stop motion with my hand.
“Right.” She said petulantly, “Even in Equestria there is a ‘universal signal’ for stop moving, if you will.”
Now it was my turn to smile sheepishly.
I hit the brakes, threw the automatic shifter into first gear, then pressed the button on my 4x4 control to switch it into 4 lo, that way I wouldn’t blow up the transfer case and make a bad day for everyone. Glancing in my side view mirror I noticed at some point an Idaho State Police officer had come down the road, noticed what I was doing, and had turned on their rear lights to deflect what little traffic there was from the slow lane for me and after I pumped the brakes once to let him know I was ready, he flashed his brights in return and I put my foot on the accelerator, crawling forwards until the length of nylon strap and chain had tightened against the tow hitch. As soon as it did however I could feel the back end of the truck give a little bit to the right, so while there was still tension on the chain I pushed the accelerator in farther. The big, old diesel roared blowing black smoke out the exhaust but the extra power straightened me out and tires spinning, began to spin and straighten the van as well. I angled the truck back onto the road as the van spun giving me more of what little traction was available until the van straightened, and front tires spinning slowly crawled onto the road with me.
“Okay, let’em know to stop.” I said as I stopped the truck, and fixed the gear configuration before putting it in park.
I glanced in my side mirror however and the van was still accelerating towards us.
“Um, stop?” I asked.
“I’m trying, they aren’t listening!” Rarity said in a panic, hitting the rear window over and over as if that would get their attention.
“Can they see through this glass on that side?” She asked quickly.
“Not if they aren’t looking!” I noted, seeing the husband and wife were again, arguing instead of, you know, driving.
Rarity’s ‘horn’ lit up for a bright brief moment and the van lurched to a stop, as a panicked driver hit the brakes all of the sudden.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“Pulled those hooks I saw you connect the other direction.” Rarity wiped a bit of sweat from her brow and beamed at me. “Though I don’t think I can to that again.”
“Good job.” I grinned, and hopped back out to retrieve my stuff.
By the time I got the back of my truck the State Patrol was already disconnecting the tow hooks from the van and directed it back into the other lane while I rolled them up, leaving everything attached but throwing it back into the bed. Because who knows?
“Good job there.” One of the officers said, “Where ya headed?”
“Dillon.” I said, using the quick disconnect on the tow hitch itself and tossing it – still with the chain attached – into the bed.
“Bad storm coming, the highway closed behind you so you shouldn’t see much traffic after us.” The officer said, “If you try to help anyone else out, just don’t get stuck yourself.”
“Don’t worry, I don’t get stuck.” I said confidently and we shook hands and parted ways.
Once back in the cab, Rarity and I rejoined the now one lane road as snow cover had all but made deciphering where the edge of each lane was. So instead everyone ahead of me had opted to drive in the safest part, between both lanes.
“If I am understanding what happened just now, did you just save that argumentative family from being stuck in the snow?” Rarity asked, interrupting my train of thoughts.
“Huh? Oh, yeah.” I smiled somewhat bashfully, “Saved is an awfully strong word though; a tow truck would have come along eventually.”
“Don’t by coy, Asher, it was very gentlemanly of you, regardless.” She said.
I, meanwhile, continued grinning like a fool.
That is until we came across a small sedan that had slid off into the median. Just as I was getting warm again too. I pulled the truck over on the left side of the road, angled so I was only mostly out of the lane of traffic, and repeated the process of helping a nice old couple get unstuck from the middle of the freeway with some help from Rarity. Jumping back into the car wet and cold again as well, but feeling warmer on the inside. This particular situation repeated another three times before we finally reached the off ramp that led home. It was still near white out conditions as my poor overworked truck slid and spun its wheels up the dirt road and stopped in front of my home and as I put it in park, and I was feeling much like the truck was. Cold, wet, and worn down.
However, something had happened that did not go unnoticed while I was being the good Samaritan. Each time I had hopped back into the car Rarity’s hand would like with mine, and she would squeeze me hand a little tighter each time, and her expression would soften more each time, that us until we had gotten home when I finally noticed the levels of adoration that she had reached.
“Stopping and helping those people was very heroic, Asher.” Rarity said, looking at me with little stars, glittering in her eyes.
“Heh, glad you think so. I was just doing what’s right though. Not a big deal.” I brushed off the compliment and opened the door, hopping out.
Little needles of pain lanced through my half frozen feet as I walked to the other side of the truck but I managed to keep my balance on the uneven, frozen terrain, then opened the door for Rarity and helped her out.
“A Storm like this is unusual, yes? I know your people can’t control the weather but this seems a bit extreme.” Rarity remarked as she hugged herself. I meanwhile fumbled with the keys before finding the one I was looking for, and unlocked the door.
However, as we both hurried inside and I shut the door, I didn’t immediately notice an increase in temperature. I didn’t immediately feel warm because of te jacket I was wearing, and Rarity was still shivering.
“No, it isn’t normal, neither is this.” I said distractedly and walked to the hall to check the thermostat.
It was set at seventy, but just to confirm the fears I had as to why the house was so cold I pushed the little lever all the way up to surface of the sun mode (also known as 95) but still there was no click. No tell tale sound of air circulating throughout the home, nothing. I glanced into the kitchen and from my vantage point in the hall could tell that clocks and lights were still on – confirmed further when Rarity turned on one of the living room lamps and plopped down on the couch, still in her coat and hugging herself.
“Just a second, I need to check something.” I said and walked into the garage without hearing her response.
My fears were confirmed when I got to the heating unit which sat on a concrete step right next to the water heater. The latter was natural gas powered but the former was original to the home, and electric. And dead as a doornail. A fact that was confirmed after a moment of fiddling with a side panel I was able to expose, and remove the ye-olde-heating-element that was installed inside. It consisted of a thick piece of wire bent into multiple layers on itself and would produce the heat when a sufficient current was passed through it, and would normally be a metallic silver color. My heating element was black, with a scorched end where the plug attached into HVAC system and disintegrated into several pieces when I pulled it out.
“Hey Rarity I have good news and bad news, which would you like first?” I asked once I got back into the house.
“Good news should always be told first.” Rarity declared.
“Right, so I know what’s wrong with the heater.” I forced a smile and held up the old, broken heating element.
“Oh good, so will it warm up in here soon? This cold is doing nothing for my coat – err – skin.” She complained.
“That’s the bad news, I may be a handy man but I won’t be able to get a heating guy out to fix it till tomorrow, and the snow is bad enough I’m afraid the ol’ truck wouldn’t make it all the way to town and back without getting stuck.” I explained.
“So…there’s no heat? What about the fireplace?” Rarity’s voice pitched upwards as she spoke, concerned about the lack of a way to stay warm with night coming on in the middle of an eastern Idaho style blizzard.
“Well there’s some firewood I keep in the barn, I’m going to grab some of that and bring it in but this fireplace will only really heat the living room because the house is so spread out.” I sighed.
“What are you suggesting then?” She asked.
I sighed, rubbing my temples a little bit before straightening up and facing situation like a man,
“Grab some blankets.” I suggested. “I’m going to the barn to get some logs to burn.”
Hint, there will be a Date Part 3 
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vhat a nize guy.
Being "the guy with the truck" is a position of underappreciated, but great responsibility.
Yeah chapter!
.........And then they fucked.
"Oh, the weather outside is frightful..."
Time to make blanket beds in the living room to sleep in front of the fire.
I wish I had a fireplace, that sounds cozy.
3580420 "And the fire Is so delightful..."
and since we've no place to go.....
3580420>>3580501>>3580914
Let it snow Let it Snow Let it snow
3579867 You're really not kidding. Having a truck sticks you with a lot more than you might think.
3581240
*sees comment downvotes*
Awww...looks like somebody's lost their christmas spirit!
3582154 I think it's less the loss of Christmas spirit as it is being worn out from Christmas stuff being out in stores before and since Halloween, including the songs.
3581240>>3580914>>3285950 "Man it doesn't show signs of stopping..."
3582922 "And I've brought some corn for popping..."
3583009 'The lights are turned way down low...." This works so well with what might be happening
So Deleth! I am very excited for the next chapter and kinda hope things get nice and toasty for these two
This chapter was pretty good, not your best but still pretty good 
I am still here and always waiting for that next chapter so untill next we meet!
-Element
3583266
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!
3585582 "When we finally kiss goodnight..."
3586130
"How I hate going out in the storm..."
3588006 "But if you really, Hold me tight..."
3588044 "All the way home I'll be waaaaaaarm..."
3588682 "And the fire is slowly dieing..."
3589940
and my dear, we're still goodbyeing....
3590466 "But as long as you love me so..."
3592179 Let it snow Let it snow Let it snow
3595228>>3592179>>3590466>>3588682>>3588006
Alright. Done. No more singing.
3595250 Sorry!
3595267
I aint even mad bro, thought it was hilarious, just don't want the comments spammed out
3595273 Ok
And I'm back! Schooling is calming down, so on to something fun!
Having amenities spontaneously destruct is never fun.
Keep going! ;)