Tommyknocker Ridge

My Small Town story for the Wild At Heart Flash Fiction Bingo challenge!

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Now for some Flash Fiction!

Tommyknocker Ridge

I flinch as my body’s thrown forward. My head crashes into something, then the airbag slams into my face so hard I see stars. Things go dark for I don’t know how long and the next thing I know, some incessant dinging sound is ringing in my ears.

“Uhh.”

My moan rattles through my head, which is now pounding, and my neck hurts.

“Jesus, what’d you do now, Ads?” My voice scratches my throat, probably more from being on the road so long without stopping for snacks or water more than the accident. I’d stopped as little as possible on my mad dash cross country, all the way from Louisiana into the Rockies. A cabin in a mountain town seemed like the perfect hideout until I could figure out what to do about Jackson. I had a knack for making bad decisions. That man was at the top of a very long list of them. Thinking I could handle back-road mountain driving was going on there too now. I’d actually been doing just fine until that last bend I’d come around put me face to face with a stupid cow. I panicked and swerved and the rest was my own sorry luck.

Sliding my face over the airbag, I look out the passenger side window. Pine branches fill my vision. I blink several times, little green spikes kaleidoscope-ing before my eyes each time I do. Little tiny Jackson heads appear inside the optical illusion.

“Noo.”

Just as I’m about to let the sickening blur fade into darkness a second time, a tingle shoots up my spine. A shadow falls over me and the heat from the sun shining through the driver’s window cools. There’s a thump on the window. My body jerks before I slide my head back around to look.

A silver belt buckle and jeans on what could only be a male pair of hips fill my eyes, then my handle pops and the door pulls open. In my harried, not-all-there state, my mind goes right to the inevitable. One of Jackson’s goons found me! I can’t help it. I scream.

“Whoa! Easy.” A deep voice rumbles as a man drops down inside my open car door. He looks at me with the clearest, deepest green eyes I’ve ever seen. God help me if I can find my tongue. I just stare at the face under the cowboy hat, clean shaven, so I get lost in the shape of his lips. The stranger smiles and it must be the adrenalin, but my stomach flips at the twin dimples that appear. I don’t even want to think about that weird feeling I’m getting a few inches lower.

 His mouth moves again, continuing to croon to me in a soothing yet no nonsense tone. “Easy now, you’re okay.”

“I-I-I am?”

The slight nod he gives tips his hat before he reaches into his back pocket, then leans closer. His big hands reach into the car, moving between me and the airbag. I hear a soft flick, then he cuts through the bag with a knife and pushes the fabric up over the steering wheel.

“Must’ve taken that last curve a little too fast.” His voice is gruff, slightly admonishing, as he wrestles with the deflated safety feature.

“I guess.” I mumble, not thinking to mention the cow.

When he turns back again, he brushes my hair back with one hand while holding my chin in the other. He looks at my head, frowning at the spot I banged on the steering wheel before he pulls back a little. The close proximity sucks all the breath from my lungs and I’m really glad I still have my jacket on because my nipples harden. When I squirm, he pulls back a bit. Then something strange happens. Our eyes lock. His narrow then widen as if in recognition, which is totally crazy because I know I’d remember if I’d ever seen him before. Under the shadow his hat casts over the upper half of his face, his eyes brighten to the point they glow, then a shimmer of gold dust fills the air between us.

What the hell? I blink. Wetness hits the tops of my cheeks and I quickly swipe it away. Shit! That’s all I need. One look at my fingers bears the evidence of my secret condition and I smear the shine on my shorts. Come on, Addison, try not to let your weird show for once, I silently chide myself. When I look back up, the cowboy is sliding on a pair of dark sunglasses. Yeah, I know that trick too—all too well. Except… I didn’t just see what I thought I did. Did I? Gold sparkles floating out of his eyes? Pff, yeah right. My addled brain must be projecting my little problem onto him.

Glasses in place, the cowboy looks me up and down before stopping on my face. He scrubs a hand over the five o’clock shadow on his jaw, then gives his head a shake.

“I’ll be damned,” he says, “she said it’d be soon. I didn’t think she meant today.”

“Huh?”

I’m having a hard time figuring out if that hit to the head was worse than I thought or if tall drink of water here is nuts. Before I have the chance to give it anymore thought, an ominous sound like a teakettle releasing steam squeals under my hood.

“Shit!” he curses, then shoves his arms under my back and my legs and yanks me clean out of the car. The sound of pressure and doom coming from my car’s engine makes me think we’ll never make it out of harm’s way before she blows. The cowboy’s face drops down. Suddenly, so close to mine were sharing the same air under the brim of his hat. His sunglasses slip a little so, once again, I see his eyes.

“Trust me?” He asks.

Caught in his stare, I nod. I’m not sure why, but I absolutely do.

He closes his eyes. Once he opens them again, that same gold dust illusion sparkles in the air between our faces. My eyes start to water again. Before I can worry about it, three things happen: a loud boom rips through the air, the cowboy’s grip on me tightens, and everything goes black.

Copyright © 2022 Amanda V. Shane, First published as Tommyknocker Ridge in the Wild At Heart PNR Flash Fiction Writing Circle. All rights reserved.

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Thanks for reading!

This story fills the “Small Town” trope square for the Wild At Heart PNR Flash Fiction Bing Challenge. (Say that five times fast! ;) ) Then we’re on to, my favorite, “enemies to lovers.”

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