Highway traffic has slowed down and some drivers have decided to wait it out on the shoulder, just inches from where other vehicles are passing by. It’s a mid-November evening and raining heavily. The young couple are driving back to Toronto after attending a wedding in Montreal. 

      “This is crazy,” Ruby says, “Let’s get off this road.” 

      Shifting in the driver’s seat, Liam’s back aches; his neck muscles are wound tight.

      “No, let’s keep on going. We’ll be home in a couple of hours,” he shouts over the noise of a passing transport truck, the humming from his car’s tires and the pounding of the rain.

      “Sure,” Ruby says, “but first we have to live long enough to see home again.”

      “Don’t talk like that.”

      Liam eases his foot off the gas pedal.  

      “What’s coming down now?” Ruby says pointing at the windshield. “It’s not rain anymore is it?”

      “No, I think it’s sleet.”

      “Sleet! Oh come on, Liam, do we have get to Toronto tonight?” She rummages through her handbag, finds a bottle of pills and removes one. She places the Ativan on her tongue and with a sip of coffee from a travel mug swallows the tablet.   

      He does not reply but inclines his face closer to the windshield. After a minute he glances at his wife. “What are you mumbling about?”

      “I’m not mumbling, I’m praying.” 

      The sun is setting and the road is becoming slicker by the minute. 

      “What’s that?” Ruby says, pointing a finger.

      “I’m concentrating on driving. I can’t look. What do you see?”

      “On the other side of the road, in the ditch, an eighteen wheeler.”

      “Is it upright?”

      “It’s tilted.” She sighs, closes her eyes, opens them again. “We’re hardly moving now,” she whispers. “Maybe we should just pull over onto the shoulder like some of the others?”

      “No. If we stop here, a semitrailer might plow into us, kill us. Look in front of you. Way down the road. Red and blue lights flashing.”

      “Cops, ambulance?” Ruby says.

      “I can’t tell, maybe fire trucks.”

      “We need to get off this road,” she says. “We’ll find a hotel and stay the night or just sit in the car if we have to till it clears up.”

      “Okay. There’s no choice.” 

      He grips the steering wheel harder and his knuckles turn white.

      “Okay? What made you change your mind?”

      “The windshield wiper blade on my side is tearing apart.” His voice is charged with fear. “See? It’s leaving slush on the glass.” 

      He’s leaning forward, his nose over the steering wheel, his eyes fixed on the blurred highway. The hint of a smile crosses his lips. “Over there, the sign says Wynnewood next exit. There’s bound to be a hotel or something.” But he doesn’t sound convinced. “Anyway we’ll stop there.”

      “Thank God.” She pulls out her cell phone. “I’m checking the internet for hotels around here. Wynnewood, where the hell is Wynnewood on this app?”

      “Don’t bother, we’re almost there.”

      Their Chevrolet SUV slowly makes its way off the highway.

      “Careful, Liam, they haven’t salted this road.”

       “Yeah, I can tell.”    

      Five minutes later there are no street lights, trees and low bushes border both sides of the slender two lane road. They pass a shack with a fading sign, ‘Lynda’s Hair Salon’ more trees then a red brick two bay automotive repair shop, ‘Gerry’s Garage’. 

      “Look down there, to the left. Maybe it’s a motel,” Liam says.

       The Wynnewood View Motel is a one-storey building divided into ten units. A flashing neon sign reads, vacancy. The structure appears to have been recently painted a cheerful green.

      “Well, it looks okay,” Liam says sounding relieved.

      “But where’s the view?”

      Moving at a crawl he drives the SUV off the narrow road down a slight incline to the motel’s parking lot. He parks near the only other vehicles in the yard, a dented GMC pickup truck and an old Ford Fairlane. 

      Liam and Ruby, careful not to slip, walk to the motel’s front door. 

      In the small reception room a man, of about fifty, is sitting behind the desk. He is wearing a checkered shirt and a Mets baseball cap and watching a black and white John Wayne movie on television. On his shirt front is a name tag, Frank.

      “Good evening,” he says smiling. 

      “We need a room for the night,” Liam says trying not to laugh at Frank who with his long sideburns and thick wavy black hair looks like a scrawny version of Elvis. 

      “Sure. That’ll be seventy-five dollars cash. We’ve getting the credit card reader fixed. Our motel is clean, quiet and warm. But the Wi-Fi hasn’t been working the last couple of days and the TV gets only three channels. 

       “Can we see the room first?” Ruby says sounding doubtful.

      “Of course. Follow me.”

      They move slowly in the dark and cold, shielding their eyes from the sleet which begins to melt as it hits the asphalt. 

      “Be careful,” Frank says as they walk through two inches of slush. They stop at unit three. “This is the largest room we have.”

      Frank, after a little jiggling with the lock opens the door. A musty smell assaults Liam’s nose but it quickly seeps out the open door and is gone. Inside the chamber appears straight out of the 1960s or 70s; wallpaper with red and yellow flowers on an olive green background, a starburst wall clock with hands frozen at five past three and a tangerine sofa in surprisingly good shape. 

      “Oh, it’s got two double beds,” Ruby say as she sits down on one of the mattresses. “Well it doesn’t squeak. That’s nice.” She lifts a mattress corner to look for bed bugs and finding none, checks out the washroom.

      “It’s okay,” she announces. 

      “I’ll be at the reception desk till eleven if you need me. Dial 999 and I’ll pick up even after midnight.” He points to an ancient phone with a rotary dial sitting on a nightstand between the two beds, then leaves.  

      “What is this place?” she says. “It looks like a museum.”

      “Yeah, definitely retro,” Liam says. “It’s just for one night. I’ll get our bags, stay here.”

      Liam half-walks, half-slides to his SUV. As he pops open the back door to get at their luggage, a man dressed in a brown parka and fur hat approaches the old Ford Fairlane.

      “She’s a cold one,” he says to Liam.

      “Quite the car you’ve got. How long you had it?”

      “Not long. I just got it in March. I only buy Fords, they ride the best.” 

      “You going now, in this weather? It’s rear-wheel drive isn’t?”

      “Sure its rear-wheel drive.” The man gives Liam a curious look. “I’m hungry and I’m going to find a restaurant, if this town has a restaurant.” He chuckles and tosses Liam a little bag. “Samples,” he says and gets into his vehicle. The Fairlane’s wheels spin a little in the slush, then fishtails its way onto the road. Slowly it zigzags south towards the town’s lights in the distance.

      Liam drops the bags with a thud. “Now what are we going to do about dinner? The owner of that old car said he’s heading into town to look for a restaurant.”

      “Let’s ask Frank.” 

      So they call the front desk.

      “You don’t want to be driving without your windshield wipers working. Gerry can fix that for you in the morning. You know, the garage just north of here.” 

      Liam asks about other meal options.

      Frank grunts. “Delivering pizza in this weather in this town? No one’s going to be driving around Wynnewood delivering food tonight.” 

      So they get instructions to the restaurant closest to the motel. 

      “Hike down to Yu’s. It’ll take you maybe fifteen or twenty minutes to walk with the sleet and all. The food’s good and he doesn’t over-charge.”

      So that’s what they start doing.

      Fifteen minutes later Ruby says, “I’m freezing. Where is this place? I’m walking five more minutes then I’m heading back. I’ll eat in the morning.”

      “Okay, five more minutes.”

      As they come around a sharp turn in the road they spot it, Yu’s Chinese Restaurant. They quicken their pace.

      “Table for two?” asks a young woman.

      “Yes.”

      “Rotten weather tonight,” she says. “I’ll bring a pot of tea while you look at the menu.”

      Liam orders lemon chicken and Ruby, Szechuan Beef. The eatery is busy, mostly seniors. The place feels secure and comfortable with friendly chatter among its patrons. 

      “Looks good,” says a small man sporting a polka dot tie and yellow shirt. He indicates Liam’s dessert of deep-fried honey banana.

      “It is good.”

      “New in town?” says the gray-haired woman sitting next to the man. She has a very pink face and puffy eyes.

      “No, just passing through,” Liam says. “We’re at the Wynnewood View Motel.”

      “The View?” laughs the man. “Listen to that Marsha, The View.”

      “What a joker you are,” Marsha says, her puffy eyes now full of mirth. 

      “What do you mean?” Ruby says.

      “What do I mean,” says the man. “The View burned down decades ago. I was only a kid. Poor little Ted lost his father Frank in that fire. A travelling salesman also died. They said he worked for Fuller Brush. What a terrible way to go, meet your maker.”

      Liam and Ruby looked at each other. 

      “Let’s get out of here,” Liam mumbles. “They’re nuts.” 

      She shrugs her shoulders. “These small towns are filled with kooks.”

      He quickly pays the bill and they exit the restaurant.

      “I don’t know what kind of people I expected to meet in a backwater like this.” Ruby says shaking her head. “Those two have a weird sense of humor.”

      Now with their stomachs full the couple leisurely walk back to their motel room. The weather has improved, the clouds are gone, the sleet has stopped and a full moon shines down on them. 

      “I’m so tired,” Ruby says as she looks at her cell. “Jesus, it’s only nine-thirty. I’ll sleep well tonight.”

      In the parking lot of their motel they stop next to their SUV. 

       “No motel?” She says her eyes wide with fright. She turns toward him seeking confirmation. 

      “No. I see what you see. Except for our SUV there’s only an empty lot with a few chard cinder blocks where some building once stood.” 

       “And our luggage?” 

      “It’s in the back. Looks like all of it. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

      “But the wiper blade.”

      “It’s cleared up. We won’t need the wipers I hope. I’m not staying here that’s for sure.”

      He fires up the engine, switches on the lights and without thinking turns on the windshield wipers. “It’s fixed. The blade is fixed. Bizarre.” 

      Ruby says nothing, reaches under her seat for her purse. “What’s this?” She holds up a paper bag.

      Liam glances at her. “Samples the guy in the old car called it.”

      Ruby turns the bag over. ‘Fuller Brush Company’ is printed on its side. Her hands shaking she opens the window and tosses the bag out.

      After taking a deep breath she finds her purse and takes out the bottle of Ativan removing one tablet. She swallows the pill without water. Five minutes later they’re back on Highway 401 heading to Toronto.

      “We’re not telling anyone about this,” Liam says. His jaw is clenched, his complexion pasty. 

      “I’m not even going to tell my therapist.”

      West of Grafton a speeding car pulls up beside their SUV. It’s an old Ford Fairlane. The driver waves at Liam and Liam waves back. 

      “Who is that?” Ruby says.

      “The Fuller Brush man.”

      The Fairlane takes the next exit ramp and heads north into the dead of night.