I Plow Roads in the Idaho Mountains. Something Got Into my Cab During The Storm.

I scraped the windshield with the edge of Aubrey’s lawyer’s letter. It was a certified letter, which meant somebody had paid extra to make sure I got it, and it turned out the paper was good for ice. The corner had enough stiffness to it that I could work along the bottom of the glass without tearing through the envelope.

The ice came off in white curls. It fell onto the hood and blew away. It was cold enough that the scraper in the door pocket had frozen to the rubber mat. I could’ve pulled harder and gotten it loose, but the letter was already in my hand. That seemed easier.

I’d been in the yard since before dark. Eleven hours on overtime by then, which sounds like a lot until you remember what overtime is for. I’d eaten two gas-station taquitos and half of a third one. The first two were chicken, or labeled chicken. The last one was still in its wrapper because it had gone cold and I’d decided I didn’t want to know what was inside it.

The county plow sat under the yard lights with snow packed around the tires. Unit twelve. The lights made the snow look gray instead of white, and the wind kept moving it across the lot in thin lines. It was the third night of the whiteout. I knew that because Mia had said it on the radio earlier, and because nobody was pretending it was going to clear up anymore.

I finished the windshield and climbed into the cab. The heater was working. That was the good part. It blew hot air around my boots while my hands stayed numb on the steering wheel. I held them over the vents for a while, but that only warmed the backs of my fingers.

The fronts stayed cold. There’s probably a reason for that. I don’t know what it is. The letter went on the dashboard beside the wiper controls. I’d stopped reading the letters connected to the divorce.

They all said some version of the same thing, except each one had a different deadline and a different amount of money attached to it. This one was from Aubrey’s lawyer. I knew that without opening it because I recognized the envelope and because certified mail from anybody else usually had a return address I could ignore more easily.

Aubrey had left a voicemail earlier. I listened to it in the cab with the engine off. Her lawyer would file for the sale of my house if I didn’t answer by Monday. That was the whole immediate problem. The rest of it had been going on long enough to become background noise.

The house. The legal debt. The forms I didn’t understand until somebody explained them and didn’t want explained after that. Monday was different because it had a day attached to it. I deleted the voicemail and didn’t call her back.

Then I started the engine. The route board was mounted inside the yard office, but I could see the assignments through the window from where I sat. Interstate ninety was still closed. The closure notice had been left up for so long that snow had gathered along the bottom of it. Cedar Ridge Forest Service Road was the only route still assigned to the county crew.

Christian was out sick. That was what the board said. Christian had called in sick, and I decided he’d been drinking. Not because I’d seen him drinking. I hadn’t.

But Christian didn’t usually call out, and people who drink on a work night tend to describe the next morning as sickness when they have to talk to the county. The radio clicked.

“Clyde, you there?”

It was Mia. She worked dispatch from the office in town, where the heat probably reached all the way to her hands. I picked up the microphone.

“Yeah.”

“Listen. We’ve got a tour bus stalled above the Cedar Ridge switchback.”

“Above it where?”

“Above the switchback. I’m trying to get the location from them.”

“That road hasn’t been graded since October.”

“I know.”

“It’s closed.”

“So is Interstate ninety.”

I looked through the windshield at the route board. The storm had covered the yard gate and most of the fence behind it. There wasn’t much point arguing with the signs. They were all saying the same thing. Mia came back on.

“There are nine passengers on the bus.”

“Nine?”

“Nine. Mostly retirees. They’re going to freeze if we don’t reach them.”

“Then they should’ve stayed off Cedar Ridge.”

“Clyde.”

I knew that tone. It was the one she used when she’d already made the decision and was letting me participate in the part where I pretended it was still being discussed.

“I should wait for Interstate ninety to reopen,” I said.

“You have driven Cedar Ridge more than a hundred times.”

“That was before the snow.”

“It’s still the same road.”

“It’s not the same road if you can’t see it.”

There was a burst of static. Then Mia said, “Clear a path to the bus.”

“I’m telling you, that road hasn’t been graded since October.”

“Copy that. Clear a path to the bus.”

“Mia.”

“Pull the gate and take unit twelve up.”

The radio hissed again. Her next words came through in pieces. Something about the passengers. Something about the upper switchback. Then nothing but static.

I set the microphone back in its holder. My hands were still numb. The heater was still blowing on my boots. Outside, the yard lights disappeared behind the snow whenever the wind pushed hard enough. I put unit twelve in gear and pulled away from the office.

The letter slid against the dashboard beside the wiper controls. I left it there. Then I turned unit twelve toward Cedar Ridge with Aubrey’s certified letter still sliding against the dashboard.

The county gate was half buried by the time I reached it. I stopped unit twelve beside the lock and left the engine running. There was no reason to shut it off. The heater had finally reached my hands, and I didn't want to start over. I got out and walked around the front.

The plow blade was down but not touching the ground. I checked the connections anyway. The pins were in place. The hydraulic lines weren't leaking. The blade had a ridge of ice along the bottom, which was normal in weather like this.

Normal didn't mean good. It just meant you saw it every time. I checked the fuel next. The gauge said three-quarters full. That was enough for Cedar Ridge and back if the road didn't turn into something worse than a road.

The county tank had been low all week, but somebody had filled unit twelve after my last shift. I didn't know who. There were only four people who could've done it, and two of them weren't speaking to each other. Then I opened the side compartment and looked at the emergency gear. Chains.

Flares. Jumper cables. First-aid kit. A tow strap that had frozen into a shape nobody would want to use. Everything was there.

The flashlight batteries were weak, but the flashlight worked if I hit it against my palm first. I put it back where I found it. The letter slid across the dashboard when I climbed in. It stopped against the wiper controls. I picked it up and moved it to the passenger side.

It slid back when I turned toward the gate. That was going to keep happening. The dashboard tilted toward the road, and the letter was a flat envelope with nothing in it except paper and a deadline. I could've put it in the glove box. I could've put it under my leg.

I could've thrown it onto the floor. Instead I left it beside the controls and put unit twelve in low gear. The gate opened with a metal groan. I had to get out again and pull it the rest of the way because the snow had packed around the bottom rail. By the time I got back in, my gloves were wet and the cab smelled like cold steel.

The radio clicked. “Clyde, I have more on the bus.”

I picked up the microphone. “Go ahead.”

“They're beyond the upper switchback.”

“That isn't a location.”

“It is the last location they gave us.”

“Which part of beyond?”

There was static. It came in hard enough that I pulled the microphone away from my mouth. Mia came back through it.

“Nine passengers.”

“I heard you the first time.”

“I need you to hear it again. Nine passengers.”

“I know how many people are on a bus.”

“Then drive like you know.”

The road climbed ahead of me through the trees. The county had graded Cedar Ridge in October, like Mia said. It had been a different road then. The snow hadn't reached the ditches, and you could see the edges without guessing. There'd been gravel showing through the turns.

Maybe even some mud. I couldn't remember exactly. October was a long time ago when you worked roads.

“What bus company?”

I asked. The radio hissed.

“Mia. What bus company?”

Something came through. It sounded like a word, then a long burst of static. I caught bus. Maybe. The rest broke apart.

“And the driver?”

I said. Nothing. I turned the volume up. It made the cab louder without making the message clearer. Static filled the space where the company name and the driver's name were supposed to be.

“Listen,” Mia said.

“The passengers are stranded above the switchback. The driver called it in. You need to reach them.”

“Why didn't you send somebody who knows the road?”

“You know the road.”

“Christian knows it too.”

“Christian isn't here.”

“I noticed.”

There was another burst of static. Then Mia said, “Clear a path and bring them down.”

“I've got one plow.”

“You've got unit twelve.”

“That's the same thing.”

“It isn't. Unit twelve has chains.”

I looked down at the tires. The chains were on. I hadn't noticed that when I left the yard. They made a dull metal sound every time the tires rolled over the packed snow, which was better than the other sound they made when they came loose.

“I am telling you, Mia, this road hasn't been graded since October.”

“I know.”

“And the upper switchback is worse than the lower road.”

“I know.”

“And if the bus is past the switchback then they're not just stalled. They're stuck.”

“That's why you're going.”

The radio cut out again. I held the microphone near my mouth.

“You could've led with that.”

She didn't answer. I drove through the gate and started up the lower road. The snow in the lane was packed hard enough to carry the tires, but it wasn't smooth. Unit twelve moved from side to side whenever the blade caught an old ridge underneath. The letter slid toward me.

I put one hand on the wheel and pushed it back with the other. There were no lights ahead except the headlights. The trees stood close on both sides. Snow had gathered on the branches until they looked heavier than the trunks holding them up. Every so often one of them dropped a load into the ditch.

It sounded like somebody throwing a blanket over a roof. The route was simple. Clear a path. Load nine people. Bring them down.

That was all. It wasn't a complicated assignment unless the road gave me a reason to make it complicated. Roads did that sometimes. They took a task with three parts and added a fourth part nobody had planned for. A slide.

A buried culvert. A tree across the lane. Then somebody at dispatch would ask why you hadn't just gone around. Mia came through the radio again.

“Clyde. Do you copy?”

“Yeah.”

“Your position?”

“Still on the road.”

“I need more than that.”

“I passed the gate.”

“Copy. How far from the marker?”

“I'll tell you when I get there.”

“You have nine passengers.”

“I know.”

“Nine.”

“I said I know.”

The radio went quiet except for the static. I could see the lower Cedar Ridge marker ahead. It was a narrow green sign with the road name on it, though the snow had covered most of the bottom. I slowed before the turn because the road beyond it hadn't been touched by a plow since October.

The blade lowered. Unit twelve leaned forward against the deeper snow. Then unit twelve passed the lower Cedar Ridge marker and began pushing into the ungraded snow.

For the next twenty-five minutes, the road got worse in ways I didn't have names for. Above the switchback the snow came down so hard that unit twelve's headlights reached about ten feet and then stopped. After that there was just white. Not the clean kind of white you see on a clear field. This was gray and moving.

It filled the windshield and kept coming at me. So I slowed down. Not stopped. Slowed down to the kind of speed where the blade had time to tell me when I was wrong. The road dropped off somewhere to my right.

I knew that because Cedar Ridge had always dropped off there, and because the blade started vibrating differently whenever it got near the edge. I couldn't see the edge. I couldn't see the trees either. But the plow knew when it touched something under the snow. That was enough for a while.

The engine made the same low sound it had been making since the gate. The blade pushed snow ahead of me. The chains turned under the tires and made a dull metal knock. Those were the only things I could trust. The headlights weren't showing me anything.

The road markers were gone. The tree line had disappeared. Even the windshield looked like it had been painted over. I kept the wheel turned a little left. Not enough to cross the road.

Just enough to keep the drop-off on the other side of me. That was based on memory more than anything else. Cedar Ridge had four switchbacks above the lower marker. Or five, depending on whether you counted the short turn near the old service cut. I didn't know if I was near one of them.

I didn't know if I'd already passed it. The road had stopped looking like a road. I reached for the navigation screen because that was what it was there for. The G P S showed a blank gray tile. No road.

No arrow. No little blue line telling me where I was or where I was supposed to be. Just a square of nothing. I tapped the screen. Nothing happened.

I tapped it again harder. The screen stayed gray. I tried the side button, then pressed it with my thumb until the edge of the plastic started cutting into my glove. It didn't shut off. It didn't come back.

It just sat there with the blank tile on it, which was probably the most accurate picture of my location anybody had. I hit it once with the heel of my hand. The truck moved toward the right. I caught the wheel and brought it back before the blade found the edge. The vibration changed under the cab.

It went from a steady grinding to a fast rough chatter. The right side of the plow had found the road edge. I turned left until the sound eased off. That was the road telling me where it was. The radio clicked behind me.

“Clyde, do you copy?”

It was Mia. Or part of Mia. The first few words came through clear enough. Then the signal broke apart.

“Yeah,” I said.

“I hear you.”

Static answered. I held the microphone near my mouth.

“Mia, say that again.”

A voice came through. “The passengers are—” Then it was gone.

The speaker filled with a long hiss. I turned the volume down and then back up, because sometimes that helped. It didn't help this time. It only made the static louder.

“Mia?”

There was a pop. A few words. Something about the bus. Then another burst that sounded like gravel being poured into a metal bucket. I looked through the windshield.

The headlights still reached ten feet. Maybe less. Snow hit the glass and disappeared under the wipers. The road ahead looked exactly like the road behind me, except I wasn't planning to back into the one behind me.

“Clyde,” Mia said.

Her voice came through thin and far away. “Go ahead.”

“Can you—” Static.

“Can you hear me?”

“Most of it.”

“Turn around if you can't—” The signal broke.

I knew what she was trying to say. Turn around if I couldn't see. Pull back to the gate. Wait for the storm to let up. Any of those would have made sense on a normal road.

But turning around up there meant backing through the same switchbacks I couldn't see now. It meant putting the rear tires somewhere I couldn't check. It meant leaving nine people in a bus above me while the temperature kept dropping and the storm kept filling the road. I wasn't going to do that. The radio clicked again.

“Mia?”

Nothing but static. I set the microphone back in its holder. It bounced once against the plastic and settled there. The speaker kept hissing. Every few seconds it made a short pop that sounded almost like a word.

I stopped listening for one. The tree line came back for a few seconds on my left. It was only a dark smudge through the snow, but I could see the trunks close to the road. Then the smudge disappeared again. I kept steering toward where it had been.

That was the part I didn't like. The road edge and the trees were gone for several minutes, and I had to keep the truck centered without knowing if there was still a center to find. The plow blade stayed down. The engine stayed in low gear. I held the wheel with both hands and watched the snow move across the glass.

There wasn't much else to watch. Every time I thought the road was pulling right, I corrected left. Every time the blade went quiet, I eased back toward the middle. I wasn't sure whether I was doing it correctly. I was sure that doing nothing would be worse.

Then the blade caught the edge again. The sound changed all at once. Metal scraped under the front end. Unit twelve pulled right and the cab leaned toward the drop-off. I turned the wheel left and felt the tires slide before they caught.

The blade kept scraping. I turned farther.

“Come on,” I said.

The truck moved back toward the center. The scraping faded into the regular vibration. I straightened the wheel and left it there. The road was still invisible. The G P S was still frozen on its blank tile.

The radio still had Mia's voice buried somewhere inside the static, if it had a voice at all. I could've stopped and waited for one of those things to fix itself. The screen wasn't going to fix itself. The radio probably wasn't either. And the storm didn't look like it was in a hurry.

So I kept unit twelve moving uphill with the G P S frozen, the radio reduced to static, and the blade vibrating against the unseen road edge.

Then I saw two weak orange lights through the snow. They were low and close together, which meant they weren't a road marker or somebody's porch. They were hazard lights. I eased unit twelve forward until the bus appeared. It was half buried above the upper switchback with snow packed over the hood and along both sides.

The lights blinked through it every few seconds. Orange. Then dark. Then orange again. I stopped the plow beside it and picked up the radio.

“Mia, I found the bus.”

Static came back first. Then her voice.

“Confirm the location.”

“Upper switchback. Tour bus. Half buried.”

“Copy. Nine passengers.”

“I've got it.”

“Get them into unit twelve.”

“I know.”

The radio went quiet. I left it hanging from the emergency line and climbed out. The wind hit me before both feet were down. Snow got inside my collar and worked its way along my neck. I opened the side compartment and pulled out the line.

It was a thick orange rope with a metal hook on one end. The manual called it an emergency line, although it was mostly there so somebody could find their way back to the truck after the weather erased everything else. I hooked it to the front rail of the plow. Then I wrapped the other end around my waist and tied it twice.

I checked the knot because the first one looked like something I'd done with one hand. That was accurate. The rope ran from the front of unit twelve across the snow toward the bus. It wasn't long enough to let me wander. That was the point.

The bus door was somewhere under the snowbank. I found the handle with my glove and pulled. Nothing happened. I pulled again and felt the door move an inch before the snow stopped it. So I put both hands on it.

The metal was cold through my gloves. I leaned back and pulled until my boots slid forward. The door made a sound like somebody dragging a shovel over concrete. Snow broke loose along the top. Some of it fell inside.

I pulled harder. The door opened. There were nine people sitting inside under blankets. They weren't talking. They weren't moving much either.

The dashboard lights reached back through the bus in a thin greenish glow, but they didn't show me the driver's seat from where I stood. A woman in a red parka sat closest to the door. She had a fixed smile on her face. Not a big smile. Just enough to show that she knew I was there.

“Everybody out,” I said.

“Single file. Keep hold of the person in front of you if you need to.”

Nobody answered. I looked past them at the seats. An older man in a dark coat. A boy in blue. Two people who looked like they were traveling together.

Another couple farther back. Then two more near the rear. The county safety manual said to count during a winter evacuation. It didn't say what to do when nobody acted like they were being evacuated. I decided the counting part was more important.

“I'm taking you to the truck,” I said.

“Stay in line.”

The woman in the red parka stood up. She didn't hurry. She didn't look at the snow or the open door. She just stepped down and stopped at the same distance from the bus that she'd been sitting from me.

“Danielle,” I said.

“Take my arm.”

She looked at my arm. Then she took it.

“One,” I said.

The rope pulled against my waist as I started back toward unit twelve. Danielle walked beside me with her hand resting on my sleeve. She didn't slip. She didn't ask where we were going. The wind pushed at the red hood around her face, but she didn't pull it tighter.

Unit twelve looked farther away than it had from the bus. That happens in bad weather. A distance can change while you're standing in it. The truck was still there. The orange line was still tight between us.

It just took longer to reach. I opened the passenger door and pointed inside.

“Get in. Stay by the heater.”

Danielle climbed into the cab and moved toward the rear. I turned back before she had both feet inside. The tall man was waiting at the bus door. He had a dark wool coat and a long face. He looked past me toward the snow, but he didn't look at me.

He didn't look back at the bus either. “William,” I said.

“Come on.”

He stepped down. “Two.”

He followed the rope without touching it. His shoes sank deep in the snow, but he kept moving. Every few steps I looked over my shoulder. He was still there. That was about all I could tell.

“Get in the back,” I said when we reached the truck.

William climbed in and sat beside Danielle. He didn't say anything. He didn't look at her. He didn't look through the windshield. The boy was next.

He stood at the bottom of the bus steps in an oversized blue coat. His boots were too big for him. Or they looked too big because the snow had built up around them.

“Robert,” I said.

“Watch your step.”

He stepped down and went straight into a drift. His legs disappeared to the knees. He didn't make a sound. I grabbed him under the arms and pulled him free. The snow came up to my thighs in that spot, and I had to brace one boot against the bus to get enough leverage.

“I've got you,” I said.

Robert looked at me. His eyes were wide, but he didn't complain. He didn't say he was cold. He didn't say he couldn't feel his feet. He just waited while I lifted him.

“Three.”

I carried him across the line and back to unit twelve. He was light enough that the wind moved his coat against my arms. I put him in the rear beside William and pointed toward the heater.

“Stay there.”

Robert sat down. I went back to the bus. There were six people left. I knew that because I counted three in the truck and six still inside. Counting helped when the rest of the situation didn't.

You could count people. You couldn't count how many things were wrong with the bus. The woman closest to the steps wore a quilted coat and a scarf pulled up under her chin. She stood when I reached her.

“Alexis,” I said.

“Take my hand.”

She took it. Her glove was dry and stiff against mine.

“Four.”

She walked carefully through the drift. She kept looking toward the truck instead of at the road. When we reached the passenger door she climbed in and moved toward the back without waiting for me to tell her. The stocky man behind her followed. He had a brown coat and a wool hat pulled low.

“Clifford,” I said.

“Stay close.”

“Alexis,” he said.

That was all. “Five.”

He stepped down and went after her. I kept one hand near his shoulder without touching him. He didn't stumble. He didn't look worried about Alexis. He only looked where she had gone.

I sent him into the rear of unit twelve and turned back again. The next pair came together. A woman in a cream coat stood beside a man with short white hair. They were close enough to be holding hands, but they weren't. The woman looked toward him.

“River,” I said.

“You first.”

She stepped down. “Six.”

“Come along,” she said.

The man followed her from the bus. “Dan,” I said.

“Watch the step.”

“We will follow the driver,” he said.

There was no driver to follow. I looked past him into the dark bus, but he was already stepping into the snow.

“Seven,” I said.

The wind took the word and pushed it sideways. Dan walked beside River until they reached the truck. I opened the door wider and got them both inside. Six passengers were in the rear now. Danielle, William, Robert, Alexis, Clifford, River, and Dan.

That was seven. The last two were still on the bus. I went back alone. The rope dragged behind me and made a shallow groove in the snow. The orange hazard lights blinked above the roof.

They were the only lights on the bus except for the dashboard. The driver's seat was empty. I climbed onto the first step and looked inside. The keys weren't in the ignition. I checked the floor.

Nothing. The seat was shoved back. There was no coat hanging from it and no bag on the floor. I looked behind the bus. The snow was smooth from the rear tires to the road edge.

No footprints. Not even a partial set leading downhill. The driver had taken the keys and walked into the storm before the passengers realized he was gone. That was the only explanation I had. It wasn't a good one, but it was the one that fit.

The woman in the navy parka stood up. “Cynthia,” I said.

“Come on.”

She stepped down. “Eight.”

She crossed the snow without speaking. The man in the black parka came after her.

“Zayden,” I said.

“Stay with Cynthia.”

He nodded once. “Ruth,” he said.

There was no Ruth there. I didn't correct him. I had the line around my waist and one hand on the bus door. The wind was filling the space behind me with snow.

“Come on,” I said.

Zayden stepped down. “Nine.”

I brought him across to unit twelve. Cynthia was already inside. Zayden climbed in after her and moved toward the rear with the others. I counted them again through the open door. Danielle.

William. Robert. Alexis. Clifford. River.

Dan. Cynthia. Zayden. Nine passengers. I got into the cab, pulled the passenger door shut, and counted Danielle King, William Fuller, Robert Anderson, Alexis Davidson, Clifford Davidson, River Lee, Dan Lee, Cynthia Porter, and Zayden Porter inside.

The passenger door was still shut. I pulled it closed anyway and climbed behind the wheel. The nine passengers were in the back. Danielle sat closest to the door with her red hood still up. William was beside her.

Robert sat between them and Alexis, with his oversized boots sticking out into the aisle. Clifford was next to Alexis. River and Dan were together behind them. Cynthia and Zayden had taken the last row. That was nine.

I looked at them because counting people once doesn't mean you counted them correctly. Especially when the people aren't helping. Nobody said anything. They were all sitting where I'd put them. They had their hands in their laps or against their coats.

Nobody was trying to get warm. Nobody was asking how far the gate was. I picked up the radio.

“Mia, I have the passengers.”

Static filled the cab. I waited for her voice. It didn't come. The speaker made a short popping sound and went quiet again.

“Never mind,” I said.

There wasn't much else to tell her. I had nine passengers. The bus was still up there. The driver was gone. The storm was getting worse.

That was the whole report, and I didn't think the radio was in a condition to receive it anyway. I checked the fuel gauge. Three-quarters full. The temperature gauge was where it belonged. The chains were still on.

Nothing had changed except that I now had nine silent people in the back of the truck and a bus I needed to come back for. I put unit twelve in reverse. The cleared section was only a short stretch beside the bus. I had enough room to turn if I kept the rear tires on the packed road.

The trouble was that the road was hard to see from the cab. The wind had covered most of it again while I was loading people. I rolled backward slowly. The passengers didn't move. I watched the side mirror and the edge of the plow blade.

When the blade reached the snowbank, I turned the wheel and eased forward. Unit twelve swung around in a wide arc. The rear wheels slipped once. I stopped. The cab leaned toward the ditch, then settled back when I brought the wheel around.

Nobody in the back said anything. I looked at them through the mirror. Nine faces. All of them looking somewhere other than the storm. I put the truck in low gear and started down Cedar Ridge.

The road was easier going down, but that didn't mean it was safe. It only meant gravity was now involved. The blade stayed low and dragged through the snow. The chains knocked under the tires. Snow came over the hood and slid off toward the sides.

I kept both hands on the wheel. The heater was blowing. The windshield was clear. Those were the useful things. At the first switchback, I looked in the rearview mirror.

I did that every time. It was just something you did when you had people behind you. You checked the road. You checked the passengers. You made sure nobody had fallen over or opened a door or decided to stand up while the truck was moving.

There were ten people in the back. I saw the number before I understood it. Then I counted again. Danielle. William.

Robert. Alexis. Clifford. River. Dan.

Cynthia. Zayden. Ten. The tenth person sat behind them somewhere. I couldn't see the whole body.

The face was there in the mirror, though. Pale and indistinct. It looked like the features had been pressed into fogged glass and then left unfinished. Every face was turned toward me. Not toward the road.

Not toward the windows. Toward me. They were all smiling. I looked back at the road. The truck was still moving through the switchback.

I corrected the wheel and brought the blade away from the edge. Then I checked the mirror again. Ten people. I counted the names out loud because that was what I did when a count stopped making sense.

“Danielle. William. Robert. Alexis. Clifford. River. Dan. Cynthia. Zayden.”

The tenth face stayed where it was. I didn't give it a name. I tried to match it to one of the others first. The pale cheeks could've belonged to anybody. The eyes were too blurred to tell.

The mouth was there but not clear enough to know whether it was wide or narrow. It didn't look like the others. That was the only part I could say for sure. I checked the mirror a second time. Still ten.

I looked through the rear window. The glass was dirty around the edges, but I could see enough of the road behind us. There was no bus. No orange hazard lights. No dark shape sitting above the switchback.

There weren't any tire tracks either. The snow behind unit twelve was smooth. Not windblown over old tracks. Smooth from one side of the road to the other. The rope had dragged behind me when I went back for the last two passengers, and I could see the shallow line it had made near the truck.

That was all. I looked again. The bus was gone. Maybe a drift had covered it. The storm had covered half the road in the time it took me to walk from the bus to the truck.

Maybe I'd mistaken the snow and the darkness for a bus in the first place. The orange lights had been weak. The visibility was bad. There were reasons for it. They weren't good reasons.

But they were reasons. I kept driving. Stopping would mean getting everybody out again, and I wasn't doing that on Cedar Ridge. The truck was warm enough for the moment. The road was still under the tires.

If the bus was buried, I could come back with better equipment. If I had seen the wrong thing, then I could deal with that when I got down the mountain. I checked the mirror at the next turn. Ten people. All facing me.

The heater kept running, but the cab was getting colder. I turned the fan up. It made more noise without making more heat. The air coming through the vents had gone thin and cool. My hands started losing the warmth they'd gotten back at the bus.

Then the windows fogged. It began on the rear glass. Small patches appeared behind the passengers and spread outward. I could see their breath against the cold window. Nine people breathing inside the truck.

Nine faces softened by the fog. The tenth face stayed in the mirror. I wiped the windshield with my sleeve and kept unit twelve moving downhill. The road dropped away into the storm. The chains knocked.

The heater ran. The tenth indistinct passenger remained visible in the rearview mirror while nine passengers fogged the glass with their breath.

The speaker moved before the voice came through. It made the little click it always made when Mia was about to talk, then waited half a beat.

“Clyde, pull into the next turnout and let the passengers out. There’s a second rescue vehicle waiting there.”

It was Mia’s voice. The words were clear this time. No static. No broken pieces. Just Mia telling me what to do.

I kept driving. The next turnout was somewhere below the switchback. I knew where it was because I’d used it before, although that didn't mean I could see it now. The snow had covered the road markers and the trees were still coming at the windshield sideways. I kept the plow centered and watched the road for any change in the surface.

Then the radio clicked again. “Marky, pull into the next turnout.”

That wasn't Mia. Aubrey had called me Marky when we were married. She'd used it when she wanted something and when she wanted me to stop pretending I hadn't heard her. Nobody else called me that. Nobody had ever called me that over the county radio.

I didn't touch the microphone. The voice continued.

“There’s another truck waiting there. Let the passengers out.”

The radio speaker moved again after the words were already finished. It made a soft crackle and then went still. The timing was wrong. Not bad reception wrong. The voice had arrived first and the speaker had followed it.

I checked the mirror. The tenth passenger's mouth was moving. It was sitting behind the other nine. I still couldn't see the whole body. The face had the same pale unfinished look as before, and the mouth opened and closed with Mia's words.

It didn't speak ahead of the radio. It didn't speak after it. It moved with the transmission. The other passengers stayed still. Danielle sat with her hands in her lap.

William was looking toward the side window. Robert had his head down. Alexis and Clifford were sitting shoulder to shoulder. River and Dan were facing forward. Cynthia and Zayden were in the last row.

None of them moved their mouths. I looked back at the road. That was bait. I didn't know what it wanted me to do after I stopped. I didn't need to know.

If something uses a private name to get you off a mountain road then it isn't trying to help you. It’s trying to get you somewhere. I reached for the radio and turned the volume down. Mia’s voice became smaller. It was still there under the engine noise.

“Marky, use the next turnout.”

I turned the volume down again. Unit twelve kept descending. The blade pushed through the snow and the chains knocked underneath the cab. I could feel the road through the steering wheel. That was better than listening to the radio.

The road had never pretended to be Aubrey. Then the humming started. It came from the back of the truck. One low note. Not loud.

It sounded like somebody holding a tune without knowing what the tune was supposed to be. Danielle started it, or I thought she did. Her mouth barely moved. Then William joined her. Robert joined next.

Then Alexis and Clifford. River and Dan. Cynthia and Zayden. Nine people making one sound. I checked the mirror again.

The tenth passenger's mouth was open now. It joined the note without changing it. The sound came from all ten of them at once, even though they weren't breathing in time with each other. The cab began to vibrate. At first I thought it was the blade.

Then the humming got louder and the vibration moved into the seat. It filled the windows. It got into the floor under my boots. I couldn't hear the blade anymore. I could see snow pushing ahead of it.

I could see the hood shaking. But the usual scrape and grind had disappeared under the humming. That was a problem. The blade told me when the road changed. Without it I had the tires and the steering wheel, which wasn't enough on Cedar Ridge.

“Stop it,” I said.

Nobody stopped. The note continued. It had no beginning anymore. It just existed in the cab, steady and flat. I tried the radio volume, but it was already almost off.

Mia's voice was still coming through somewhere beneath the humming. “Marky.”

I didn't answer. William stopped looking at the side window. He turned his head toward the mirror and looked directly into it. He hadn't done that before. Most of the passengers avoided my eyes and avoided each other.

William had spent the whole trip staring at things outside the truck. Now he was watching me through the glass. His face looked the same as it had on the bus. Long and pale. No expression to explain what he was doing.

I looked at the rear window. Breath had fogged the glass in front of the other passengers. It spread in round patches where they sat. Their coats and faces blurred behind it. There should've been fog in front of William too.

There wasn't. The window between him and me stayed clear. I checked his mouth. He was humming. I could see it moving.

But there was no breath on the glass. Not even a small mark.

“William,” I said.

He didn't stop. The road bent left. I turned the wheel and felt the tires slide across packed snow. The blade hit something under the surface, but I didn't hear it. The steering wheel jerked in my hands.

I corrected and kept the truck in the lane. The radio clicked. This time the voice was Aubrey's.

“Marky, pull into the turnout and let them out.”

Her voice sounded closer than it had in the house. That was the part that got through. Not the nickname. Not the instruction. The way she said it like she was sitting beside me with one hand on the dashboard.

I left the microphone alone. “Marky, stop the truck.”

The tenth passenger's mouth moved with her voice. William kept looking into the mirror. The nine others kept humming. The snow kept filling the road ahead. I knew the next turnout was coming.

I couldn't see it yet, but the road had a certain slope before it. The left side would open up. There would be a short flat section before the road dropped again. I’d stopped there during a summer inspection once. There was no guardrail, just a ditch and a view that went farther than it needed to.

I wasn't stopping there now. I moved my foot toward the brake and reached for the blade control. If the road ahead was blocked I needed to stop hard, not ease up and hope the snow held me. Unit twelve was too heavy to trust to hope. The blade began to drop.

Aubrey's voice came through the radio again. “Marky, pull into the next turnout. The rescue vehicle is waiting.”

I lowered unit twelve's blade and continued toward the turnout while Aubrey's voice gave another false instruction over the radio.

About fifteen minutes later, two headlights showed up through the snow. They were low and spread apart like a county plow, not a car. I slowed unit twelve and watched them come closer. Then I saw the shape of unit eight behind the lights. Christian was standing outside it and waving both arms.

I hit the brakes. Unit twelve slid a few feet before the chains caught. The plow stopped beside unit eight with the blade angled into the snowbank. Christian kept waving until I opened the passenger door.

“Christian, get in.”

“I’m not drunk,” he said.

He was shouting, but the storm took most of it away. “What?”

“I’m not drunk. I heard the emergency traffic and drove up.”

His face was pale under his cap. Snow had gathered on his shoulders and along the front of his county coat. He looked like he’d been waiting there longer than he wanted to admit.

“I thought you might need a second rig,” he said.

“So I came to the pullout.”

“You came up here alone?”

“I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

“I’m telling you, I’m fine.”

That was Christian. He could be standing in a ditch with a broken leg and still start by saying he was fine. Usually it meant he was embarrassed. This time it meant he was scared. I looked past him at unit eight.

Its headlights were on. The engine was running. The driver’s door stood open, and snow was blowing through the cab.

“Take the passengers into unit eight,” I said.

“I’ll keep the road clear.”

Christian looked into the back of unit twelve. Nine people sat there without speaking. They had stopped humming, but the sound was still in my head. Or maybe it was under the engine. By then I didn't know which noises belonged to the truck anymore.

“Nine of them?” he asked.

“Nine.”

“Okay.”

“Take Danielle first. Then the others. Keep them together.”

Christian stepped toward the passenger door. He had one hand raised to block the snow from his face. His boots slipped once on the packed surface and caught again. He didn't look at the road. He kept his eyes on the people in the back.

Danielle stood before he reached the door. She moved slowly. That was how she moved when she was pretending to be a person. Slow enough to look careful. Not slow enough to look strange unless you watched her for a while.

“Danielle,” I said.

“Go with Christian.”

She turned toward him. The red hood framed her face. The fixed smile was still there. Christian reached for her arm. Her face stretched.

It didn't open like a mouth. It pulled sideways first. The cheeks lengthened under the skin, and the smile went across her face until there wasn't any face left around it. Christian grabbed at her sleeve, but his hand went past where her arm should have been. Something came out of the back of the cab.

I don't know if it had been hiding behind the seats or if it had been part of Danielle the whole time. It moved over the others without touching them. White packed material pushed forward through the coats and faces. It struck Christian in the chest before he could step back. He went down beside unit eight.

I reached for him. My hand got as far as the door frame. Then the thing pulled him through the snow. Christian’s boots dragged first. One caught against the tire of unit eight and came loose.

He kicked once. The snow swallowed his legs up to the knees. He was still trying to get his hands under himself when the thing pulled again.

“Christian!”

He looked at me. “Clyde, help me.”

I climbed halfway out of the cab. The road was between us. The snow was blowing so hard I could barely see his face. I could see his mouth, though. I could see the way it opened when he tried to breathe.

Then I understood. It didn't want me. The passengers hadn't been stranded people. They hadn't been people at all. Danielle, William, Robert, Alexis, Clifford, River, Dan, Cynthia, and Zayden were faces the thing had put on.

They were all the same thing. It had brought them down the mountain because it wanted Christian at the pullout. Christian had come to help me. That was why it wanted him. I got one boot onto the step.

I was going to jump down. I don't know what I thought I could do after that. I had a tire iron somewhere in the cab. Maybe I could reach the emergency line. Maybe I could get between them.

Those were the kind of plans you make when the better plan is already gone. The people in the back turned away from me. Danielle turned first. Her red parka twisted as the thing inside it pulled her around. William followed.

Then Robert. One by one they faced the open side of the truck instead of looking at me.

“Get out,” I said.

Nobody answered. William’s long face softened around the edges. His white hair lifted in the wind, but there was no head underneath it anymore. The coat collapsed inward. Snow poured through the sleeves and ran across the seat.

Robert went next. The blue coat dropped flat. His boots filled with white and tipped over in the aisle. Alexis and Clifford came apart together. Their coats opened at the collars and filled with blowing snow.

River’s cream coat folded around nothing. Dan’s gray coat disappeared into the same wind. Cynthia and Zayden dissolved in the last row, their faces stretching thin before they broke apart. It happened fast, but not fast enough. I saw each one go.

The rear of unit twelve filled with snow. It moved across the seats and out through the open passenger door. The storm pulled it away in long white strips. There was no blood. No bones.

No bodies under the coats. Just packed snow and wind moving through the cab as if the truck had been left open for years. Outside, Christian was still fighting. He got one elbow under himself. The thing pulled him flat again.

His gloves scraped across the snow. I could see the marks his fingers made before the wind covered them.

“Hold on!”

I said. “I’m getting you down!”

I stepped out. The snow reached above my boots and took my weight sideways. I grabbed the door handle to keep from falling. Unit twelve rocked under me. The storm hit my back.

For a second I couldn't see Christian or unit eight or anything else. Then the snow thinned. The thing was bent over him. It still had pieces of the passengers on it. A red sleeve.

A dark coat. A pale face that didn't stay in one shape. White material packed itself around Christian’s shoulders and dragged him lower into the snow. He stopped kicking. I took another step.

The thing lifted its head. For one second I saw what was underneath. There was no Danielle. No William. No person at all.

Packed white material formed its mouth, and a hundred small teeth opened inside it. The tenth passenger bent over Christian Robertson in the snow with packed white material opening into a mouth full of small teeth.

I put unit twelve in gear and dropped the blade. The control lever shook under my glove. The thing was still bent over Christian, and the mouth was still open. I didn't have time to find a better plan. Better plans are usually what you make before the problem starts.

I hit the gas. Unit twelve moved forward and the blade caught the snowbank. The front end lifted for a second, then came down hard. Snow covered the windshield. I kept the wheel straight and drove through the space between the two plows.

The blade hit something. Not the creature. The snow under it. Maybe the road. Maybe Christian.

I don't know. The truck went over the bank and the rear tires spun. Unit eight's headlights swung across the pullout. Its engine was still running. The open driver's door moved in the wind.

Then the snow came up around the cab. I saw Christian once more through the passenger window. His coat. One arm. The side of his face.

Then the spray covered him and he was gone. I didn't stop. That was the part I kept going back to later. I didn't stop to check unit eight. I didn't stop to look for Christian.

I didn't even stop to see if the thing had followed us through the bank. I just kept unit twelve moving downhill because the road was there and the truck was still running. The first switchback came up too fast. I turned left and the rear end slid toward the ditch. The chains caught after a few feet.

I hit the brake, corrected the wheel, and let the truck pull itself around. There were no passengers in the back anymore. I knew that without looking. The cab had gone quiet behind me. No humming.

No voices. No one using Aubrey's voice to tell me where to go. I checked the mirror anyway. There was nobody there. Just my face in the glass.

Gray skin. Dark eyes. Snow stuck along one side of my hair. I looked like a man who'd been driving too long and had stopped making good decisions somewhere above the switchback. I looked again at the next turn.

The storm weakened as I got lower. The snow still came down, but it wasn't filling the whole windshield anymore. I could see the trees. Then the road markers. Then the edge of the ditch.

Those things should've made the drive easier. They didn't. They just gave me more things to see that weren't Christian. Unit twelve made it through the lower road without sliding off. I don't remember much of the rest.

The engine. The chains. My hands on the wheel. The radio making a soft hiss whenever I hit a bump. At some point the sky started getting lighter.

By the time I reached the county yard, it was after four. The yard lights were still on. Their glow looked yellow against the snow, which meant the storm had finally stopped trying to erase everything. I pulled unit twelve beside the fuel tank and shut off the engine. The cab went quiet all at once.

No blade. No chains. No voices. Just the metal ticking under the hood. I sat there for a while.

Then I turned around and looked into the back. The seats were empty. There were no coats. No blankets. No snow packed into the floor.

Nothing from the bus had come down the mountain with me. The rear window was clear too. No fog. No handprints. No pale face in the glass.

The truck looked like it had only ever carried me. I got out and walked around to the passenger side. The door was still shut. I opened it and looked at the floor. There was some loose snow on the mat and a dark mark where my boot had been.

That was it. Mia came out of the office before I reached the yard door. She had her county fleece on and was holding a paper cup in one hand. She looked past me at unit twelve.

“Where’s Christian?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“He was at the pullout.”

“With unit eight?”

“Yeah.”

“Was he hurt?”

“He was being pulled into the snow.”

Mia stopped with the cup halfway to her mouth. She didn't drink from it.

“Who was pulling him?”

I looked back at the truck. The passenger compartment was still empty.

“I don’t know what to call it.”

She set the cup on the hood of a parked pickup. “Start with what happened.”

“I found the bus.”

“Clyde.”

“There were nine passengers inside.”

“There was no bus.”

“I know what I saw.”

“Search and rescue went up there.”

“Already?”

“They went as soon as you stopped answering.”

“I didn't stop answering.”

“You stopped making sense.”

That seemed fair. I couldn't remember what I'd said over the radio. Something about a vehicle. Maybe that I'd found a vehicle. The log would have it if the radio had caught it.

Mia folded her arms. “They found unit eight at the pullout. Engine running. Door open.”

“Christian was there.”

“They didn't find Christian.”

“He was there.”

“They didn't find any bodies either. They didn't find a tour bus. They checked the whole road down to the gate.”

I looked at the snow on my boots. It had turned gray around the edges from the drive.

“What about the passengers?”

She shook her head. “There was no record of them.”

“I got nine people out of that bus.”

“You said that.”

“I counted them.”

“I know you counted them.”

“I counted them more than once.”

Mia looked toward the office windows. The lights were on in dispatch, but nobody was standing behind the glass.

“There was no emergency call from a tour bus. No company name. No driver. Nothing.”

“There was a bus.”

“Clyde, I never sent you to rescue nine passengers.”

I didn't answer. She picked up the paper cup again but still didn't drink.

“The only emergency traffic in the log is your transmission. It came through broken. You said you found a vehicle.”

“A vehicle.”

“That’s what it says.”

“And you didn't tell me about a turnout?”

“I told you to go up Cedar Ridge.”

“You told me to pull into the next turnout.”

“I didn't.”

The yard was quiet except for the wind moving loose snow along the fence. It made a thin scratching sound against the metal. I went back to unit twelve and climbed into the cab. Mia followed me to the door but didn't get in. She stood there with one hand on the frame.

I looked at the radio. The volume was turned almost all the way down. I turned it up. Static came through, then nothing. The passenger seat was empty.

The floor was empty. The back was empty. Then I saw the letter. It was still beside the wiper controls where I'd left it before driving into Cedar Ridge. Aubrey's lawyer's letter.

Certified mail. The envelope had a crease through one corner, but the flap was flat. I stared at it. The thing had used Aubrey's voice. It had used Marky because that was what Aubrey called me when she wanted me to listen.

I would've followed that voice anywhere. That was the point. It hadn't picked a voice I might recognize. It picked the one I wouldn't question. Mia said, “Clyde?”

I didn't look at her. I reached across the dashboard and lifted the unopened certified letter from beside the wiper controls.

The investigation took two days. Maybe it took longer than that, but two days was how long people kept asking me the same questions. After that they mostly stopped asking. I went back to plowing Bonner County roads because the roads were still there and because the county didn't have enough people to let me stay home.

I started taking overtime again. That part wasn't complicated. Aubrey's lawyer still wanted money. The house still had a payment. The divorce debt didn't disappear because I drove into a storm and came back with less than I left with.

Bills are good that way. They don't care what happened to you. I stopped putting the certified letters on the dashboard. That was the main change. I kept them in the glove box now.

Sometimes I left them in the truck for a week before taking them inside. The envelopes slid around in there whenever I turned. I could hear them moving under the registration papers and the tire chains receipt. I knew what they were without looking. Aubrey called twice while I was working.

I didn't answer either time. She left a message the first time. I listened to it in the yard office with the door shut. She said my name. Then she said I needed to call her back.

That was all. The second message was longer, but not in a useful way. It had a deadline in it. There was always a deadline in it. I deleted both messages.

That didn't solve anything. It just meant I didn't have to hear her voice while I was trying to eat. On the third morning I was back in unit twelve before daylight. The heater worked better than it had that first night. Somebody had replaced the weak batteries in the flashlight too.

That was probably part of the investigation, although nobody explained which part. The flashlight sat in the side compartment and came on without being hit. I checked the fuel. Three-quarters full. I checked the blade.

The pins were in place. The hydraulic lines weren't leaking. The chains were already on the tires because Cedar Ridge was still closed and because nobody had found a reason to make the road easier since the last time I drove it. Then I put the truck in gear. The county gate opened with the same metal groan.

Snow had been pushed back from the road, but Cedar Ridge still had a narrow lane through it. The trees stood along both sides with their branches bent down. The storm had cleared some. Not enough to make the mountain look friendly. I drove uphill.

There wasn't a bus above the switchback. I knew that before I reached it. There wasn't a second plow either. No orange hazard lights. No open door.

No man standing beside a county truck with snow on his shoulders. Still, when I reached the empty stretch above the turn, I stopped. The engine stayed running. The blade sat in the snow. The radio was quiet except for the usual low hiss between transmissions.

I looked in the rearview mirror. The back of the cab was empty. It had been empty since I left the yard. There were no coats on the seats. No breath fogging the glass.

No pale face behind the others. I counted anyway.

"One."

My voice sounded wrong in the cab. Too loud for one person. I waited for another number to come out. It didn't. The passenger door was locked.

I checked it with my hand. The latch held. I don't know why I checked. Nobody was sitting there. Nobody had been sitting there since I got back.

But the door had opened before, and I wasn't interested in giving it another chance. I put unit twelve back in gear. The road climbed through the trees. The plow pushed a thin line of snow to either side. Nothing moved in the ditches except loose powder blowing across the lane.

I kept both hands on the wheel and watched the edge of the road. That became the routine. Every later trip toward Cedar Ridge, I stopped in the same empty stretch. Sometimes it was still dark. Sometimes the sun was up enough to show the tops of the trees.

Once there was a red fox standing near the ditch, although it ran before I reached the stop. The road was always empty when I stopped. No bus. No passengers. No second plow.

I checked the mirror. Then I counted.

"One."

That was as far as I got. I never said two. I never needed to. One was the number that mattered. One driver.

One truck. One person in the cab who could see what was in front of him. The first few times I counted with both hands on the wheel. After that I started doing it before I reached for the microphone. I didn't call Mia.

She didn't ask me to. The radio stayed quiet, and I left it that way. Aubrey called again that week. Her name showed on my phone while I was parked outside the county yard. I watched it ring until the screen went dark.

Then I put the phone in the cup holder and checked the passenger door. Locked. I kept taking overtime. The letters stayed in the glove box. The house stayed where it was.

Those were things I could still keep track of. On the next trip I stopped above the switchback and looked in the mirror. The glass showed my own face. Gray skin. Tired eyes.

A little snow along my hair where it had blown in through the door. Nobody else was there. I counted the cab.

"One."

Then I reached over and locked the passenger door again. The latch clicked once, and unit twelve continued uphill toward Cedar Ridge with me alone.