Howling at the Moon: The Complete Series by Sasha Livingston

Howling at the Moon: Part 1
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    B ecky was dying. Her death rattle rumbled through her tail pipe and the smoke from her hood signaled her final goodbyes. I sang along to the old country song on the radio, hoping this wasn’t her final song.
    “You got to know when to hold 'em... Know when to fold ’em...” I sang the words at the top of my lungs, filling Becky with my lackluster voice. She and I were headed to the middle of nowhere, and I thought a song might help her get us there. Ironically, I was living the words of the song today. I had folded my cards on a whim and decided to run away from my old life. I just hoped I was making the right decision.
    “C’mon, Becky old girl. You can do it.” I rubbed the steering wheel and continued to sing to her. We were close to our destination, about thirty miles out, and I couldn’t have her dying on me now.
    My mind drifted to the cost of fixing the old girl if she did go kaput on the side of the highway. Whatever the price, it wasn’t in my tight, jobless budget anymore and I needed to conserve every penny. Dammit, every time I thought about my lack of money a cloud of depression seemed to appear.
    Ever since I was sixteen, I had always worked or had some type of job. From shelving books at the library when I was in middle school to waiting tables in high school, I always had to depend on myself. When I lost my job last week, it was like my heart stopped. It was a layoff, not like getting fired, but it felt the same to me. I was sent away from my office with a box of my belongings and a severance check. The only problem was that I wasn’t good at dealing with rejection.
    Now I was acting on impulse, leaving my whole life behind to live in some town that had a population smaller than my high school.
    My car that was now sputtering and seizing down the highway was packed with all my earthly belongings. With my severance in hand, I decided to take a year and find myself. I’d conserve my money by living in a small hick town and maybe write the novel I had put off writing for years.
    It was an easy decision since no one cared about me in the city anyway. All I had there was bad luck. Leaving was an easy decision.
    Hillston was the first town on the map that caught my eye; an old vacation town that my grandmother had taken me to when I was a teenager. A few calls and I found a perfect house for a fraction of what I paid for my apartment. At this rate, I could live for at least a year without having to work.
    Everything looked fine until Becky’s temperature gauge slowly spiked into the red. The plumes of smoke she coughed up from under her hood were so bad I was forced to pull over. Beating on the steering wheel and rubbing the dashboard were not sufficient coaxing methods anymore. Becky needed help, and just my luck, I was nowhere near being a mechanic.
    I opened the hood and peered inside as if I knew how to fix her. Water was shooting through some hose and green goo was oozing from the radiator. I’d fed Becky some water and coolant at every gas stop but it must not have been enough.
    I should have known better. Becky was thirty years old and was more like an heirloom than a means of transportation. She had belonged to my mother, and her mother before that. Still, after all these years, I didn’t have the guts to get rid of Becky. She had to be my companion on this trip, but this excursion was killing her.
    I looked down the road. Nothing but hills and trees. I couldn’t remember the last time I saw a house, gas station, or a rest stop. There was no one to call. Everyone I knew was a thousand miles away.
    You gotta know when to walk, know when to run. The lyrics played in my head as I looked around. There was nothing left for me to do but walk down the highway for help.
    I took inventory of my personal belongings. My purse, cell phone, and laptop needed to come with me. I didn’t want to leave those things just sitting in the car for some looter.