I see the hazard lights before I see the car. A dark blue pickup, hood propped open, as far off the road as the gravel shoulder allows.

There’s a man standing beside it. Tall — I can tell from here. One arm braced on the roof of the truck, the other holding a phone up at different heights and angles, the universal body language of someone who has found zero bars and is not thrilled about it.

I’m pulling onto the shoulder before I’ve consciously decided to stop. I dismiss mom’s voice in my head warning me against impulse decisions.

He turns at the sound of my engine. He doesn’t walk toward me. He waits. Both hands visible. That small, considered courtesy registers.

I stay in the car and keep the engine running, just in case.

Up close, he’s better than the thumbnail impression, which was already working in his favor. Tall enough that I’d have to look up if I were standing next to him, and I’m not short. Dark hair, several days of stubble — not the artful kind, just the kind that happens when a man doesn’t think about it, which is somehow more attractive than the artful kind.

The first thing I notice is his hands. Large. My next thought is to wonder if his business end is also large.

“Car trouble?” Brilliant, Captain Obvious.

“Belt snapped.” His voice is low and unhurried, the flat New England vowels of someone who grew up in the region. He runs a hand through his thick mane of hair before adding, “She’s not going anywhere today.”

“Tow company?” Why am I speaking in two-word sentences?

“Trying to call them, but no signal out here.” He glances at his phone. “You?”

I check. Three bars. Hmmm. “Same here.”

“Shelburne Falls is about twenty minutes up the road. I can call from there.” He pauses. “If you’re heading that way. I don’t want to put you out.”

“You want a ride?” I say. Four words are better than two.

That corner of his mouth moves. Not a full smile yet. He closes the hood. The truck beeps as he locks it and walks around to the passenger side of my car. He apologizes before getting in.

“I’m Riya.”

“Caleb.”

I watch him fold himself into my passenger seat and revise everything I thought I knew about the interior dimensions of this car.

***

I steal looks. Can’t help it. Those hands on his thighs. The line of his profile against the moving trees when he turns to watch something on the roadside. I look at the breadth of his shoulders and think, without planning to, about weight. About what it would feel like to have something that size above me, pressing me down.

He catches me looking.

He doesn’t comment. He holds the look for a beat, and then turns back to the road. But that corner of his mouth moves — a real smile this time.

Fuck, dimples will be the death of me.

I look back at the road and feel a warmth settle low in my belly that has nothing to do with the October sun.

We come around a long curve and there’s a brown state forest sign on the right: MOHAWK TRAIL STATE FOREST — CLOSED FOR OFF-SEASON MAINTENANCE. A narrow road leads off into the trees. A single bar across the entrance, held in place by a simple latch.

Something in my chest goes very quiet and clear.

“Do you mind if I take a detour?”

He looks at the sign. Looks at me. A full beat of silence in which we both understand what the question actually is.

“You think I’ll be bored?”

“You won’t be,” I say. “I promise.”

“Okay,” he says. Not performing enthusiasm, not playing it cool. Just: okay.

I turn off the highway.

Continue the story The Detour.

All images are AI generated and do not depict any real person.