Some days Sol is my greatest enemy. He makes it so hot I can't breathe, sucking the air from my lungs and bleaching the sky so white I can't see.
Woozy and dry-mouthed, I stopped at Green Oasis, a lame excuse for a general store. The only things remotely green were two ancient gas pumps, a cactus by the door, and the ramshackle shed that housed a restroom. Inside the "oasis," a Casablanca fan spun air slowly above a battered cooler half-filled with cans of pop and beer. I plucked a Coke from the cooler and slapped change on the counter. The old Mexican clerk, staring at the money a moment, gave me a baleful look.

"No gas, Senor Terrell?"

"Nope. Next time, Tomas . . . I promise."

"You go on to Pueblo Blanco, si?"

Pueblo Blanco is a ruins in the San Juan mountains of New Mexico,
similar to but far less known than Mesa Verde. Indians have occupied it for centuries, but more recently illegals from Mexico have joined them.
I was a U.S. Postal worker whose daily route was a 250-mile circle roughly between the Rio Chalmas and Rio Grande rivers. Twice a week, if that, I drove a stretch of non-graded road to Tomas's store. Usually I dropped off anything addressed to Pueblo Blanco with him.

"Well . . . it's so hot--"

"The woman was here today."

The woman. I knew who he meant because of her long red hair, very rare for these parts. A month or so earlier I'd met her after dropping some badly-abused mail on the counter. She was filling a small tote bag with all the penny candy he had on hand and smiled at both of us.

"Por los ninos," she said as she paid him. "I don't bring it, they cry."

I stopped scrutinizing the expiration date of a dusty box of cookies.

"Really?"

"Yes." Her blue eyes met mine. "They have so little."

We'd talked a little more, and I'd learned she was an archaeologist spending the summer studying all the Anasazi ruins in this sector of the state. When she left, Tomas caught me grinning and never failed to allude to her some way thereafter.

Today his lower lip wrinkled upwards, the closest he'd ever come to smiling the two years I'd known him.

"The Pueblo. She works there . . . today."

He knew I longed to see her again, but it was so damn hot and I didn't relish a ten-mile trip of hairpin turns all uphill.

"I--I have only two letters. I could leave them with you," I said.

"La Pelirroja--" Tomas pointed at his hair. "She is . . . hermosa, si?"

I nodded.

"And le gusta . . . you like her?"

"Yes," I muttered.

"Then vaya! Go!"

I did.



After climbing into the Jeep, I stared at the dog-eared letters addressed to Pueblo Blanco I'd thrown onto the passenger seat. One had "Postage Due--10 cents" stamped in a corner. I knew that dime would come from my pocket as these folks had given all their money to some thieving coyote to smuggle them over the border.

Today was hot. Too hot! But I take my job seriously, always have. I seldom receive mail myself, but I know how important it is to others. Especially soldiers. I'd spent two tours in Afghanistan as a medic. Often when I wasn't patching wounds, I was reading letters to the badly injured. A few words from home gave many just enough incentive to forget their pain and get better.

These illegals had a hard enough time eking a living in a new country, and I would not deny them whatever hope and inspiration these letters might provide.

I started the engine and adjusted a vent as the old Jeep rumbled to life. It was a combo wagon/pick-up with over-sized tires and faded Postal Service logos on each door. It wasn't new when I inherited it, and I'd put on well over 100,000 miles. I changed the oil myself every 3,000 miles and never went anywhere without extra quarts of 10W-30, a full five-gallon gas can, and gallon jugs of distilled water. It had a manual transmission, a sturdy clutch, and fairly new brakes.

I put the Jeep in low gear, knowing I'd likely never shift once I hit the incline. Power was not the issue; handling was. Too often that road to Pueblo Blanco was full of newly-fallen rocks from the sandstone cliffs on the passenger side, sometimes small boulders I'd have to swing around.

Nasty business if I went more than 20 mph since the road was narrow, the cliffs were sheer, and a two-hundred-foot drop lurked on my left almost from the time I left Green Oasis. I had more control of the vehicle going uphill, but the road was rutted and I wisely hugged the cliffs when I could.
I had half the journey behind me and was just coming out of a hair-pin curve when the road lurched before me.

Yes, lurched. As if I were suddenly at the bottom of a roller coaster loop heading upwards. I braked hard and the Jeep fish-tailed toward the overhang. I white-knuckled the steering wheel to the right, felt the vehicle shimmy on half its wheels, then angle toward the cliff. Tires spit rocks in all directions, but grabbed enough of the roadway to keep us upright for a long, slow twenty yards.

A tall leafless cedar stopped us. No pillows erupted from the dash, and my face smashed into the windshield. Blood poured into my eyes.
I spilled out of the Jeep onto my knees, and felt tremors surge through me. Not pain, but--

Earthquake!

My mind had barely wrapped itself around the word before the ground jarred me off balance. I fell forward, my face again taking most of the brunt. For what seemed forever, the Earth rocked and wobbled, its spasms ripping through my sternum. At last the shaking stopped, but the aftermath was far worse.

A low growl like a mountain cat's began overhead, growing into a loud rumble as it echoed off the cliff. A rock just missed me. Then a flurry of them, as if catapulted, came crashing down.

Avalanche!

Panic or adrenaline got me off the ground and tumbling under the Jeep's rear end. I pulled my legs in as rocks pummeled raw metal. Soon I was virtually encased.

In time the Earth stopped shaking beneath me. Rocks ceased hitting the Jeep's roof. Because a cracked rib may have punctured a lung, I could barely breathe. Dried blood in my eyes and dust made it almost impossible to assess my status. My head throbbed, but I was lucid enough to know I had to push through the rock wall, or I'd suffocate.

I started kicking outwards. A few rocks toppled . . . then a few more. An open space grew to the size of my head. Air, lots of it, rushed in. I ignored the knives slashing my lungs and kicked harder. Rocks moved. The space enlarged. Suddenly I was out.

I struggled to get upright. My hands grasped the bumper, and I levered myself upwards until I leaned forward against the trunk. I twisted my torso, hips and legs until I could see the road we'd climbed, the overhang a body length away.

I hazarded a glance upwards. Blue sky. Old Sol. Both apparently indifferent to Mother Earth's agonies. And then she was spinning . . . wildly.

Vertigo!

I'd had something similar before . . . in Afghanistan. An IED exploded. Our ambulance rolled over, I fell out, and my head got banged about. Wound up in a tent hospital where the canvas roof kept spinning every time I opened my eyes. Six months after my discharge I had occasional debilitating bouts of vertigo Stateside.

I retched . . . until the world stopped spinning. Then everything seemed tilted. Especially the Jeep, though it sprawled on all four wheels. To say the least, it had been badly abused. A dented roof, battered doors, and countless scrapes across its hood.

Would it start? Could it move? Was I in any shape to drive?

Sol hadn't moved much, and I knew I was dehydrated. How long could I function before the pain in my head and chest became too much? Until that growing numbness in my extremities made steering or braking impossible?

At least my head wounds were no longer bleeding. I knew I had one black eye, my left which was swollen shut, but the other saw clearly.
I glanced at my backtrack. Returning to Green Oasis was out of the question. . . downhill around those curves . . . and me at what . . . thirty per cent . . . maybe?

No, get up the mountain to Pueblo Blanco if . . . if I still had a transmission . . . if there weren't more landslides farther up the road . . . if there were no aftershocks forthcoming.

Rest a bit, stupid! Don't get reckless.

But when did Ryan Terrell ever heed his own advice? Use common sense?
I heaved a sigh probably heard in the valley below. Groping for and grasping door handles, I pulled myself around the Jeep. When the driver's door opened with little effort, I sighed again, and wriggled inside.
I twisted the key and the engine roared alive. "Hot damn!" I shouted.

I felt for the clutch with my left foot and touched the accelerator with my right. We moved . . . rolled forward . . . then surged forth as I stomped the gas.

Whatever suspension the Jeep once had was shot. As we lurched and bounced furiously, my back and ribs weren't spared abuse. Soon my head throbbed worse than before. We moved up that road not much faster than a tortoise, but . . . we didn't stop.

When we crept out of the final hairpin fifteen or twenty minutes later, I could see Pueblo Blanco two hundred yards ahead.

Or what was left of it!