Rescued on the Prairie

I gripped the steering wheel tight, squinting at the dark, fog-covered road. I knew this route through the Nebraska Sandhills like the back of my hand, but that night the fog was so thick I couldn’t pick out a single landmark. A sign jumped out of nowhere: “Warning, Sharp Turn.” I knew the curve that came after it. And I knew I was going too fast. My pickup skidded out of control. Glass shattered. I flew through the air.

The impact knocked me out. I opened my eyes when I came to, and felt cold prairie grass beneath me. Where am I? Where’s the road? I tried to sit up. A sharp pain ripped through my chest. I turned my head gingerly. Nearby, the outline of the truck was visible through the fog.

I gritted my teeth and dragged myself toward it. Something told me that if I could just get back to the truck, I’d make it through this.

Only a few yards, but it felt like it was a thousand miles. I made it to the truck and opened the door. The dome light in the cab went on. I pulled myself onto the passenger seat. That light filled me with peace. Lord, don’t let the light go out, I prayed, then I drifted into unconsciousness.

I woke up in the hospital, covered head to toe in casts and bandages. A doctor leaned over me. “You have a collapsed lung and a broken collarbone,” he said. “But you’re going to be all right.”

The next time my eyes opened it was morning. The sun shone through the hospital blinds and a breakfast tray stood by my bed. My uncle sat next to it. “You’re lucky, Mike,” he said. “You know how deserted that stretch of road is at night. A woman driving by spotted a light and called the police. Your truck had skidded so far into the prairie, I don’t know how she even noticed it through all that fog.”

“That was my dome light,” I said. “It went on when I pulled open the door of the pickup.”

“Dome light?” my uncle said. “It couldn’t have been, Mike. No lights were on when they pulled your truck out of the ditch. The crash knocked the battery out and threw it twenty feet away.”