Thanksgiving. It was that blessed time of year where students often found themselves traveling back home to stay with parents who likely didn’t understand in order to eat more food than necessary alongside relatives that nobody could genuinely stand to be around. While that was not the case with every attendee of East Texas University, local students, just like Debbie Winger, tossed a duffle bag full of dirty laundry into the back seat of the car, slid into the driver’s seat, and made like a Willie Nelson song.
Debbie’s dread began to mount the instant the engine turned over. The obligation of having dinner with her mother stung. She loved her mom, no denying it, and her advice on careers was invaluable, but she knew with it would be coming a horde of needling questions. How were her grades? Was she dating someone? If she was, was she taking full advantage of it?
Where that left her was behind the steering wheel of her stark white Toyota Camry on a lonely stretch of East Texas parkway, empty save for the looming, nearly naked trees of Autumn, and her only company with her being the speculative imaginings of what her friends were doing about now. Mike spoke of watching the “big game” with his dad and uncles, sprawling out lazily on sofas and recliners while trying to digest the enormous meal his mom and aunts would prepare. And while she was no stranger to football, she was a cheerleader because it would get her noticed.
“You just need the right person to notice you, darling.”
Kip was staying on campus for the holidays. His parents had invited him to come home, certainly, but he of course didn’t agree with their politics, nor their ideas of what an ideal society was. No, this Thanksgiving he was going to stick around Pinebox, protesting the useless slaughter of thousands of innocent turkeys meant only to sate the appetites of the affluent.
Debbie wondered if she should feel insulted by that comment, but shrugged it off. Kip was not the usual jockish type, like Mike, usually drawn to ETU, and he was maybe the kind of person she could be into perhaps in a past life, but he was so high strung she found him grating. Not to mention how fearful she was of his lackadaisical attitude towards getting into trouble. She couldn’t afford that.
“You can’t afford any negative publicity, sweetie!”
PK was different. He was actually kind of oddly sweet, and strangely brave. That was at least the case in the happenings at the house of Lisa Gray. It was with this odd, sweet, strange bravery that he asked if she’d like to have dinner with his family, and despite Thanksgiving being completely new to them, they were going to assimilate it into their collective quest for the American Dream. Debbie considered it, but soon changed her mind at how “Saag Paneer” sounded in her mind. No, this Thanksgiving, it was nice to just focus on herself.
“Always focus on yourself, Debbie.”
The music on the radio cut to buzzing static serving only to emphasize the rain pattering against her windshield. Not again, she thought. It seemed something was always messing up on this car, even if it was brand new. It was alright, she supposed. Japanese cars were never likely to catch on in America anyway. She reached over with a free hand to adjust the tuning. Still static, and then, silence. Her hand jiggled the volume knob to no avail, so she resorted to her tried and true method. She whacked it. The digital display went dark upon impact.
She noticed the figure in the road just in time.
Her foot slammed the brake pedal nearly to the floor, the car screeching to a halt, bumper only a few inches from this individual’s knees. Fury was the first thing that entered her mind, a fury that melted away as soon as she laid eyes on him.
Standing in front of the Camry was quite possibly the most handsome man she’d ever seen. His dark hair was combed back, parted to the side, rain soaking into the shoulders of his perfectly tailored three-piece suit. Both of them realizing that nobody was getting plastered by a front bumper, he smiled at her, adjusting his tie. Music fluttered to life on the speakers.
He calmly strode to the passenger side of the car, making a motion with his hand to roll the window down. It took her a while to do, since she was far too busy staring at this obvious gentleman, but she eventually found the right button, the pane of glass sliding downward into the nestled confines of the passenger door.
“Hi there.” She shuddered at the sound of her own drawl.
“I couldn’t trouble you for a ride, could I? My car is a few miles ahead and I’ve already walked enough in the rain just to find a payphone.”
His hand slicked the water backwards out of his hair.
“Oh God are you alright? Did you have a wreck or somethin’? Here! Get in!” She immediately unlocked and flung the door open for him. He sat comfortably in the passenger seat, chuckling.
“I’m fine. Just ran out of gas. It’s actually my brother’s car that I sort of… borrowed without permission. I’m not used to how temperamental it is.”
“Mine’s the same way, always somethin’ tearin’ up. The radio was on the fritz a little while ago, ya know, before I almost… well…kinda run ya over.”
“Well thankfully you didn’t, and I appreciate that very much. Headed home for Thanksgiving?”
“No, no, no. My family, it’s not one to celebrate many holidays. We don’t even call each other on our birthdays.”
“That sounds kinda sad, in a way. Oh! Sorry! I’m Debbie. Nice to make yer acquaintance, I guess.”
“Nice to meet you too, Debbie. My friends call me Jerry. It’s honestly not that sad. My brothers, we’re not that close.”
The sudden desire to invite this man to Thanksgiving dinner welled up inside her. At least her mother would be impressed with the man she brought home. She could secretly profess that he was her new boyfriend, and with a suit like that, he was certainly money.
His voice snapped her attention back to the present, back to the wipers slinging away the rain from her view. “I’m assuming you’re a student at ETU?”
“Yeah. Meteorology major. Kinda hopin’ I get to be a weather girl on TV someday.”
“A noble profession. Perhaps I’ll see you forecasting sunny skies on Channel Five some day!”
“Thank you. That would be very nice. What about you? Are you a businessman or somethin’?”
“A student of business actually. I was on my way to the university for a visit. If I happen to like it, I was thinking of finishing my Masters work there. It seems like quite a college, in spite of all the strange stories I keep hearing about it.”
Debbie’s mind flashbacked to the night at the Gray house. Back to the spirits of the slain victims of the Holocaust. This guy didn’t know the half of it.
“Well, some pretty strange things happen there, can’t lie about that. Place is full of…ghost stories.”
“Nice! I like ghost stories…”
Perhaps it should have weirded her out, hearing him speak like this, but he was just so nonchalant about it, it was oddly comforting. “There’s my car! Thank you very much for giving me the lift. Walking in this kind of weather, I could have caught my death…of cold, you know?”
“I hear ya,” she replied. The Camry eased off the road, and the strange, handsome young man opened the door and stepped out. “Debbie, right? What might your last name be?”
“Oh, uh…Winger. Debbie…Deborah Winger.”
“Deborah? Nice, very biblical.” He started to close the door and walk away. She stopped him.
“Wait! What about your last name?”
He halted. “Mine? Richards. Jerry Richards at your service.”
“Richards, huh? Well, it’s been real nice to chat with ya, Mister Jerry Richards.”
He chortled. “Please, just call me Jerry!” A heavy pause. “Think I might be seeing more of you around campus, by chance? I may have just made up my mind about attending…”
Her heart pounded in her chest. “Um, sure! Glad I could help you reach a decision.”
“Excellent! Well, anyway, take care, and enjoy your Thanksgiving with your mother.”
“Thank you! You know, you’re awful nice.”
He shrugged in the pouring rain. “I try.”
His eyes locked with hers. The static that had returned to the radio while she drove him here died away, a great tune now back on the air, it’s lyrics flooding her car.
Don’t you forget about me…
She stared back into his gaze, lost there for what felt like eternity. “Take….take care, yourself. See you around?”
He returned a devilish grin. “Of course.”
The door shut behind him, her eyes following him as he walked over to quite the car. She didn’t know it at the time, but he stood there by the 1967 Mustang Fastback, painted a rich, candy-apple red. He waved at her, and she waved back at him before finally getting back onto the soaked, leaf-peppered parkway road headed to her mother’s house. She rolled along, thrilled about the chance meeting that just took place, but also couldn’t shake how something he said seemed slightly…off. She shook the thought from her head, and continued on her way.
Jerry watched her tail lights slip further down the lonely parkway road and into the evening. He opened the door to the Mustang, slithering into the leather bucket seat. The door shut with a heavy thud. He settled into the car, reaching up to adjust the rear view mirror, saying out loud, “You know, I think I’m going to like it here. Very much so, mister…”
With a free hand he opened the glove box, pulling out the registration card for the metallic red horse that encased him. He read the name from it.
“…E. D. Fletcher.” He read over the card some more. “Ew, Mister Fletcher, you should have better taste in license plate numbers than this.” His head craned down to address the severed head in the seat beside him, its eyes frozen wide open in terror. He snapped his fingers. “There…That’s much better.”
The key slid into the ignition, engine roaring to life. “Now,” he continued to converse, “Let’s go have some fun.”
The car lurched onto the asphalt, fire leaping from the blackened tracks of spent rubber. The exhaust bellowed as the car, license plate CH405, hurtled past the large green road sign, rising like a tombstone from a blanket of fallen November leaves, that read:
This idea came to me at work a day or so ago. Debbie is a character portrayed by the fantastic-as-always Meghan Caves on an East Texas University mini-campaign on SavingThrowShow. Check out those videos, as that campaign is actually a preview of the new Savage Worlds Adventure Edition rules that will be coming soon. Kip, PK, and Mike are her fellow cohorts on the show. (Hi Other Jordan, Gaurav, and Dom! *waves*)
As for the gentleman? Well, that’s a spin on a non-player character devised by none other than Jordan Caves-Callerman, who you can also find on SavingThrowShow as well, based off his esthetic from the Old Spice Gentleman class stream he was a part of. Both of them are on the Deadlands Reloaded stream Wildcards (Only 4 eps left at the time of this posting!), another Savage Worlds setting that I SERIOUSLY recommend. And yes, it is indeed HIM.
Why these characters? Well, a few days ago, methinks, it was actually Meghan and Jordan’s third wedding anniversary, so, Happy Anniversary, you two!
So yeah, I wanted to pull a Stephen King and connected two different universes, kinda like how the Man in Black is also Randall Flagg. I hope you enjoyed it! MORE ETU PLZ!
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