Refuge

The shimmering New Mexico sun bleaches the earth and reflects off towering thunderheads. From inside an RV nestled among the desert brush just off a barely-paved road, the middle-of-nowhere silence is broken by one quick and alarming gunshot. Nothing moves. Moments later, out of the waves of a heat mirage emerges a leather clad Darryl Tripp, high school English teacher, astride a screaming motorcycle. His mission is to toss his just completed first novel to the four winds, an act of self-loathing and despair. As he stops and pulls the novel out of his satchel, his motorcycle sputters and dies, out of fuel. He stands high on his cycle and spies the lone RV, a hope of help. He rolls his motorcycle to the RV, knocks, gets no answer. He opens the unlocked door, steps inside, taking shelter. As he finishes a phone call with his fiancée, deputy district attorney Helen Kaufman, promising to be on time for their engagement party that evening, Amelia Philips, hospice nurse and RV owner, emerges