"Eight to twelve hours? Are you kidding me?" Michiru incredulously asked the woman on the phone. "I could freeze to death!"

"I'm sorry, ma'am," the crackly voice replied, "but like I said, all of our tow trucks are busy assisting other stranded vehicles—"

Michiru hung up on the roadside assistance agent in frustration. After leaving the highway in a snowstorm to get much-needed gas in a nearby town, Michiru had hit a slick spot on the snowy, deserted road leading back to the highway, lost control of her car, and wound up in a snow bank. Though the impact was minor, her car now wouldn't start and was quickly becoming buried in the heavy snowfall.

Placing her cell phone in her lap, she desperately tried the ignition again. As before, the engine cranked but steadfastly refused to start.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!" she swore as she smacked the dead car's steering wheel with her gloved palms. The cheerful melodies of A Prairie Home Companion drifted from the radio, mocking her.

"Fuck you, Garrison Keillor," she said turning off the radio, somehow instantly feeling guilty for swearing at the affable radio host.

Michiru's shaky hands gripped the steering wheel as she attempted to calm herself, but the heady mix of anxiety and adrenaline from the crash was still coursing through her veins. Eventually she turned off the windshield wipers, sighing as the snowy forest illuminated by her headlights was obscured from her view snowflake by snowflake.

Placing her forehead on the top of the steering wheel, she tried to think.

Eight to twelve hours for a tow truck. No, that was simply unacceptable. In twelve hours she was supposed to be starting her first day of teaching at Northwaters College, not freezing in a broken-down car in The Middle of Nowhere, Wisconsin.

Determining that doing nothing and freezing to death in her car was the least-palatable option, she decided to try calling the gas station she had just left at about 10 miles back. It was situated on the edge of a town so tiny it was unlikely to be able to offer much help, but it was still her best lead at the moment. Thankfully, the gas station attendant picked up after only a few rings, and Michiru quickly explained her predicament.

"Your best bet," he told her, "is Tenoh."

"Tenoh?"

"Tenoh Auto Works," he explained. "Just outside of town. It's pretty late so you'll probably have to call a few times, but Tenoh lives above the repair shop so just keep trying."

Thanking the attendant, Michiru quickly took his advice. As he predicted, no one answered and the call went to voicemail. She hung up and tried again. And again. And again.

Finally, after seven attempts, a gruff voice answered.

"What?"

"Hello, is this Tenoh Auto Works?" Michiru asked, relieved.

The voice on the other end grunted an affirmative reply.

"I'm so sorry to bother you, but my car slid off the road and died and I'm stranded. The man at the Gas 'N' Go told me to call you for assistance."

"Call AAA."

"I did, but they said they wouldn't be able to get a tow truck to me for eight to twelve hours because of the storm."

The person on the phone sighed.

"Please," Michiru said, "I'm stranded and absolutely desperate. You're my only hope in this snow."

Michiru heard another sigh. Then, "Give me your model, make, and location."

"Oh my gosh, thank you! I'm in a black Honda Civic with Illinois plates and uh . . ." Michiru paused as she fumbled to look at her maps app as quickly as possible. "I'm on Maplewood Road, about halfway between Winchester Waters and Route 51."

"I'll be there within an hour."

"Thank you so . . ." Michiru trailed off when her phone beeped, indicating the other person had ended the call. She pursed her lips but couldn't get too upset, considering Tenoh had agreed to come to her rescue in the end.

In an effort to save her car's battery, Michiru turned off the headlights, plunging the car into darkness, save for rhythmic red glow of her hazards filtering through the snow on her rear window. She sighed and was unsurprised to see a burst of fog from her breath; the engine had long gone cold, and so too had the inside of her car.

Michiru figured it would be best to next call Northwaters College's dean to explain her predicament, but only got her voicemail. She left a message assuring her that she would do everything she could to get there in time for class in the morning and promising to call with any updates.

Hanging up, Michiru bit her lip. She had the sense that the dean wasn't terribly impressed with her for whatever reason—her lack of teaching experience perhaps, or maybe her unconventional artistic background. The dean had made it well known during the selection process that she preferred a local educator over Michiru, but the department head battled hard for Michiru and prevailed. Michiru was justifiably worried that the dean would try to replace her with her preferred choice if she failed to show up for term on time. She just had to hope that the repair was quick and that she could be back on her way in an hour or two.

Wrapping her coat tighter in the falling temperature, she grabbed the bag of cheese curds she impulsively bought at the Gas 'N' Go and began snacking, waiting for help to arrive. She let out a sigh of relief when the glow of headlights lit up her snow-covered windows about thirty minutes later.

Leaving the safety of her car, she waded through the snow, wishing she'd worn warmer pants than thermal leggings and actual snow boots instead of cable-knit UGG's, but eventually made it to the road. The tow truck driver—a masculine figure shrouded in a thick parka—was waiting for her.

"Thank you so much for coming to get me," Michiru said as she approached the driver, whose youthful but sullen face was partially obscured by a beanie and hood. Michiru was surprised; from the phone conversation she was expecting a middle-aged man, not someone her own age. "I'm Michiru, by the way," she added.

"Haruka Tenoh," the driver said, clearly scrutinizing Michiru's appearance, and not looking terribly impressed. "So, what happened here?"

"I just hit a slick spot or something, I don't know," Michiru explained, feeling slightly self-conscious under Haruka's piercing stare. "I just suddenly started fishtailing and then I was in the snow bank. I wasn't going all that fast but now the car won't start."

"Where are the keys?"

"They're in the ignition."

"Go wait in the truck while I prep the car."

Michiru gratefully walked to the enormous truck, pulling open the passenger's side door to sit in the blissfully warm cab. She was still working on warming her fingers (her toes were a lost cause) when Haruka returned, skillfully backed the truck up to Michiru's car, and jumped out again. Haruka was in and out of the truck several times more times, first pulling the car from the snow bank, maneuvering the vehicles, then finally securing the car for towing. Eventually, the mechanic finished the task and they were on their way, the plow attached to the front of the truck making quick work of the accumulating snow.

"Thank you again for coming to get me," Michiru said as they traveled down the snowy road. "I was afraid I was going to be stuck in the middle of nowhere forever!"

Haruka grunted. They rode in silence, eventually skirting the edge of the tiny town of Winchester Waters and passing the now-closed gas station before continuing on.

"Gosh there's really nothing up here, is there? I would go crazy living here . . ."

Haruka didn't answer.

"I'm on my way to Northwaters College," Michiru explained, breaking the silence. "I'm teaching there for the spring semester, which starts tomorrow."

She paused, waiting for a response. None came.

"I'm taking over for an art professor who's going on sabbatical," she continued, preferring the sound of her own voice over uncomfortable silence. "It's not something I ever thought I'd do but the department really wanted me since I'm kind of a well-known artist and I figured, well, why not?"

Nothing.

Michiru was starting to wonder what Haruka's deal was. She wasn't stupid—she knew she was an attractive and charismatic woman who typically had people eating out of her hand in no time if she so wished. Men in particular were usually quite eager to engage with her and susceptible to her charms. What was this guy's problem?

"Listen, Haruka . . . it's really important that I be there tomorrow morning for the first day of class, so . . . if there's any way you could possibly get the car fixed tonight—"

"FIBs . . ." Haruka muttered.

"Excuse me?" Michiru turned, her eyebrows raised at Haruka's response.

"FIBs," Haruka loudly repeated. "Fucking Illinois Bastards. Y'know, people who come up here, don't know how to drive, and act like they're better than us. Namely, people like you."

Michiru stared at Haruka's profile in shock.

"And just what is that supposed to mean?"

"You're from Chicago, right?"

"Well, yeah—"

"Yeah, I could tell," Haruka sneered, giving a quick glance at the freshly dyed teal hair tumbling out from under Michiru's hat. "People like you, you're all the same. Acting like some pampered princess. Think you can snap your fingers and get what you want."

"A pampered . . . I do not . . ." Michiru sputtered, trying to formulate a response.

"Lady, it's 10 o'clock at night, you made me come get you in a snowstorm, and now you think you can demand that I stay up all night fixing your car?"

Fuming, Michiru turned away from Haruka to stare straight ahead. How could Haruka be so uncaring? She'd tried to be nice, tried to make conversation . . . Sure, it was late and the weather was bad, but it's not like she chose to crash! What other choice did she have?

Michiru shook her head. Realizing she needed to calm down if she ever had a chance of convincing Haruka to fix her car that night, she breathed deeply several times until she felt in control enough to respond.

"Look. I'm sorry if I said or did something that offended you. I was stranded, I need your help, I'm willing to pay whatever, so just, please try to fix my car, OK?"

"You think I need your money that bad? Do you even have anywhere to stay?"

"Well hopefully it's a quick fix and I won't need anywhere to stay."

"I bet you don't even have snow tires . . ."

Michiru's silence was all the answer Haruka needed.

"Yep, thought so."

Michiru turned her head to stare out of the passenger's window, hoping Haruka wouldn't notice the few angry tears that managed to escape, and they sat in stony silence for the remainder of the ride.

The tow truck had barely pulled up to the shop before Michiru had hopped out of the cab to put as much distance between herself and Haruka as possible. She pouted in the snow, fuming over Haruka's refusal to work on her car that night, facing the pitch-black forest rather than watch Haruka transfer the car into the garage.

Eventually a side door opened and Haruka leaned out.

"You gonna sleep out there tonight, Princess?"

"I was considering it," she said into the darkness.

"Well, it's your choice, I guess," Haruka said.

Michiru turned to find Haruka gone, but the door still open. She scowled, but her frozen feet and hands soon overpowered her pride.

Inside, she found a surprisingly spacious garage. Three cars were parked inside, though the one parked beside the far wall was missing its hood and most of its innards. Michiru's black Civic was next to a sturdy-looking car that was hoisted high on a hydraulic lift. Various tools and rags were scattered about and an ancient 70's-pattered sofa sat against the wall near the side door Michiru had entered. To her left was a plain wooden staircase leading to a closed-off loft. Below the loft was a bathroom and an office space of sorts. An office phone and an enormous beige desktop computer Michiru assumed hadn't been on the market for at least 15 years sat on a desk littered with papers and a boom box sat on the floor near the work area, blasting 80s hard rock. Michiru didn't bother to ask Haruka to turn it down.

Haruka pointed to the garishly pattered sofa. "Your royal chambers."

Michiru studied the sagging couch, wondering if she should just have Haruka tow her back to the road so she could wait in the snow and take her chances with AAA instead.

"Get whatever you want out of the car now," Haruka continued, "before I start working on it. I don't want you getting in my way when I'm working."

Michiru stared, her eyebrows raised in surprise. "You're going to work on it now?"

"Sooner I fix it, sooner I get my garage back. But if you really wanna spend all night here—"

"No! No, just give me one minute." Relief washed over Michiru—all of Haruka's previous sins forgiven. Giddy with hope that the night could be salvaged after all, she ran to her car and grabbed a few essentials—purse, computer, phone charger, sketchpad, and, of course, the leftover cheese curds. She looked over to where Haruka was hanging up the snow-covered parka and beanie to give thanks, but had to hold back a gasp of surprise as she saw Haruka properly for the first time.

Her knight in oil-stained armor was . . . a woman.

A very, very attractive woman.

She watched mesmerized as Haruka hung up her hat, tossed her head back and shook out her short hair, running strong fingers through her blonde locks, somehow winding up looking effortlessly windblown. She looked so capable and rugged, so unlike anything Michiru was used to . . .

Haruka looked over to Michiru and noticed her staring.

"What?" she snapped.

Michiru shook her head, sighing. Yep, still the same old Haruka.

"Nothing," she said, hoping she wasn't blushing as she scurried over to the couch.

Haruka immediately put on work gloves, made her way to the Civic, popped the hood, and went to work.

Michiru peeled off her own soggy coat and hat, shaking the melting snow out of both items, then laid them across the far arm of the sofa to dry. Next, Michiru hunted down a free socket and plugged in her phone, then grabbed her purse and slipped into the bathroom.

"Oh, lovely look, Michiru," she told herself, scrunching her nose at her messy reflection. Between the snow and her tears of frustration, her mascara and eyeliner had smudged horribly, giving her the look of a slightly psychotic panda. She immediately set to work fixing her make up and her deflated, tangled hat hair, brushing and cajoling it until it once again fell in smooth waves.

Finally satisfied that she looked somewhat like herself again, she returned to the sofa and took off her damp UGG's, positioning them near a heat register so they could dry faster. Slightly more comfortable, she got out her computer and curled up on the ancient couch, which bowed dramatically below her.

"Hey, Haruka?"

A grunt in reply indicated that she was listening.

"What's your wifi?"

"Does it look like I have wifi?"

Michiru stared. "But . . . how do you use your phone?"

Haruka looked up, one eyebrow raised. "You don't need wifi to use a phone."

"Yes, but what about your apps and stuff?"

Haruka rolled her eyes, pulling a chunky gray Nokia phone from her back pocket and holding it up.

"This baby works just fine. No apps necessary," she explained before pocketing the phone again and returning to her work.

Michiru sighed in defeat. No wifi . . . just perfect. And the shitty cell network in the middle of the forest meant social media wasn't going to save her sanity this night.

She closed her now-useless laptop and set it down, picking up the sketchpad in its place, but after flipping through to an empty page, she felt utterly uninspired to draw anything. After several attempts, she gave up and abandoned the sketchpad as well.

In a last-ditch attempt to entertain herself, Michiru got up and explored the garage, though there wasn't much to look at. An out-of-date calendar featuring a busty girl in a bikini draped across a motorcycle was prominently displayed and few posters of shiny cars hung in random places. A collection of photographs was haphazardly arranged on the wall near the computer. Michiru was unsurprised to find that they featured vehicles—mostly vintage muscle cars—but in an effort to pass the time, she spent as much time as she could bear looking at each. Haruka was in quite a few, often shaking hands with various ecstatically happy people. After successfully wasting a whole 30 minutes, Michiru returned to the sofa.

No Internet. No TV. Not even a measly car magazine to entertain her.

She was bored out of her mind.

Michiru snatched up the bag of cheese and popped a curd in her mouth. As she chewed, her eyes fell on the only thing left of interest in the garage: the woman repairing her car. She watched as Haruka continued to work under the hood, occasionally pulling up random wire or part for closer inspection, an intense look of concentration on her face. After a few minutes, Haruka paused in her work to stand up a stretch a bit, rotating her shoulders and pulling her arms this way and that.

As Michiru watched, she pondered the prickly mechanic. Sure, Haruka was grumpy and rude, but she was just so . . . different from anyone Michiru had met in a long time. Something about Haruka made her feel slightly off balance and out of her element, like she wasn't sure what would happen next. Still, a little uncertainty and excitement wasn't necessarily a bad thing . . .

Haruka stood, pushing her bangs back with the crook of her elbow, then shoved her sleeves up, revealing perfectly toned forearms. Michiru bit her lip as she studied her every move and ogled every inch of skin, feeling a slight blush creep across her nose.

Then again, maybe her intrigue was something else entirely . . .

Michiru smiled as she finally figured out a way to pass the time. Picking her sketchpad back up, she once again flipped to a new page, only this time, she had no trouble finding something to draw. Figure after figure soon took shape on the page, dynamic in pose and movement, as she studied and sketched her subject.

Deciding she needed a closer look, Michiru grabbed the office chair from in front of the ancient computer and rolled it over to the work area. Haruka looked up at the ruckus the chair was making, but returned to her work once Michiru settled into the seat. Michiru quickly got back to sketching, giving Haruka brief glances as she worked.

Haruka did her best to stay on task, but after a while could no longer ignore Michiru's presence.

"What are you doing?" she asked, looking up.

"Keeping myself entertained," Michiru replied, continuing to sketch.

Haruka narrowed her eyes. "Yeah, probably drawing me as the devil or something."

Michiru laughed. "Nope, just a normal figure study," she said, turning the sketchpad around to show Haruka, whose eyebrows furrowed when she saw Michiru's work. There Haruka was, sketched in various poses, artistically replicated in black and white.

"See? No devil horns," Michiru said as she turned her sketchpad back around.

Haruka stood and stared for a moment, eyebrows still furrowed, watching as Michiru returned to her sketching.

"You . . . did a nice job," she mumbled as she turned to return to her work.

Michiru grinned at the unexpected compliment.

"How's the repair going?" she asked after a few minutes of silence, continuing to sketch.

"I haven't located the cause of the problem yet but there are still a few things I need to try."

"You'll figure it out. I trust you."

Haruka looked up at this. "You do?" she asked incredulously.

"Sure," Michiru said. "You're a professional. You obviously know what you're doing."

"Right . . ." She furrowed her brow again as she continued to tinker. "So," she said, not looking up from the car, "that's the kind of art you do? You draw stuff?"

Michiru smiled, pleasantly surprised that Haruka was willing to engage in a friendly—if slightly stilted—conversation. "Mmm, sometimes I draw or paint, but I'm mostly known for my large-scale art installations."

"Art installations?"

"Installation art is when an artist creates a three-dimensional artwork in a space. It's meant to be immersive . . . to not just be a picture on a wall but a whole experience. Installation artists use all sorts of materials, like glass, light, sound . . . anything they want, really."

"Huh. And you use . . . ?" Haruka asked, no longer pretending to be only interested in the car in front of her.

"My specialty is installations involving water and mirrors. That's what I'm best known for, anyway," she explained, her eyes occasionally flickering up to Haruka as she continued work on her sketch.

"Huh," Haruka said a bit skeptically.

"And you?" Michiru asked. "You mostly just fix up cars?"

"You could say that," Haruka said, standing up fully and crossing her arms.

"Those pictures by your desk," Michiru mentioned, waving a breezy hand toward the office, "what are those about?"

"I do some custom work and restoration for select clients. See that car over there?" she said, pointing to the hollowed-out car sitting by the wall. "That's my next project. I'll be spending the next few months restoring the body, upgrading the electrical system, brakes, stuff like that."

"And that keeps you busy?"

"Busy enough, I guess."

Michiru sketched in silence for a few moments, then asked, "What about your free time?"

"My free time?" Haruka's brows knit at the question.

"Yeah," Michiru said, chuckling, "like, what do you and your friends do for fun?"

Haruka shook her head, turning away from Michiru. "I like to keep to myself."

Michiru narrowed her eyes. "There must be something you do to keep from going stir-crazy. I can't picture you sitting in your garage all day every day."

Haruka leaned back on the car. "There are a lot of days like that, to be honest." She shook her head again, though this time a smile was on her face. "Sometimes I get so absorbed in my work that I'll forget to eat or wind up working all night."

Michiru laughed. "I know how that goes. Sometimes I'll be working in my studio in the middle of the day, and next thing I know it's pitch black outside. I just get so focused on what I'm doing that everything else melts away."

"Exactly. When I'm in the zone, I can spend days in here, totally cut off." Haruka paused, tapping her fingers on the side of the car. "But to be honest, even I have my limits."

"Oh yeah?" Michiru leaned forward, grinning. "And what happens when you reach your limit?"

Haruka studied Michiru, clearly mulling something over. Finally, a cocky smirk bloomed on her face.

"C'mon, Princess," she said, pulling off her grease-covered work gloves. "You wanna see what I do for fun? Get your coat and I'll show you."

Finally, a HaruMichi fic! I wrote the outline to this in LAST JANUARY after driving through a terrible snowstorm. Sorry guys, I wish I wasn't such a slow writer! Better late than never, right? And not to worry, the rest of the fic is nearly done, so you won't be waiting long for the rest of the fic. Hope you enjoyed chapter 1!

Shout out, as always, to my awesome bae-ta Antigone2, who is my constant cheerleader and gives the best feedback a girl could ever hope for.

(My apologies to Garrison Keillor.)