Creative Writing: The Land Rover

The Land Rover sat at the base of a mesa, dead and useless. A nearby ash tree with its broad umbrella canopy provided slight shade and helped reduce the daytime temperatures from boiling to simply sweltering. After a week, Jade still couldn’t believe the disaster this road trip became. Lane gnawed at her patience (this was all his fault, after all) and she didn’t want to look at him, so she stood away from the Rover and stared at the rampant vegetation surrounding her. The desert, she thought, should be stark, barren—all sand and rock and sun—but she was wrong. Several different vines snaked through the low grass, and great shocks of purple and blue sage dotted the land along with a crayon box of colorful flowers.
“You’re not gonna leave me, are you?”

They alighted and buzzed erratic circles in the air.
“I said let the flies get at it,” Jade said and flushed the wound with water she’d gathered from a nearby pool. “Leave it alone and let the flies get it. Trust me now.”
Lane opened his mouth to protest, then closed it and lay back against his pack; his foot was propped on Jade’s pack. He baked in the mid-day heat beneath the ragged tarp they’d hung from the open doors of the Rover. Jade watched her brother’s sickly form and wondered how much longer his body could handle the situation. It was floundering now, barely treading water, but at some point, he’d start to go downhill, and it’d happen quickly when it started. She looked back at the scenery.
Ernie, Lane’s Airedale, high-stepped around the front of the Rover. He wagged his tail at Lane, walked over and sat next to him. Lane ran his hands through the dog’s fur. Jade watched the pair. Ernie proved a godsend, twice bringing dead hares to supplement their provisions and discovering a pool of water. She cooked the meat over meager fires in the evenings and then chewed and chewed and half-convinced herself the charred meat tasted better than it