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large truck or step van. Its foremost feature was a dented metal table bolted to the floor. A couple of plastic milk crates could be seen, plus a folded-up metal chair, and in a forward corner sat a HOME DEPOT bag on its side. Next to it lay a Black & Decker power drill, and from this an electrical cord extended and disappeared into the front of the vehicle. Battery charger? she wondered. In the back sat some additional grocery bags, and to Veronica’s left there lay stacked three dingy sleeping bags, rolled up. But when her eyes panned to the opposite corner…

Oh my God…

She saw a Bescor bowl-mount tripod and—

Veronica stared.

—a Sony HVR-S27 digital video camera.

The familiar shaggy head appeared in an opening up front. “Why, hey there, Veronnerka!” greeted Helton.

“You!” she yelled when the hand came off her mouth.

“That rascal behind ya’s my nephew Micky-Mack.”

The muscular arms around her loosened. Shuddering, Veronica craned her neck and saw a lean, 20ish man with choppy blond hair and a ragtag jacket. He grinned, showing bad teeth. “Hey there! Good golly, you’se a purdy one!”

It now occurred to her that Helton was sitting in front on the passenger side of the mysterious truck. “And this here,” he said, “is my son, Dumar.”

Now the driver looked back: a creepily skinny redneck with long, stringy black hair and a thin face. “Howdy, Veronnerka! My Paw done tolt us all about ya! Says you was a mite nice sellin’ him that fancified camera.”

The truth finally set in. I’ve been abducted by crazy rednecks! and she screamed at the top of her lungs.

The truck weaved. Helton and Micky-Mack palmed their ears. “Dang, girl!” the younger man yelled.

“Let me ‘splain!” Helton barked.

When Veronica stopped screaming, her heart felt ready to explode.

“Sheee-IT, missy!” Helton climbed in back and sat his large frame on a milk crate. Micky-Mack, erection in his pants and all, slipped out from behind her and took a crate next to her.

“Ya scream louder’n a blammed train whistle,” Helton said. “Ain’t no call fer screamin’.”

“What else can I do?” she yelled. “You’ve abducted me!”

“Aw, no, hon, now see, ya just don’t understand. We ain’t abductered ya, we only, kind’a, borrowed ya fer awhile.”

“Borrowed? Why?”

Helton flapped a sheaf of papers. “That camera ya solt me’s right nice, but holy jumpin’ jehossafats!” He frowned at the papers, whose front page read OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS - SONY HI-DEF HVR SERIES. “‘Tis true I ain’t had no proper schoolin’, but my Maw, she made dang shore I learnt ta read. I gotta tell ya, though, these damn ‘structions? I cain’t make head’re tails of ’em. May as well be readin’ Alfred Einstein!”

Veronica’s face seemed to slowly droop, like melting wax. “Helton. Are you saying that you abducted me because you don’t understand the instruction booklet for the Sony?”

The shaggy head nodded. “Yeah, hon. All these buttons’n switches? A hill fella like me’d never figure it all out. So’s I need you ta show me how to work the dang thing.”

Are these men on drugs, or are they just out of their minds? she thought.

“We’se need ya to help us out is all.”

“Helton, couldn’t you have just asked me? Did you really need to abduct me in a parking lot?”

Helton sighed. “Reason we didn’t do that, is ’cos, well, this is a ‘mergency. A family ‘mergency. We’se need a favor is all, and since I knows you to be a nice-type gal, I took it unta myself—”

“To abduct me!” she yelled.

Helton appeared downcast. “It’s only ’cos ya don’t understand the whole ball’a wax. But this is dang important.”

“Family videos at Christmas is important enough to abduct someone against their will?” she continued to bellow. “Helton, you’re not making any sense!”

Micky-Mack had been staring fixedly at Veronica’s bosom the whole time. He seemed pent up sitting there on his crate, but finally he rubbed his crotch, said, “Hail, Unc Helton, this gals tits stickin’ out are killin’ me. I’se just got to have me a feel,” and then his callused redneck hand reached for her bosom.

CRACK!

Micky-Mack fell off his milk crate due to the mammoth open palm that slapped him upside of the head. “Dang, Unc Helton! That hurt!”

“This ain’t no ruckin’, boy, and you know it!” came Helton’s authoritative scold. “Veronnerka’s our friend, and we ain’t layin’ a cotton-pickin’ finger on her less’n she says we can. Ya hear me, boy?”

“Aw, fuck yeah, Unc,” Micky-Mack whined and sat back on the crate, “but Gawd dang that hurt.” Dumar up front was laughing.

The truck rocked and rocked, and Veronica’s unsorted thoughts rocked with it. Madness, madness… Certainly, abductions of young women were always founded by some sexual motive. So…

Why haven’t they raped me? Why this nonsense about needing help with the camera?

“Okay, Helton”—it was the only thing she could think to say—“I’ll show you how to operate the Sony.”

“Why that’s just dandy, girl!”

She picked up the weighty unit, flicked some switches, turned on the lamp. “There. It’s ready now.” She turned the unit around to show him. “See that little square? That’s the view-screen. Whatever you see in that is what you record. And to shoot”—she shouldered the camera and began to record Helton’s astonished face—“you squeeze this little button here on the grip.” She panned around the inside of the truck, released the record button, then showed the view-screen to Helton. “Now I’m replaying the movie I just made. Watch.”

Micky-Mack rushed over and squatted next to his uncle. In the modest view-screen they watched.

“Hey! That’s you, Unc Helton!”

“Shore is! Dang if that ain’t a fine?movin’-picture camera!”

“It’s all stored on the camera’s memory, but it’s also copied onto this”—she snapped out the mini memory card. “You know, this doohicky that you bought twenty of. So for your friend to see your Christmas movies, all you have to do is give him this.”

Helton held out his hands. “It’s too good to be true!”

“That shore is some fancy camera!” Micky-Mack enthused.

Even Dumar, peering back, exclaimed, “Dang!”

Veronica set the camera back down. “There. Now you know how to use it, so you don’t need me any more. You can drop me off right here.”

Helton grit his teeth. “Naw, see, hon, it ain’t that easy.”

I KNEW it! “So it’s all a lie then, right?” she spat. “You abducted me because you want to rape me!”

“Please don’t think that,” Helton pleaded. “You’re right. We done sort’a took ya ‘gainst yer will, but it’s all fer a greater good. It’s like this…” Helton rested his shaggy chin on his dirty fingertips. “When a poe-leece man’s follerin’ some bad fellas, if that poe-leece man’s car breaks down, then it’s all right for him to stop the next car that come by and take it—I think it’s called common-deerin’. See, that poe-leece man’s allowed to take another car. Why? ’cos it’s fer a