One week later Lena was lugging her carry-on off to the YVR.

The plane to Vancouver was smoother than she expected.

It had been over a year since Lena had flown anywhere and she had almost forgotten the routine. She had sworn she was going to get rugby tackled when the Louisville Airport, aka SDF, security stopped her to question her ID. Just to confirm that she was indeed the chick who played Kitty Matthew's.

He was a diehard X-Files fan.

Cordelia had booked an early morning flight for Lena. Hoping that it would get her out of the rush. But it seemed everyone was going somewhere. New York, Boston, Philly, Los Angeles, there was a plane out to England that was full.

It wasn't just the locals that ate, slept, and breatjer, Kentucky's barrel aged bourbon. It was the tourists too.

Lena was certain that Kentucky wouldn't be much without tourism, and most folks didn't mind it, as long as they were respectful and didn't intrude to much on the day to day. Southerners were renowned for their niceness, Hawaii didn't seem to get the nice tourism memo when she visited as a girl.

The airport in Vancouver was just as Lena remembered it — gray skies, a light mist clinging to the glass windows, the smell of coffee, expensive Arabian perfume, and jet fuel thick in the air. Nothing had changed. Not one bit.

Cordelia had sent a cab to pick her up twenty minutes after she landed. Lena had half-expected and half-resented it. Seeing as she would have preferred to drive herself, to take in the roads, maybe hit a few side streets, enjoy the scenery, and the winding paths that led out of the city and into the imagined wilderness of British Columbia.

But she couldn't lie, that it was easier this way.

Cordelia had always been a damn good manager and an even better best friend.

Lena let herself be carted through the motions, her bags loaded into the trunk as she slid into the backseat, watching as the city gave way to towering evergreens and winding roads that stretched out like veins through the forest.

Williams Lake was five hours from Vancouver.

Five hours of mountains rolling into valleys, mist curling at the peaks, rivers cutting through the landscape like silver ribbons. The forests were full of more evergreen trees than Lena had seen in one place in a long time. Pines stretched tall and endless, lining the narrow road like silent sentinels, their tips lost in the low-hanging mist.

The sky was a soft, slate gray, and the air held a crispness that reminded her that summers in British Columbia were nothing at all like summers back home.

The driver, a middle-aged man with salt-and-pepper hair peeking out from under a worn Canadiens cap, tapped his fingers absently on the steering wheel as he navigated the curves of the rural road. He didn’t talk too much once they got out of the city, which Lena appreciated.

"You from Los Angeles?" the driver asked, his accent thick with the rolling lilt of French Canadian. Lena, still shaking off the last dregs of exhaustion from her flight, shifted in the passenger seat and glanced from the scrift in her hands up at him, raising an eyebrow at him in the rearview mirror.

"Lord, no."

The man flicked a glance at her before returning his focus to the road. “Figured not. You don’t talk like them. Where then?” his accent was thick and unmistakably Québécois.

She hesitated, he wouldn't know the first thing about Southern towns. "Kentucky."

He made a thoughtful sound, tapping his fingers against the wheel. "Mmm. Never been there." A frown appeared as he turned the word over in his mind. “That’s… somewhere south, eh?”

Lena huffed a small laugh, shutting her script book. “Depends on who you ask. Some folks will tell you it’s the Midwest, others swear up and down it’s the South. I just call it home.”

"What’s it like?" he asked, seeming genuinely curious.

Lena leaned back against the seat, tilting her head towards the chill that clung to the glass windows as she thought. "Different," she said after a moment. "Not as many mountains—more rolling hills, real green in the summer. Hot, too. Humid. You ever been in a place where you walk outside and it feels like you just stepped into a wet towel?"

The driver made a face. "No, thank you." Lena laughed.

"Yeah, that's Kentucky in the summer, mainly August. But it’s nice. Good people, good food." Lena leaned her head back against the seat, watching the trees blur past. “There's orse farms, bourbon distilleries. And music—bluegrass, country, folk. That's a lot of what we're known for. The Bluegrass State. It’s a place where people know your name at the grocery store and will absolutely judge you by your college basketball team.”

Louis made a thoughtful noise. “So, nothing like here, except basketball”

She grinned. “Nothing like here.”

Except basketball.

He nodded. "And you left all that for Vancouver?"

Lena gave him a look through the rearview and then glanced back out the window, watching the endless stretch of pine trees blur past. "For now," she admitted. "It’s not permanent. Just for the summer, a few months." That made her feel better.

Just a few months.

A blip in time.

The driver chuckled. "That’s what they all say."

Lena didn’t argue. She wasn’t planning on staying in Canada. But she had said the same thing about buying another property once she was out of acting.

That was short lived.

"How long you been driving?" she asked, shifting the topic.

"A few years. Pays well. Get to meet interesting people." He glanced at her in the mirror, a thin smile pressed on his lips. "Like you."

Lena snorted. "Oh, I’m real interesting."

"You’re an actress, non?"

"Yeah."

"Famous?"

Lena tilted her head, considering. She didn't think of herself as famous, though she supposed she was. People recognized her, not everyone, but a good majority.

She ignored the comment for the time being, adjusting the sleeves of her jacket. “You do a lot of driving for folks like me?”

Louis let out a short chuckle, one hand still drumming against the wheel. “Actors? Sometimes. But mostly, I drive tourists, hunters, fishermen. Americans who think they can handle the wilderness until they realize the nearest Starbucks is a hundred kilometers away.” He shot her a smirk. She didn't feel offended, though she supposed she should have a little bit. “You one of those?”

Lena snorted, shaking her head. “Nope. I grew up in the sticks. Closest Starbucks was a solid forty-five minutes from my house, and that was only if you sped.”

“Ah,” Louis nodded, as if this explained everything. "Sticks."

"And, yes I'm an actress."

"Famous?" He asked again.

"Depends on who you ask I suppose."

The driver chuckled. "If I ask my wife?"

"If she likes The X-Files, maybe."

He let out a low whistle and Lena laughed, the sound out of place in the silver Honda. "That show was big, no?"

"Still is, only by the fans though. It was cut short."

The driver nodded, seemingly impressed. "I liked that polish guy."  He looked back at her in the rearview. "Did the ending upset you?"

"No, no, I'm glad it's over. It was a good run. But it needed its end."

"And now you're in this new one, Supernatural?"

She hadn't told him of her newest endeavor, but she had left her script on her lap, big bold typewriter font spelling out her newest dirty laundry.

Lena gave him a nod, not really knowing the best to say. Kripke hadn't given her the go to he trotting around telling people she was in the show yet.

She stretched her legs out in the backseat, blue shorts displaying her tan. Maybe that's why the cabbie thought she was from L.A. that damn Kentucky tan.

"That’s the plan," she said, "Guess we’ll see how it goes."

The driver shrugged. Eyes back on the road as a green Subaru whipped past. "Well, if it’s big, maybe I’ll tell people I gave you a ride once." Lena chuckled, shaking her head. The guy was hilarious.

"And if it flops?"

That was a possibility she had thought about a lot. It didn't keep her awake enough to lose sleep over, but for water to overfill in the pot sitting in the kitchen sink, spilling out over the rim.

"Then I’ll just say you were very nice."

Lena gave him a toothy grin. "Fair enough." She couldn't argue that.

The conversation drifted after that, the driver returning his focus to the road, and Lena turning back to the trees, the mountains, the wild openness of it all.

By the time they reached the house, the sun was dipping low behind the mountains, casting long golden streaks through the trees. Jet lag had settled in, her eyes heavy and her body beginning to feel a little sickly, though she still held onto her tan, proudly.

A few minutes later, the trees thinned, and a gravel driveway appeared on the right. The house was exactly as she remembered — a two-story cabin tucked into the woods, secluded, nestled between towering pines and overlooking a small lake.

The driver put the car in park and turned to her. Lena picked at the pilling on sleeve of her jacket. “Well, here you are. Middle of nowhere, just like you ordered.”

Lena opened the door and stepped out, stretching her arms above her head as she took in the surroundings.

The air smelled different here that Vancity — cleaner, sharper, with a hint of pine and woodsmoke. The closest thing she could compare it to was the Great Smoky Mountains.

Though there wasn't any mountain laurel to give the comforting illusion.

The beat part about the rental was there wasn't any city noise, no distant hum of traffic. Just the whisper of the wind through the trees and the occasional caw of a crow somewhere in the distance. Canada had a lot of crows, Lena had discovered that her last time here.

She turned back to the Cabbie, who had already popped the trunk and was stepping out to grab her bag.

“I don’t think I caught your name.”

“Louis Bouchard.”

“Nice to meet you, Louis,” Lena said, adjusting the sleeves of her jacket. He tipped his cap.

“Alright then. Enjoy your stay, Kentucky.”

She nearly laughed at that. Kentucky. She missed home, but Louis had made her ride better. She would have to call Cordelia and ask how much she paid for him to drive out here.

Lena watched as he climbed back into the car, the gravel crunching under the tires as he backed out of the driveway and disappeared down the road, leaving her alone with nothing but the cabin, the trees, and the quiet.

Peaceful.

It wasn't Kentucky, but maybe she could pretend, for a little while, or the few days of freedom that Kripke and the rest of the producers and directors had given her, that she wasn’t back in the gig and just on vacation.

Lena exhaled slowly, adjusting the strap of her carry-on, on her shoulder as she turned toward the two-story cabin.

Everything was exactly how she remembered it.

One summer. Just one summer.

The mantra was on repeat for the rest of the five hours she had until Cordelia called.