on the right side of the road was a little sign. It was too far ahead to see. Helen walked along the highway, wheat fields to the left, wheat fields to the right, the mountains far ahead. The sun beat down on her.
"Helen had a steamboat" read the sign. It was a billboard, she supposed, but a small one, hand-painted a long time ago, for some forgotten advertisement. She approached it, and passed it, the only marking on the long road. She kept walking.
How far were the mountains? They were her destination, so long, so long, a trek. But equally she was leaving what was behind. When she reached the mountains there would be woods again. And there were things that she should do. But first, she had to reach them. Another sign had come up on the right. A little dot, growing slowly with each footstep.
"The steamboat had a bell" read the sign. Steamboats and bells. Nothing like that out here. Just sun, and wheat fields, endless rolling fields, every spot like every other one she had ever seen. Bells had pure, ringing tones. The wheat fields were a whispering sssssss sound. Sweat dripped from her brow, cooled slightly by the breeze, but it was no match for the sun. She wiped her face. The sweat tasted salty. Her hands felt thick, hanging down as she walked. She thought about her home, the cool woods, with the rustling leaves. They were similar to the rustling wheat, but deeper, richer, moister, with more color. She remembered her favorite old beech, with its gnarled roots ...
"The steamboat went to heaven" read another sign. She had been recollecting, and hadn't noticed it coming up. Well there were certainly heavens here. Clear blue sky out to the horizon in all directions, above a sea of dry wheat tops. It was just her, nothing ahead, nothing behind, just her and the road and the hot summer breeze. Unless you counted the grasshoppers. Occasionally she would find one warming on the side of the road. It would fly off to the side when she got too close.
Another sign was coming up. Trod, trod, trod. Eventually she could read it ... it said "Helen went to" and nothing more. Suddenly a murder of crows burst from the wheat behind the sign, cawing, flying across the road into the wheat field to the left, their black forms silhouetted against the deep blue sky. It gave her a terrible sense of deja vu. Well of course she had seen crows before.
There must be yet another sign up ahead, to complete the rhyme. Helen wondered how long it would take her to reach the mountains. It seemed like it was taking forever. Perhaps she would never reach them. Probably not, since she was stuck in a time loop. Wait ... no, she'd lost her train of thought. She'd probably remember it again later. In the meantime, she felt she was making good progress walking. Up ahead
This was first posted as a response to a prompt on reddit.com r/WritingPrompts, though it was written before seeing the prompt.