I really liked Gillian's character. I thought that the narrator did a great job of describing her, and that her's was a very believable character. None of the other characters were very well built, but I don't think that was the point, after all, it's a short story.
As for the story itself; I liked it just fine. I don't think that pulley system would work though, which actually is worth mentioning, because it detracted from the story's validity for me. I was reading a story, then, suddenly I was day dreaming about a series of similar situations the author may have been in which sparked the idea for this windshield wiper pulley system. Meaning, while analyzing the pulley system, I was still working within the confines of a belief in this piece of fiction, when I realized that the system probably could not work, I was reminded that this is fiction. Something to keep in mind for we fiction writers eh?