“I have to go to the bathroom,” says Blake.
“Hold it.”
“Is that truly the risk you want to take? Do I look like somebody with flawless bladder control?”
“I have to go too. We’ll go together.”
“Oh, yay.”
I get out of the car, keeping a close eye on Blake’s seat belt and the possibility that it might pop loose at any moment.
By the way, if you’re one of those people who buys a book and then skips around in it, it’s possible that this is the first page you’re reading. Let me assure you that I’m not the bad guy. Blake is horrible. I’m not going to go so far as to say that my behavior is justified, but at least skim the first twenty-five chapters, okay? Then you’ll understand.
I swipe my debit card.
The electronic display on the gas pump informs me that the transaction has been declined.
I swipe it again.
Declined.
I almost swipe it a third time but decide I can’t handle that much rejection. Was it insufficient funds? I thought I had enough money in my bank account to get me to California, but I also have to concede that planning is not my strongest personality trait right now.
“Do you have a credit card?” I ask Blake.
“For what?”
“Gas.”
“You didn’t bring gas money?”
“It won’t take my card.”
Blake stares at me for a while. “You’re a very poor kidnapper.”
“I know.”
“Am I gonna get reimbursed?”
“How about we split the costs? You owe me that at least.”
Blake rolls down the window and hands me a credit card.
“Thank you.”
“You realize they can trace it, right?”
“Yeah. If I’m worried about a credit card transaction being traced, I’ll know it’s gone too far.”
“Fair enough.”
I fill up the tank and give Blake back his credit card. I can’t deny that I’m quite a bit less devoted to the idea of driving him all the way to California now. It sounded okay while in the midst of a nervous breakdown, but I feel like there will be a lot of reasons to say, “Oops.”
We go into the gas station, and I generously allow him to use the restroom. I suppose he could leave a message for the next person, but as with the credit card tracing, if I hit the point where I’m doing a sweep of a restroom to make sure that Blake hasn’t left any messages, our road trip has gone too far.
We get back in my car, and I still haven’t decided if I’m going to turn around and head for home or if I’m going to pretend that the California trip is still on.
What would you do? Be honest.
Not kidnap Blake in the first place? Thanks. That’s real helpful. I bet you would’ve given a real answer if Katniss Everdeen asked for advice.
I decide to continue toward California. Let Blake sweat it out for a while longer and hope that he’ll learn his lesson. If I’m lucky, he’ll start sobbing and pleading for mercy and promising to help me put my life back to normal before it’s time to fill up the tank again.
And then my car breaks down.
27.
I'm able to get my sputtering car off to the side of the road before it stops working. Black smoke billows from underneath the front hood.
“Do you think it’s going to explode?” Blake asks.
“No, but we should get out.”
We hurriedly exit the vehicle and move far enough away that we won’t be struck by flaming debris if it blows up.
“I take back all the things I’ve said about your car,” says Blake. “It’s a fine, reliable automobile.” He coughs, even though we’re not in range of the smoke anymore. “I’d call a tow truck, but some very intelligent person threw away my phone.”
I pull out my own phone. This would be a wonderfully ironic moment to discover that my battery is dead, but I’ve still got seventy-one percent left, so it’s cool.
“You’re bad at everything, aren’t you?” asks Blake.
I punch him in the face.
Unlike my previous laughable efforts, this is a pretty darn good punch. It gets him right in the jaw. He lets out a grunt of pain, and his knees wobble.
Having done this, I suddenly suffer the emotional anguish of knowing that I’ve resorted to violence as well as the physical pain of how much the punch hurt my hand.
Blake looks like he’s going to topple over, but he doesn’t. Should I give him a gentle shove?
He looks really mad. Scary mad. Like if this were a very different type of book, I’d expect his skin to split open and reveal the demonic creature inside.
I almost feel like I should offer him one free punch to even things out.
He leaps at me. I throw another punch. I was not on the receiving end of this punch and thus cannot say this from personal experience, but I’m pretty sure that getting punched in the face hurts a lot more when you were in the middle of leaping at somebody.
He stumbles backward, trips, and falls to the ground.
Then he gets back up, growls (I always assumed that I’d have a good laugh if somebody actually growled at me, but nope.), and charges at me.
I don’t know any fancy martial arts moves, so I settle for letting him tackle me. We both crash to the ground.
I’m surprised that nobody has pulled over to offer us a ride, but it could have something to do with the fact that we’re currently beating each other up.
He punches me in the face. It hurts worse than my hand did when I punched him in the face.
I try to punch him in the face, but my fist brushes across his earlobe. If he wore an earring, it might have caught on my
