“We’ll get home faster if we keep going,” I said.
Trudy nodded but her round eyes didn’t leave the windscreen.
She might as well have screamed at the top of her lungs:
“That’s if we manage to get home!”
The storm had come on quickly and without preamble, like a stalker waiting in the bushes to leap out at the least opportune moment.
I’d always been a city girl, even if I had been born in the wide-open spaces of Ashbourne.
The basket of America.
The basket case of America more like.
After my friend had been abducted by a random stranger—a random stranger I had encouraged her to approach no less—the city morphed from a place of potential and light into one of darkness and danger.
It’d always been that way, but I’d always managed to distract myself with parties and drinks and, above all, men.
After my friend disappeared to God knows where, I found I could no longer block out the darker, seedier aspects of city living.
Suddenly, the city was no longer exciting, but dangerous.
And I felt the overwhelming need to return to my roots, where I belonged.
Ashbourne.
I quit my job, packed up my things, and alerted my parents to my intentions.
They were happy to see more of me, but after three months, I was beginning to grow weary of this place the same way I had five years ago.
Trudy pointed out the windscreen toward a block of warm and inviting yellow light.
Despite the cascading rain, I could make out the single block of red neon light and spinning yellow spur on one corner that signified The Spur bar.
My foot began to ease off the gas.
Maybe stopping, ordering a drink, and waiting out the storm wouldn’t be so bad.
But when I spotted the patrol car parked in the lot, my hesitating foot buried itself on the gas pedal.
The day had been a washout as it was.
I didn’t need to make it even worse.
“The lot’s full,” I lied. “It’s not far to your house anyway.”
Trudy settled back into the passenger seat and clutched her bag even tighter to her chest.
Trudy wasn’t a bad sort.
She just wasn’t my sort.
At high school, she’d always been the studious one, joining the chess club and spelling bee, mastering both.
Of all the girls in my year, I expected her to be the highflyer.
Instead, she never got up the gumption to shake this dusty old town from her heels and remained here.
I spotted her exit and took the long turn that led onto her street.
I pulled up outside her house, both of us relieved she would soon be getting out of the pick-up.
She reached for the door handle, paused, and turned back to me.
“Um, are you sure you’ll be all right getting home tonight?”
She didn’t want me to come inside, which was why she hadn’t offered me a cup of coffee.
Under different circumstances, I might have taken her up on her non-offer just to wind her up but felt I would be the one who came off worse if I accepted.
“I’ll be fine. Be careful on the way out. The door handle sticks sometimes.”
She yanked on it and, as promised, the door wouldn’t open.
She yanked harder but it still wouldn’t open.
“You have to pull on the handle and shoulder the door at the same time,” I said.
Trudy gave me a look that promised her presence wouldn’t be much of a problem in the future.
She did as I suggested and the door flew open.
She barely managed to catch herself before falling out.
She slammed the door behind her and trudged up the path to her front door.
I waited until she was inside before pulling out.
My parents’ farm was another ten miles down the freeway.
Ten miles of freedom.
It was the best part of the whole day.
I made the slow circle back to the freeway and waited for two cars that passed before pulling out.
The cars’ tail lights were lost within minutes.
Thick American Elms reared up on either side of the freeway, pointing like spears at the overcast skies.
I needed to think about what I was going to do next with my life.
For three months I’d been contemplating the same question and I still had no answer.
It felt like I was waiting for something.
But what?
I had no idea, but it was a prickling sensation at the back of my mind, daring me to do otherwise.
Eventually, I would have to confront what happened to my abducted friend and the role I played in it.
She never would have approached the stranger if it wasn’t for me.
Whatever happened to her was my fault.
I felt the familiar hot wad form in the back of my throat, ticklish and stinging.
I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and kept my grip firmly on the steering wheel.
The darkness closed in around me, fitting tightly like a shroud.
I’d grieved for my missing friend many times over the past year but never found much relief.
I got the feeling she was still out there somewhere, still alive.
I couldn’t explain how I knew that, I just did.
It was the kind of feeling that would never go away, not until someone presented me with her body on a cold slab.
I shook my head of the idea and focused on the road.
I arched around the broad swell of Phoenix Lake.
From here, the random neon green and blue flashes of lightning reflected off the lake’s dimpled surface.
That’s when I heard it:
A thunderous neon blue explosion and a screeching cry at complete odds with the booming thunder from earlier.
A glint of moonlight winked off the metal frame of the plummeting object.
“Oh my God!”
The metal craft zipped through the air, its tail green with fire as it careened toward the road—my road!
Right where I was driving.
I grabbed the wheel with both hands and swung it around.
The metal screamed as if in pain as it grew louder—and bigger!—in my windscreen.
My previous swerve brought me directly into its line.
I swerved again.
The entire pick-up shuddered as the object slammed into the lake’s surface, sending up a
