“Stop? We’re in the middle of the mountains! There’s nowhere to stop!”
I started heaving, my hand in front of my mouth.
“Hold on! Keep it in!” He swore and, in flailing panic, blindly fiddled in the backseat with
his free hand, his eyes never leaving the road. He pulled out a plastic bag, emptying its
contents before throwing it at me.
I pulled the bag open and I threw up immediately, repeatedly.
“That’s so gross!” he gasped, opening his window and sticking his head out. “It still smells
like chow mein.”
The fresh air rushing in from his opened window made me feel better—and I had nothing left in
my stomach to puke up anyway. After a few minutes, I pulled my face away from the bag and
glanced up.
He was glaring at me, holding his nose and wincing. His face had gone from rosy-cheeked to pale
and sickly.
“Throw the bag out the window,” he ordered.
“I can’t do that!” I said. “It’s a plastic bag. It will take over a hundred years to
disintegrate. I don’t want to pollute.”
“Emily,” he said, carefully enunciating every syllable, “if you don’t throw that bag out the
window in the next second, I’m going to be sick too.”
I sighed and reluctantly threw the bag out my window. But I didn’t feel the slightest bit
guilty as I watched him breathe through his nausea.
“Sorry,” I said, trying to not mock him, “I guess my bruised head’s still not quite right.”
He looked at me with revulsion. “That’s the grossest thing I’ve ever seen. Now I’m kinda
glad we didn’t take my car. Who knew one girl could be such a pain …” His voice trailed back
into his head.
“Ugh!” he groaned dramatically a few seconds later, “It really stinks in here.” And he stuck
his head out his window again.
I’ve never had an iron stomach. Once a guy on his bike crashed next to me, and a broken bone in
his right calf pierced through his skin. As any Good Samaritan would do, I insisted on waiting
with him until the paramedics showed up. He spent the next twenty minutes holding my hair back
while I puked on the side of the road. I couldn’t remember if he ever thanked me for waiting
with him.
I thought about telling Kid about this life event to further solidify our kidnapper-hostage
bond, but I was worn out. I let my head fall back into the seat and closed my eyes.
Chapter Five:
The Farm
I was awakened by the sound of gravel crushing against the Audi’s tires.
Kid glimpsed at me from behind the steering wheel.
“Welcome back to the land of the living,” he muttered.
We had turned off the country road onto a narrow, gravel, side road where the blackened branches
of trees hovered too close, trying to grab hold of the Audi, trying to consume us. Kid was
absentmindedly drumming his fingers against the wheel to a Britney Spears tune that was cracking
through the radio in broken waves. The darkness beyond the headlights … it besieged us.
He was wrong. This wasn’t the land of the living. It was a dead zone.
“Where are we?” I croaked.
Kid stretched his arms, pushing against the steering wheel, and sighed, “Almost there, thank
God. Cam totally owes me for this.”
My throat was raw, and my body emotionally exhausted. I could feel the dark isolation seeping
into the car like a deep depression. I just wanted this to be over, but he seemed to be going
through great lengths to drag out the inevitable. Maybe breaking my spirit first was part of the
preparation.
After a while of the tires bouncing us around on the road, the trees moved away, and Kid slowed
down. My eyes were beyond tired; I was even starting to see man-sized shadows stirring in the
woods. I focused on the speck of light that shone ahead. I couldn’t have imagined that—it grew
bigger as we drove closer.
The car came to a stop. Kid turned off the ignition and was out in a flash, breathing in the
fresh air repeatedly, overdramatically. I waited, rubbing my eyes, forcing them to adjust to the
refrigerator-sized light that had come on inside the Audi.
Kid eventually came to rest his hand against the frame of his opened car door. “I don’t know
how you can stand being one more second in that car. It really reeks in here.”
I glanced up through weary eyes. “Am I supposed to get out of the car?”
His face scrunched. “You’re so … weird,” he mumbled, shaking his head and walking away. His
kidnapping methods were confusing to me; or possibly, most people would already know what to do
in these types of situations. I took his obscure response as a yes and climbed out of the
vehicle.