8
We were supposed to be in Kansas City by now. Instead, we seemed to be stopped on the proverbial dark country road in the drizzling rain, in front of an ancient, rusting bridge. Well, half of an ancient, rusting bridge. The span that was supposed to project over the ravine seemed to have broken off and fallen in, leaving a precariously tilted bridge stump on our side of the crevasse.
“Collin.” I straightened in my seat. “Where the hell are we?”
“I didn’t trust the GPS system on your phone,” he said hesitantly. “I believed I remembered a shortcut from my previous travels through the Heartland.”
“Previous travels through the Heartland? Decades ago? Before modern highway systems were built?”
He pursed his lips. “I may have gotten turned around in a few spots.”
“How long have I been asleep, Collin?”
His lips pressed together, glowing white in the greenish light reflected by the dashboard. The clock read 3:20 A.M.
“How long?” I demanded. “How long have you been lost?”
“About six hours,” he admitted. “You were so tired, and I didn’t want to wake you. You haven’t slept properly since you left Half-Moon Hollow.”
“Six hours?”
“Miranda, I know you’ve just received some upsetting … news, but there’s no reason to get overemotional.”
“Overemotional!” I yelled, shoving the door open and stomping down the slight incline to the mouth of the bridge. Wind whipped my hair around my head in a crazed crown as the rain misted over my cheeks. The headlights were warm against my legs as I stood in front of the car, throwing my arms wide. “Overemotional!”
The sky was pitch black above our heads, the moon hazy and soft through the rainclouds. I gave the rocks at my feet a vicious kick, listening as they skittered over the edge and plummeted at least five stories to the shallow water below.
“You get us lost, in the middle of God knows where, when we were only a few hours’ drive from home, and you don’t want me to get overemotional?” I yelled as Collin climbed out of the car. I flew at him, slapping my hands against his chest. I shoved at him, forcing him off the crumbling asphalt shoulder into the grass. “We could be anywhere!”
“Why are you getting so upset? It’s my deadline, not yours. Look, I’ll call Iris and Ophelia. I’ll explain that it was my fault we got off track.”
“You’re not even supposed to be driving the car, Collin!” I exclaimed. “It’s my responsibility to get us from point A to point B. If you tell Iris you got us lost because you were driving, I will be fired.”
“Miranda,” he said, his voice hoarse as he wrapped his arms around me. I struggled against him, shoving my hands against his chest to break free. “Please, stop.”
“You suck,” I hissed.
“Under normal circumstances, you wouldn’t be so angry about this,” he said. “If your idiot fiancé had not just broadcast his sexual hijinks through your phone, you would probably think this was rather funny.”
“No, you getting me fired from a job, after finally finding one that I enjoy, is not funny under any circumstances!”
“It’s a little funny,” he insisted against my forehead, with a level of mirth that was completely inappropriate given our current circumstances.
Before I could respond, I heard the crackle of gravel underneath the tires. The car was rolling forward! Collin hadn’t set the parking brake, and the natural gravity of the slope was pulling it toward the ravine.
“Collin!” I shrieked.
He rounded the car, pulling the bumper and slowing the car’s progress toward certain plunge-y demise. I leaned in through the open driver’s-side window to grab for the emergency brake. Collin’s strength slowed the car’s movement, but it was still rolling. I yanked on the parking brake, only to have the lever snap loose and come off in my hand.
“Shit!”
My feet slipped on the pavement, and I slid forward through the window, smacking my face against the upholstery of the driver’s seat, just as the front tires rolled off the edge. I pushed back, hoping to balance on my arm, to find that my belt buckle was caught on the window track. I was stuck. I couldn’t pull back from the car.
Great, now I was making progress toward certain plunge-y demise.
Well, I always knew it was probably going to end like this. Though I did think that a falling piano was going to be involved somehow.
“Collin!” I screamed.
My legs dangled helplessly out the window, while I wriggled my hips to loosen the buckle. I felt a rush of air behind me. Cool hands jerked twice at my jeans, gripping at my waist. I spotted my photo journal, wedged between the passenger seat and the console, and yanked it free. Just as the car tipped forward, Collin pulled me through the window and set me on my feet. I watched helplessly as the brake lights disappeared over the edge of the bridge.
I stood, horrified and slack-jawed, as the cartoonish mushroom cloud marking the car’s descent and destruction plumed up toward us. Any moment, I expected Wile E. Coyote to walk out with a little sign that read, “Uh-oh.”
“The parking brake?” I whimpered, holding the plastic lever up without looking away from the ravine. The photo journal hung loose from my other hand.
“I may have gotten a bit bored while I was driving. And I’m not used to modern automobiles. Everything’s made of plastic now and, really, very flimsy. I may have been fiddling with the brake lever during the drive and … bent it a bit.”
“Fiddling?”
“I was trying to help!” he shouted back. “I thought that if I could take a shortcut and get us home faster, it would help you impress your employer.”
“And you didn’t see this happening?” I yelled, gesturing wildly at the ravine.
“I told you, my gift is hardly any use around you. All I saw was the possibility of us running off the road because you dropped one of those Slushee drinks in my lap, which I prevented by buying you a bottle of water. Who could possibly guess this would be an outcome?”
“Well, pardon me for being the jinxed albatross around your neck!” I groused, slapping at his chest.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “Pardon me for a minute.”
I shrieked. I shouted nonsense curse words as Collin disappeared over the lip of the ravine. My heart plummeted into my belly, and I dropped to my knees, peering over the edge. I watched as he dropped gracefully to his feet, sticking the landing with some superhero crouch. The Batmobile was turned on its back like a fiery automotive turtle. The engine had burst into flames as the car rolled, engaging the gas line and creating a dangerous little blaze at the front of the car. Collin gingerly yanked the rear doors open, tossed the crumpled metal panels aside, and crawled inside.
“Collin! What the hell are you doing?”
He emerged quickly with his silver briefcase. He dropped it into the water, and I swore I could hear it steaming. I watched as he gripped the handle in his mouth and smoothly, rapidly ascended the rock face of the cliff.
“Are you crazy? That car was on fire!” I yelled as he climbed over the edge and deposited the case at my feet. “That’s one thing on the short list of things that can kill you.”
He held up his all-important case, looking rather proud of himself, which really, really annoyed me. “The case is fireproof. And waterproof … and it can stand up to most explosives. It’s made of the same material they use for the black boxes in planes. I’m sorry I can’t say the same for our suitcases and your purse, which seem to have tumbled directly into the flames.”
Of course.
“Th-the same material as black boxes?” I spluttered. “Collin, for once and for all, what the hell is in that case?”
He opened his mouth, as if he was seriously considering telling me. But he clamped his lips shut and offered an apologetic smile. “I can’t tell you.”
I threw back my head and growled in frustration. He still didn’t trust me. Even after mechanical failures, partial nudity, and parking-lot rescues, he didn’t trust me enough to tell me what I’d been risking my neck to help him move cross-country.
“Fine,” I told him, storming away from the ravine. “I’m out of here.”
“Miranda!” he shouted, running after me. “Where are you going?”
“As far away from you as possible!” I yelled.
“Look at it this way. You don’t have to worry about telling Iris about the repairs.”
I glared at him.
“The wound is too fresh to joke?” he asked as I took a swing at him. He dodged out of the way, of course, and righted me when I nearly fell on my face. “Look, we’ll just find a motel, bunk down for the night, and call Iris in the morning to explain. I told you, I’ll take responsibility for the car.”
“No problem. We’ll find a motel that accepts magic beans as payment!” I whirled around on him. “Maybe you can tell futures out in the parking lot to pay our way.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, his brow furrowed.
Oh, right, Collin didn’t know we were broke.
“M-my purse,” I spluttered. “My purse was in the car, remember? We don’t have any cash, cards, nothing. You know, I thought maybe the worst you could do to me on this trip would be calling Iris and trying to get me fired, but clearly, I have underestimated you. I didn’t realize you would stoop to vehicular homicide to screw with me.”
“Miranda, that’s not fair. I didn’t do this to you.”
“No, but the aftereffects will still be the same,” I told him.
“Slow down, woman. What could you possibly do? You don’t have any cash. You don’t have any identification. How far do you think you’re going to get?”
I turned on him, snaking my hand into my bra. Collin frowned, perplexed about why I was feeling myself up. “Ha!” I exclaimed, pulling out a twenty-dollar bill I had tucked in the right cup. With the other hand, I presented my driver’s license, which had been nestled under my left breast. “And ha!”
He stared at me. “What—what else do you have in there?”
“Nothing. Well, not nothi—never mind. I always carry my driver’s license and extra cash in my bra.”
“Why?”
“Because of situations like this!” I yelled, throwing my arms wide. “These screwed-up worst-case scenarios that I seem to find myself in.” I pushed past him. “I’m done, do you hear me, Collin? Done. I’m done with you. I’m done with your stupid case. I quit!”
I turned on my heel and stomped off, the drizzling rain soaking through my clothes.
“Not like you care,” I grumbled petulantly. “You’ve got your case, right? You’re covered.”
He caught up to me without really trying. “Don’t do that. I could have gone for the case, but I pulled you out of the car before it fell over the cliff. So don’t pretend that I put this thing ahead of you.” He grabbed my arm—gently, I supposed, given his strength—and made me stop. My momentum threw me off-balance into his side. “And I do care about you. You force me to. Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is to be induced to care about someone against your will?”
“Did you hit your head on your way down that ravine?” I demanded.
“You’re messy, and you’re loud and chaotic. And you’re kind. You have a profound sense of what’s right. You made me laugh, really laugh, for the first time in decades. I like the way you look at the world, the way it comes through in your photos. I love that you are a constant surprise. I’m two hundred sixty years old. Do you know how long it’s been since I was surprised by anything?”
“So you like me because I’m chaos,” I scoffed. “I am a walking tornado of destruction. That’s not exactly a profession of love.”
“Do you want one?” he asked, grinning at me and leaning in as if to sweep his mouth over mine.
“No.” I reached up and popped him on the nose like a misbehaving dog. I put my finger in his face. “Sorry, that was probably an overreaction. I’m just a little a wired. But really, do not even think about kissing me right now.”
“Ow!” he exclaimed. “I guess you don’t want one.”
I turned and walked down the road with purpose. “Didn’t see that one coming, did you?” I called over my shoulder.
He pinched his nose, testing it for broken cartilage. “No, I did not.”