Several hours pass before Drew suggests stopping. I shift in my seat while trying not to elbow Sara. I’ve tried to scoot as close to Matt as possible, but even so, fitting the four of us into the front seat of this truck hasn’t made for the most comfortable trip.
“Yes please,” I mumble. I instinctively start looking for an exit sign before realizing we could just stop anywhere. These roads we’ve been taking have been mostly empty, especially in the last half hour or so. There’s just been a few abandoned vehicles and crows picking at gruesome piles I tried not to identify.
“There’s an exit there,” Sara offers, pointing to an overpass ahead. She just barely manages to stifle a yawn and rubs a hand across her face. I don’t know if it’s just the traumatic morning or what, but she looks exhausted. Her eyes are dark and she keeps rubbing her forehead. Maybe a migraine? But then she’s also been constantly readjusting and fiddling with the atlas— really anxious behavior.
Drew lets off the gas as we approach the exit and Sara shifts away from his leg again. She’s tried to avoid getting too close despite the cramped quarters, but that just means she’s been pressed up against me instead. And each time she flinches away, I see Drew’s hands flex on the steering wheel.
He said he didn’t feel bad about leaving her uncle on the porch this morning, but I’ve known him too long to believe that. Drew may be bossy, overprotective, and a touch arrogant at times, but he looked guilty when I called him out about it— too guilty to truly feel nothing.
Right before I ruined everything, I remember. I bite my lip and feel a blush rising, even hours later. If I hadn’t tripped over my own feet and knocked that picture frame off the wall, we would probably still be at that house. Or maybe the street would have cleared and we would have parted ways.
Would we have just parted ways? I wonder. I wouldn’t want to be left alone, not in this world, and I’d argued that we shouldn’t —couldn’t— just leave her alone. Drew keeps reminding us – more so me, probably – that no one can be trusted. But so far Sara doesn’t seem evil to me. I mean, we are driving her truck after all. Which was conveniently parked outside the window of the room she locked herself in earlier. She could have just ditched us, but all of us got out of there.
I squirm in my seat as we slow to a stop near the center of the bridge. This road looks eerily abandoned too as Drew finally shifts into park. It strikes me as wrong somehow, seeing these empty stretches of road that a few months ago would have been teeming with traffic— or at least a few other moving vehicles— now devoid of any movement.
Matt waits for Drew’s okay and passes him Sara’s rifle before opening the door. I look at Sara, but she doesn’t react. Instead, she watches as Drew pulls the key from the ignition part way and leaves it there. The truck dings as Drew gets out, only turning off once he’s closed the door. Sara’s gaze stays on the key for a moment, but then she finally shakes her head and slides out behind me with her backpack.
“There’s water and food in the black tote,” she says. She shrugs her backpack on and eyes the woods toward the end of the bridge, shifting her weight. She glances back toward the steering wheel and then to the trees again. She does seem more nervous than tired now. And then suddenly I get it – she’s nervous about us. She must think we’ll drive off and leave her if she walks away. I saw the way she tried not to get too far ahead of the guys back at the underpass too. That has to be it.
“I have to pee,” I announce abruptly. All eyes are on me, even Drew’s as he rounds the front of the truck, and I feel like a toddler when he raises his eyebrows. I look away quickly and see Matt open his mouth, but I cut him off before he can say anything. “Sara,” I say instead, “will you come with me?” I hope I read her right, and that she’ll at least trust that the guys won’t leave without me. She bites her lip slightly and stares down the road, but then slowly she nods.
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“Great,” I say, “I’m about to burst.” I resist the urge to grab her arm and drag her away before Matt or Drew can say something, but I’m not quite fast enough. Drew holds up a hand and steps into our path, arguing that it’s not safe. He glances past us at Matt, who I know is probably in agreement.
“Anything that’s nearby would have been drawn in by the sound of the truck already,” I argue. He surveys the road and the trees, but there’s no movement. I pull the handgun Sara gave me earlier out of my pocket. “I know how to use it,” I say sternly. I indicate Sara’s holstered gun with my other hand. “I think we can manage to pee by ourselves.” I glance at Sara, who looks a bit bewildered. Apparently she hasn’t had to deal with overprotective boyfriends and their brothers. I wince at that thought, though, realizing maybe overprotective is better than what she’s experienced.
“Fine,” Drew says at last, exchanging another look with Matt, “but don’t go far.” I roll my eyes and walk around him. After a second, Sara catches up and we walk across the rest of the bridge toward the trees.
“Did you mean for me to keep it?” I ask after we’ve put some distance between us and the truck. I hold the gun up slightly when she looks over at me.
“It wasn’t mine,” she replies with a shrug. She pauses at the edge of the pavement as we reach the trees, squinting into the shade between the tall, straight trunks.
“Your uncle’s,” I say quietly, more to myself than anything as I look down at the gun in my hand. And then wish I could for once just keep my mouth shut. How many times can I bring up her uncle that we left for dead before she decides to kick us to the curb? She simply blinks, though, still scrutinizing the shadowy spaces between the trees. I shift my weight, wishing I could snatch the words back somehow, but then she sighs and looks at me.
“My cousin’s,” she says in an inscrutable tone. She quickly unclips her gun and pulls it out, moving forward into the trees and cutting off any questions. Since there was no one else at the house, though, I can guess the rest of the story.
After a quick glance back at the truck – where Matt still has his eyes on us – I follow Sara into the woods. She looks back toward the road after a few yards. Following her glance, I see that we’re far enough that it’s is out of sight. My heart does a jittery leap in my chest, but I don’t sense anything dangerous. I can hear all the normal animal noises– birds chirping, leaves rustling in the breeze– but no growls or sloppy footsteps now that we’ve stopped.
“I’ll just…” I let the sentence hang and indicate that I'm heading to the left. Sara nods and heads the opposite direction. We meet back up when we’re finished and she passes me a bottle of hand sanitizer. I squeeze some in my hand and thank her as I pass it back, intrigued by all the useful things she seems to have. She swings her backpack off and stuffs the bottle back in the front pocket, then swipes her hand over her face as she shrugs it back on. I let her lead the way out and notice when she stumbles slightly.
“Are you okay?” I finally ask, coming to a stop. She turns back just as we reach the edge of the woods and looks at me without answering. The question came automatically, but her reluctance to answer makes me even more curious. I scrutinize her more closely– stumbling, tired, sunken eyes, and it can’t be much past noon. Diabetes comes to mind first, but I can’t imagine how she’d be managing that with no power or pharmacies. Or maybe blood loss from this morning. But she didn’t bleed that much, did she? “You’re stumbling, and yawning, and rubbing your eyes. You were practically falling asleep in the truck, and it’s the middle of the day.” She glances at the watch on her wrist.
“I’m just tired,” she mumbles, but I see her stifle another yawn as she turns and steps onto the blacktop. I jog a few steps to come up beside her and try to bite my tongue. But a moment later she rubs her face again.
“Just tired?” I ask. She immediately drops her hand and shoves it in her pocket. After another few steps, when we’re halfway back to the truck, she sighs and comes to a stop.
“I’ve been up all night,” she says. She pulls her hand back out of her pocket and checks the watch again. “Over 18 hours,” she adds after a moment to calculate. A confused oh escapes me, and she glances at me before continuing toward the truck.
“I took the night shift,” she adds. She rolls her shoulders and I see her jaw tighten, obviously done sharing.
“Oh,” I say again. At least with the three of us, we can divide the night into short shifts and manage a decent amount of sleep each night. I can’t imagine if I had to do more than three or four hours though, and I suspect my shift isn’t actually the same length as Matt and Drew’s are.
“It’s fine,” Sara says quietly as we near the truck. I nod and follow her around to the truck bed, where she opens the black tote she’d mentioned and passes out water, a box of crackers, and two jars of peanut butter. I also see – though I'm pretty sure she didn’t mean for me to – when she grabs an energy shot and slips it into her pocket.