December 30, 8:34 pm
Throughout time, storms caused people to hide, made children cry, and adults lied. Saying things like “Don’t worry, dear, the angels are bowling.” I wasn’t one of those people who found the rumbling roll of thunder terrifying or startling. It calmed me.
I’d sit by my window and watch as lightning streaked through the sky like cracks in glass. Nature could be calm and comforting, but it could also be violent. There was an odd beautyin that violence that I couldn’t help but admire. Maybe that made me strange? Maybe it made me dark—my closet was so full of skeletons that the bones were spilling out. I didn’t know why I enjoyed watching the world vent its anger. I just did.
This storm, however, was different.
It wasn’t nature’s anger or violence. This storm was full-on rage as if God himself chose today to release the last century of wrath.
The downpour was so bad that the road was barely visible. Everything beyond a couple of feet was gone. Even the black flash of the wipers streaking across my windshield washed out. I had them swiping as fast as they could, and all it did was smear the rain into watery claw marks that blurred what little visibility I did have.
My headlights weren’t helping, either. They bounced uselessly off the asphalt as if the storm itself was swallowing the beams whole, while wind battered my tiny car and thunder cracked overhead so loud, I could feel it in the steering wheel.
One minute, I was driving down a quiet road, and the next, the apocalypse had descended upon me. At least that was what it felt like. Not that I would be that lucky. Then again, if the rapture did indeed happen, I wouldn’t be one of the people taken to the Promised Land.
Leaning forward, I got closer to the glass and tried to see through the curtain of rain surrounding me.
Rain was everywhere. To the left, right, behind me, and on the road ahead. I couldn’t escape the cruel mockery of it. Water damned my soul years ago. Maybe it had finally come to claim it.
For a split second, I could hear her sweet voice, high and bubbling with laughter.
“Come play with me, Mazie.”
My stomach lurched as the tires skimmed over a sheet of water, jerking the car to the right.
Was this what my life had come to? Dying alone on some desolate road with no one around. How sad was that?
I desperately tried to control the hydroplane while a voice in the back of my mind told me that I deserved this. I deserved to feel suffocated and terrified like she did. It was my fault after all. And no matter how far I drove, or how many years I was gone, I would never be able to outrun the memory of her smiling face.
“No, not now,” I whispered and forced the steering wheel straight. “Not tonight.”
Tonight, I would have peace. I would get through this storm, find a place to rest, and dream about better times. Tonight, I would forget. It was the same New Year's resolution I made every year. And like every other year, the world wouldn’t let me forget.
The storm pressed down on the roof of the car and hammered against my windows, choking me with the scent of rain and the moisture in the air. Everything was dripping and wet, just like her watery grave. The trees, the road, my car… It all taunted me with the sins of my past.
“Get it together, Mazie. It’sjust a storm. You’ve been through worse.” Lately, talking to myself was the only thing that kept me from going completely insane. “Everything will be fine.”
But would it? Did I want it to be?
A fork of lightning split the sky, lighting up a crooked sign up ahead. The letters were warped but still legible.
Craven Hotel.
Underneath that was a bright red saying, vacancy.
I slammed on the brakes and stared at the arrow pointing down a road cutting through trees.
A part of me wanted to keep driving and let the storm take me where it wanted, except another flash put an end to that. The road ahead was not only flooded but blocked by heavy branches.
Sighing, I looked back at the sign. “Guess I don’t have a choice.”
Pushing my foot on the gas, I steered onto the narrow gravel path.
The road wasn’t very well-maintained. Trees closed in around my car, scraping overgrown branches along my roof, like fingernails on a chalkboard. Every screech and scratch sent a shiver up my spine.
I turned up the radio and sang along toHotel California, hoping to drown out the trees grabbing for me. It worked for a bit, but the longer I drove, the louder those branches got. The road seemed to go on forever.
When the third song came on, the foliage finally broke, revealing my so-called safe haven from the storm.
