I stop on the porch and stare into the darkness. Where is my SUV?
My gut plummets. The intruder has played a trick. Took my keys, moved my vehicle, and then left the keys on the floor, for me to find if I tried, only to discover there was nothing to use them on.
I hit the Unlock button, and a distant beep-beep sounds. It’s coming from down the lane. Right! I left the SUV there.
I cannot recall the last time I ran—the last time Idaredrun—but I run down that lane, slipping on damp patches and loose stones, cursing myself for parking so far away. I reach the vehicle, yank open the door, slide in, start the engine and…
It is only when the tires spin that I rememberwhyI left the SUV here. It’s stuck.
Conveniently stuck. Where it had never gotten stuck before. Oh, I know about the overrun creek, but in that moment, I am certain I’ve been intentionally trapped, and what fills me isn’t terror but fury.
I willnotdie like this. I don’t care how carefully the intruder has arranged my death. I spent my career putting my heroines in predicaments exactly like this. A dozen escape options leap to mind. As I sort through the most realistic ones, I work on getting the vehicle free, hitting the gas in drive and then reverse?—
The tires spin, and the SUV screams backward out of the rut. I hit the brakes, momentarily stunned by my success. Then afigure appears in the headlights, too hazy to make out with my shitty night vision.
I hit the gas again, my gaze on the reverse camera as I roar down the rutted road. The driveway curves, and all I see through the camera is dark trees. There’s an empty space to my left, and I pull into it for a three-point turn. I’m almost around and glancing over my shoulder when I see a figure behind me. Someone is in my back seat.
I hit the gas. I don’t think. All I want is to get away, and I jam on the gas and the SUV lurches and veers.
“Marguerite! Watch?—!”
The front end slams into a tree, and the world goes dark.
“Marguerite.Come on, Mags. Wake up.”
My eyelids flutter. I open them to see Richard. We’re in my SUV, and I’m slumped in my seat.
Did I fall asleep at the wheel?
I don’t care. Richard is beside me, and seeing him, the last twenty months evaporate in a blink. It was all a dream. The worst kind of “twist” in a story, but dear lord, I’ll take it.
The pandemic never happened. Richard didn’t die. My sister and friends didn’t die. Dolly didn’t die. Everything is fine, except for the part where I fell asleep at the wheel, and God, I’m going to lose my license, aren’t I? I don’t care. Don’t care at all. Better that than…
I see Richard then. And I see right through his opaque form to the windshield, the dark autumn night, and the deflating airbag.
My eyes fill with tears and I pull back sharply, smacking against the head rest.
“Mags?” he says.
I refuse to look at him, this delusion woven from my treacherous brain.
He moves into my field of vision. “I’m sorry. I only meant to spook you, not scare you into crashing the car.”
I don’t answer, just turn away as my eyes fill with tears.
“Apology not accepted?” he says. “I guess I deserve that.”
“You’re not real,” I mutter. “I’m imagining you.”
He pauses for a moment. “And everything that happened tonight?”
“My imagination.”
“Hmm.” He settles back into the passenger seat. “Well, at the risk of insulting your excellent imagination, I feel a bit slighted.”
I snort.
“Any chance it could really be me?” he says.
