He doesn’t reply, in fact, he reaches toward the dial and amplifies the volume, taking an invisible bat to my request and knocking it out.
The skin on my arms prickle with a shiver.
I rub it away.
“Okay then…” I draw both words out and roll my eyes, turning to stare out the fogged window at my side. I latch onto the pitch-black hole of the night.
That’s when it dawns on me that we’ve been driving for a little too long and something deep in the bowels of my stomach shifts at that.
The music continues to blare and I kind of want to scratch my ears off. It sobers me, and the force of our decision weighs down heavier now.
My palms have turned clammy.
And my stomach feels as if it’s sitting at the base of my throat.
I kind of want to get out.
I kind of think walking the rest of the way might be better.
I kind of don’t want to be here anymore.
It was a feeling. One that turned my gut upside down, and my mother had once told me that, as a woman,as a girl, if you felt it, you weren’t to ignore it.
Jade’s head has fallen into my lap and as I stroke her hair behind her ear, I curl over, whisper for only her to hear, “Jade, wake up.”
When she doesn’t, I pinch her arm, and she groans, eyes blinking, annoyance contorting the beautiful features of her diamond-shaped face. “Bitch.”
Where I would usually snort or laugh or swing her words back at her, tonight, I don’t.
Jade peels herself off my bare legs. The lines of her face are imprinted into my thighs, red and splotchy and messy. She sits up, holding a hand to her mouth, and with that, hope hits me.
My palm is on Jade’s back as she groans, “Oh god, I’m gonna be sick.”
This was our savior.
I flick my eyes to the guy in the front and yell over the blaring music, “Hey, pull over!”
It’s then that I notice his foot pushes the accelerator to the floor, the wheels beneath us grinding harder and faster against the road.
Annoyance blazes through me and I reel my hand back, beating my palm into the rear of his headrest.
“Hey, did you hear me, pull the fuck over, she’s about to be sick all over your shit!”
Urgency is a noose around my words and it’s as if the asshole yanks on it when he turns the wheel abruptly, slamming us into the door.
The sound of Jade’s temple crunching against the window is loud.
I gasp when the glass splinters, though it doesn’t shatter, and I watch it in slow motion weave its way out in a fragile web.
I’m chasing my breath when he settles his foot on the brake, this time catapulting me forward. My seatbelt catches me in its grip before I can connect with the front seat.
Silence fills the cabin, the music no longer playing.
“What the fuck was that!?” I raise my voice at the idiot behind the wheel, shaking my head as I hold onto my best friend and pop open the door at my side, aggressively kicking it out. “Are you trying to kill us?” I spit.
He says nothing, and it unsettles me further, his silence digging and piercing its way to my core.
I couldn’t ignore this gut feeling anymore.
