“You did already ask me something by asking,” she says with a chuckle.
I groan.
“Ask,” she says and laughs.
“What made you so interested in behavioral neuroscience?”
She stares at me for a moment.
“Knowledge gives the illusion of protection,” she says, averts her eyes, and gets out of the car. I sit in it for another moment, once again rendered speechless by her words.
The next day, our flight leaves at noon. We check out of the hotel and get to the airport.
But what happens then is something none of us has anticipated.
Sirens.
Coldness surges with fear through me.
We look at each other.
Amelie grasps her phone.
“All planes are grounded, and the hurricane is hitting the land, too. Increased to a stage 5.”
“Stage 5?” I ask, horrified, and my mind goes blank. I am not good in a crisis.
She, however, seems to be.
She calls the hotel we came from, but they have no more rooms available. She searches for some things on her phone. I just stand there, useless, on the verge of panicking.
“Okay, we could drive up north, as it is expected to stay south of Jacksonville. Meaning we could either fly from there or drive to Georgia.
“What—?” I stammer out.
“Just come, we only have six hours,” she says, grabbing my stuff.
Half an hour later, I’m back in a car, she is driving, and I am sitting with my legs drawn up on the passenger seat. I am so far out of my comfort zone.
“You would’ve sucked in neurosurgery,” she says at some point. “Seriously, crisis management is not yours.”
“Gallows humor, hm?” I ask her coldly back.
“We all have our qualities,” she says.
The wind blows our car here and there, and I wonder if driving has been the right decision, especially when we are stuck in traffic, because apparently, leaving is what people here do. After four hours, we’re finally out of traffic on a lonelier road leading nowhere.
The wind surges.
And by surges, I mean I have to push open the door with all my force when I get out of the car at a gas station.
“You’re not from here?” asks the woman behind the counter.
“Manhattan,” I say.
“You should find shelter, that storm’s gonna hit,”
“But in the news they said?—“
