Someone else appeared out of the shadows, cleaning a glass with a dirty rag.
“You look a little lost,” he said to us.
I expected Jamie to speak first, but Stella surprised me. She offered up our fake sob story to the men, told them about being abandoned on a camping trip, blah blah, and then said we needed a ride. I was incredibly impressed. Jamie looked like he was ready to wet himself.
“Where’re you headed?” asked Cowboy.
“Miami,” Stella offered.
“You’re heading north. I’m heading south.” He crossed his arms in opposite directions, as if we needed him to explain what that meant. The other men were silent.
Jamie nodded just once and cleared his throat. “Well. Thank you anyway, gentlemen. For your time.”
Dejected, we left the gas station or bar or serial killer meet-up, whatever it was, and headed back outside. It was nearly night now. Insects buzzed around us, and on us. The air was loud with their noise as we walked down the road.
And then we heard something else—a truck spitting gravel and groaning as it left the station. It pulled up beside us.
“I felt bad for ya,” Cowboy said. “Come on. Hop in.”
My legs ached with relief as I sat in the front of the cab. Jamie had discreetly shaken his head when he’d been offered shotgun, and Stella had already climbed into the back.
The cowboy was doing us a favor, and a long one, so I decided to make conversation, be polite. “So where are you from?” His name, we had learned, was Mr. Ernst.
“Born and raised in Canton, Ohio. You three?”
“New York,” Jamie and Stella and I said all at once, sticking to our script. Not suspicious at all.
“And your friends just abandoned you like that?” he said, shaking his head with disbelief.
Stella changed the subject. “So, what brings you to the Keys?”
“Oh, just driving the old girl here,” he said, patting the dashboard with a toothy grin. “Just me and her and the road.”
But as he leaned forward, I caught a glimpse of a gun in a holster on his hip. I stiffened.
Jamie had seen it too. He pretended to be interested in it, and asked Mr. Ernst about it, who happily obliged with the make and model and whatever it is people talk about when they talk about guns. I wasn’t really listening. I felt wrong, off, and the feeling made me nervous.
“Never know who you might meet on the road,” Mr. Ernst said. “Gotta be careful. God bless the Second Amendment.” He patted the holster and winked at me.
The road stretched on into infinity, and we didn’t see a single pair of headlights pass in our direction. Suddenly, after who knew how long, I felt the truck slow down.
Stella did too. She wiped her red-rimmed eyes. Jamie kept running his hand over his scalp. They were worried too.
“Where are we?” Stella asked chirpily.
“Mmm, pretty deep in the Keys,” he said evasively. “Still got a couple of hours ahead of us till we reach Miami.” We passed a sign that announced a rest stop in a quarter mile. “It’ll be a while till we hit another bathroom,” Mr. Ernst said. “Nothing around here for miles, so I thought we’d all stop and take a leak.”
Jamie exhaled just a little too loudly. I glared at him.
“I should go,” Stella said.
“Me too,” Jamie admitted.
“Do you have a map?” I asked Mr. Ernst.
He raised his eyebrows. “Girly, I’ve been driving since before you were even a twinkle in your mother’s eye. The only map I need is up here,” he said, pointing to his temple.
“Right,” Stella said, looking back at the road. But we could all feel it: Something was wrong.
17
MR. ERNST CHATTERED AWAY UNTIL HE pulled into a parking spot at the rest stop, if you could even call it that. The squat building was tucked off to the side of the road, almost completely obscured by a tangle of weeds that clung to the faded, rust-stained walls. There was a small unpaved clearing around it. And no other cars or trucks.
Mr. Ernst turned off the truck and pocketed the keys. “I’m gonna go take a leak myself,” he said. “You coming?” he asked Jamie.
Jamie raised an eyebrow at Stella. “Yeah . . . ” He didn’t want to go alone, and he didn’t want Stella to have to either.
Mr. Ernst winked at me. “Don’t get into any trouble now,” he said, then walked off toward the building.
Stella and Jamie hopped out of the cab, Stella nearly running. She must’ve really had to go. I felt bad for Jamie, trailing behind, so I jumped out of the truck too. As I approached the building, the unmistakable smell of raw sewage assaulted my nostrils. Stella had already gone inside, but I caught up with Jamie quickly, and we stood there just staring at it. A thick layer of grime covered the once blue stenciled sign for the ladies’ room, and flies choked the entrance. Jamie swatted the air in front of his face. The men’s room was on the other side of the building.
“Tough break,” Jamie said to me.
“What?”
“Not having a penis.”
“God, I know.”
“We’re stalling.”
“We are.”
“I don’t know, Mara. I’m not sure I can do it. I don’t want to walk in there and see our not so illustrious truck driver at the urinal. It could get weird. I think I’m just going to go in the bushes.”
“I feel like I’m going to catch hepatitis just standing here.”
“If you want to go in the bushes or something, I can watch to make sure no one’s coming?”
I rubbed my nose. “I’m going to go in, I think. For Stella. Solidarity, you know?”
“You’re a better man than I.” Jamie held his fist out. I bumped it. His footsteps crunched on the gravel and then faded as he walked off into the bushes.
I took a few seconds to psych myself up, then held my nose and kicked the door open.
It wasn’t as bad as I’d been expecting. It was worse. There were a few stalls. One of them was open, and the toilet was so backed up that it was all I could do not to gag. The mirror behind the sink was cracked and dingy. The tile floor that had probably once been white was stained in shades of brown and yellow.
No. There was no way.
I turned to leave, but as I did, I heard a noise behind me.
Stella was pressed against the wall, her body almost completely obscured by Mr. Ernst, who was covering her mouth with one hand. He saw me see him, and pointed his gun at me.