He looks at me like I’ve lost my head. “You have germ gel with you?”
“Thankfully, yes. Can we talk about my car, please? Can I drive it home?”
He starts up the truck. “No, it’s fucked up in the front. Seth has to order some parts. It will take a few days.”
“Well, shit. How much is that going to cost? Should I give him my insurance paperwork?”
He shakes his head as he backs out of the parking lot. “No, I told him I’d take care of it.”
“Why? You can’t do that.”
“Um, because I want to, and yes, I can. My front end is fucked. I was gonna just get rid of it, but it kind of has sentimental value now, sooo... I’m gonna let him fix it.”
“Sentimental value?”
“Yeah. We spent two days in there. How can I get rid of it?”
“You’re crazy, Storm, ya know that?”
He just laughs at me. I realize I totally forgot to call Michael because I was too busy hounding around in Storm’s truck. I pull my cell phone out of my purse and turn it on. A few emails and text messages come through. Finally! A connection.
I have six text messages from Amy. And two from Michael. Just two?
The first one: Did you get there okay?
And the second one, hours later: Call me when you have a connection.
Storm pulls into the cafe parking lot. “Hang on,” I say. “I’m going to call Michael while I have reception.”
I dial our house number, but there’s no answer. Hm. I disconnect and dial his cell.
“Hello?”
“Hey, hon, it’s me!”
“Jesus, Evelyn, what happened?”
“I got lost. And the snow got really bad and you know my car is awful in the snow, and I went off the road into a ditch. Some guy came along and tried to give me a ride, but then this crazy deer ran out in front of us and caused us to crash again. It was totally crazy, Michael. I was scared out of my mind. So we were stuck in his truck for like two days and thank God, he had blankets and some food in his truck. It was fucking awful.”