The November Wilds

by maybesomedaysameen

Driving your truck every day gives you time to think, time to see America, and time to run from your past mistakes. The things that race alongside your truck probably know when you're from, what you've done, but you don't think they judge you. Your long fingers push your hair back, and you're thankful for your new line of work. You think you may have taken this exit before. The rus

Sometimes, when you get out west, and there is nothing but endless road laying before you and millions of stars twinkling above, you take a random exit. The sign you drive under names a town that no one knows, but the road winds in the right direction. Your truck of merchandise will still reach its destination, but you need a change of scenery.

Driving your truck every day gives you time to think, time to see America, and time to run from your past mistakes. The things that race alongside your truck probably know when you're from, what you've done, but you don't think they judge you. Your long fingers push your hair back, and you're thankful for your new line of work. You think you may have taken this exit before. The rusting metal arch above a cemetery entrance feels familiar, but then again, they always do.

During the summer, when the sun in Missouri is always at its zenith, you pull over sometimes, climb down from your mobile throne, step into the unkempt grass along the almost-gravel road. Those months tan you, turn your usually porcelain skin into a beautiful, healthy gold. In the winter, deep in a snowy, Wyoming November, you think you may be a ghost, alone and silent and confined to your wheeled cage.

The edge of the cemetery passes by and you release your held breath. Superstition doesn't suit you, but these wild spaces have rules of their own and you've learned to abide. The night is quiet, only foxes and owls making their presence known. For a moment, you consider yelling with them. Humans don't have a singular, distinctive cry, but a yell is so primal, visceral and real, that you want to slam on your brakes, climb onto your truck, and scream until your throat bleeds.

You don't. You've tried before, but the night is cold and it likes to feed on voice and limb. Even in your seat, tucked away behind walls of steel, the darkness nibbles at your hands and ears. The heat is blasting, but Wyoming's November is always hungry.

Another cemetery looms ahead, again familiar in its rusted fence. The tombstones shine bright in the full moon's glow and you hold your breath, sure by now that you hardly need to breath at all. Your radio crackles with static, no one else on the line in this far place. You lean back in your seat, lungs only tickling, letting the static lull you into comfortable travel.

Something catches your eye on your dashboard and you lean forward again, peering over your wheel, and find an orange light blinking back at you. Your gas tank is low; its levels apparently escaping your attention, something that hasn't happened before. You wonder if you have a leak, or if you've been driving for longer than you thought.

Glancing to your right, you see the cemetery still stretching beside you. You wonder how close you are to a gas station, if it would even be open or functioning or full. The road you're on stretches for miles, you'll happen up something eventually.

Something yellow enters the circle of your headlights. Before, they disappeared into the shroud of night, but now they reflect off the faded paint of a gas station. It's odd, that you think of one and it appears, but this is a small road through a small town and trucks like yours must pull off to refill often.

You use your turn signal, despite the absence of other drivers. When the first click sounds in your truck, you see something in the street in front of you. The second click and you realize it's a woman. Another click and she's standing in front of your truck. At the fourth click, her slam on your breaks, gasp in surprise, turn your wheel to void her. Your truck slides along the road, tires screeching and wood splintering as you careen off the road through the fragile wooden fence across from the cemetery and into the yellow grass.

Opening your door, jumping out into the cold air, breath freezing, you race around your truck, look for the woman, but there's nothing. No blood on your newly cleaned grill, no body splattered across the road. Your heart is pounding and your breath coming quickly. A cold wind whips around you, blowing through your hair and pushing you forward.

As you stumble, you see the cemetery across the road, your deep breaths suddenly loud in the silent night. Your dark haired apparition tricked you, worried you into breathing, and now the peace is broken. You race back to your seat, climb into your cage of steel, begin to right your vehicle. The gas station still exists in front of you, but your gas tank now reads three-quarters full.

You stare at the meter, hands white around the wheel as you sit in your unmoving truck, back on the road and fully in your own lane. This is the first time they've tricked you from your truck. Before, the wolves that bayed in sharp moonlight frightened you, but you were safe in your traveling home. Looking out into the darkness, you see the gas station is gone, but the silent cemetery still sits beside you. You shiver from the chill.

You've broken the spell, breathing in cemetery air and ruining the fragile truce. The first, and only, time you did this before tonight, the night time wildlings forgave you. Wyoming's midnights are kinder than others, but you promised you'd obey and now you have not.

A shaking breath fills your lungs, almost freezing your bones, and a shaking hand shifts your truck into first gear. Slowly, with as much care as you can muster, you move forward, engine quiet in fearful solidarity. The world outside moves backwards as you continue on your current path.

Half a mile crawls passed and the cemetery ends. Again, you are surrounded by darkness, your headlights swallowed by impenetrable black. The farther you move from the place that you were, the calmer you get. No retribution for your stolen breath comes and you relax, safe inside you steel enclosure.

Sitting back in your seat, finally beginning to warm, you look at your GPS, thinking about your tired eyes and debating a rest.

An hour passes while you debate, somehow rolling along under your wheels, and the cab is warm and comfortable and you are lulled into exhaustion. Deciding to pull over, you lift a hand to turn your signal on, habit despite the empty road, and you hesitate.

The face of a woman gone fills your foggy mind and you hover above the worn signal lever. If you tell them you are stopping, then they can crowd around your sleeping place and peer through the windows with empty eyes. The slight tap on the roof always keeps you awake and you think that the woman might have an even heavier hand.

You don't signal. The sound of gravel tells you that your truck has drifted off the road and you slow to a stop alongside an empty field. It is not the best place to stop, tall grass hides taller things, but you need the rest and this is as good a place as any. You do not turn your cab light on.

As you sit in your seat, darkness wrapped around you, and wait for your heart to calm enough, quiet enough, that you can sneak behind your seat and settle into the well loved mattress, you peer out your windows. Your headlights bounce off nothing now, only partially illuminating the wooden fence and brown field beside you. It seems like nothing has followed you.

You wish, desperately, that you knew what to expect, that the ringing silence of the night wasn't a sign of trouble, that the things that race alongside your car were howling a familiar song. Instead, there was nothing. The cold cemetery air was still stuck in your throat and the heater was still trying to keep it at bay.

Static crackles from the radio that you never turned on and you stare at it, expecting something to come screeching out, but the pervasive silence continues. You need sleep. The sun is beginning to whisper above the horizon, pale blue steaming from the edge of the world like heat off the road. You should sleep now, while there was still darkness. You turn your engine off and the silence grows louder.

Slowly, as silently as possible, you unbuckle your seat belt. The click of the latch sounds like a bomb and your heart speeds up again, all the calm you've gained gone between one beat and the next. The grass beside you trembles as the wind drags its fingers threw it and you leap into the back of your cab, dive onto your joke of a bed, cover yourself with an old cotton sheet, and pretend like you've gone away.

A tap begins on the top of your truck, just as it always does when it's time for sleep. The first time you heard it, you were sure it was nothing. Maybe a low hanging branch or your trunk undulating as it settled. Now, your eyes burn with what you've seen and you stare at the darkness where the roof of your truck is and you keep guard against the night.

Eventually, you are lulled to sleep by the comfortable terror of the tap on your roof. The face of the woman who almost drove you off the road floats in front of you as you drift away. Wyoming Novembers are treacherous creatures and this one is trying to move into your mind. She seems to beckon with a hand and you follow her into unconsciousness.

Something wakes you some time later and you jolt upright, a scream ripping from your throat, strangled and hoarse and painful. All you see for a moment is light. It is blinding and bright, painful against your tear filled eyes. Your head is pounding.

Slowly, the world comes into focus. It is day. You are in your home of metal. Outside your window is a field of yellow grass, not quite as tall as you thought it was during the night. It does not calm you to see the sun peaking above a far off mountain. Daylight does not mean safety in the wild and it is still cold enough for you to see your breath swirl in the air.

You suck in a painful breath, your throat raw, and you think you must have been screaming for hours. You can't recall your dream. That frightens you. When you're out on the road, you have nightmares, strong dreams of eyes and blood. To remember nothing makes you think of death, of the end you seem to be hurtling towards, and you swallow. It is time to move on from this place.

Your body is still as you push the thin sheet down your legs and lift yourself up to the front. It is hard maneuvering into your fraying throne, but your seat is comfortable, now fitted to your body, and you start your engine easily. The heater sputters on, ready to warm you, but you shiver as nothing but cold air emerges.

There is nothing to be done for it now. You are on a deadline after all and your turn off the road, what seemed like a good idea in the night, is now going to add time to your journey. Your cargo seems meaningless, pointless, worthless, to you, but to your employers, it is everything and so you must continue on. You buckle your seatbelt with a quiet click and shift your gear into first.

As you press your turn signal lever down, to tell the nobody around you that you are merging back on to the highway, you remember your close encounter. Your light comes on and the blinking metronome conjures black eyes and blacker hair. Leaning forward to peer through the steering wheel, your gas tank is almost full.

"Let's go," you whisper to yourself, using both hands to turn your wheel, your foot pressing down on the gas pedal, moving you forward into the road.

The gravel of the road's wide shoulder crunches under all eighteen of your traveling home's wheels and you can breathe a little easier. It is early still, the sun just waking, stretching up to wrap warm fingers around the mountain's edge, and you think of breakfast.

Out where you are, there is nothing. You live on a diet of gas station snacks and too-expensive smoothies, vitamins for health and heart, and you always feel hungry. Sometimes, at midnight or high noon, your hunger deepens. It feels like a hole exists inside you and no amount of food can fill it. Your body howls with the creatures that nip at your wheels, and you salivate.

Right now, you are barely awake enough to exist and so you are barely hungry. You stretch across your armrest to the cooler sitting on the seat beside you, buckled in for safety and stability. It opens with a pop, ice rattles as you dig for a smoothie, water droplets fall as you shake your bottled drink free.

A crack in the road approaches, the pavement uneven, and your truck stumbles over it, making you fall forward against the wheel. The horn blares through the silent world, your bottle smacks into your radio dial and deafening static fills the cab. For a moment, it seems like your blind. Noise is the only thing your brain can process and the road seemed to vibrate with some other noise.

Then, it was gone. Your steel cage is hurtling forward at its normal pace. You have one hand on the wheel and one gripping your smoothie. Someone is speaking on the radio, but it's too quiet to make out. With shaking hands, you place your drink in a cup holder meant for much larger containers and reach for the dial. As the volume grows, a soothing voice fills your cab.

"You're listening to 107.1 FM and this is Sameen Shaw."

You blink at the radio, shocked to your core. In the million times you've driven this route, you have never heard a soul on the radio. Perhaps this isn't the turn off you thought it was. Perhaps that cemetery you passed was recognizable only because it rusts and whispers like all the others. Perhaps the intake of your breath the night before had allowed something into your truck and now you ride with a static companion.

"If there is anyone out there…anyone at all…I'm here." The voice from the radio is raspy and low and you wonder if it's the old radio or the older truck or if there exists a woman who sounds like dark honey and gunpowder. "My station is just off your highway, so come visit. Or don't. They make me say that."

You laugh and the sound surprises you. It's loud in the silent cab, almost drowns out the repetitive growl of asphalt under your tires, and you stop as soon as you start. The radio is distracting you and you can not afford to be distracted. The wolves may not run with you in the sunlight, but other things do, and you have not entirely learned their daytime ways.

"The weather today," Sameen's voice sighs, "manages to be both unpleasantly sunny and miserably cold. Welcome to Wyoming, if you're just passing through."

Her voice soothes you as you drive, and you feel yourself relax a bit. Tension slowly melts from your shoulders and you sit back in your seat. There's no way to tell how long you'll get this signal, but for now, you're happy to have a companion on your lonesome drive.

"I'm told there will be snow later." There's a loud puff of air that you are sure is unprofessional. "I'm still stuck out here no matter what. So, who cares about snow?"

You lean your head against the window, eyebrows raising when you feel that it is freezing. The cold inside your truck seems to have subsided. Your heat is working and the sun streams into your cage, warming everything inside. It is beautiful on the other side of the window, even though the ground is brown and yellow. There are no clouds in the sky.

"If you'd like to come take my place, be a radio host for fucking ever, please find me." Sameen laughs bitterly. "If I stay here much longer, I'll step out in front of a truck."

This makes you frown, the memory of last night slamming into you like the woman slammed into your grill, and your hands tighten around your steering wheel. There's a reason you have never heard a radio station out here. There are none. This is a desert wasteland of nothingness, grass stretches in every direction, mountains always against the skyline, but never getting any closer.

You have not seen a telephone pole or any sort of tower that could transmit a signal. Only brown fence stretches beside the road. The tension returns and a chill runs up your spine, making all the small hairs on your body stand. This is wrong. Your hand moves to the dial, but her voice makes you hesitate to turn it off.

"That was a joke." There's another sigh. "I'm not…going to do that. It's a touchy subject. My job. I'm fine."

This dialogue seems like it's for you, almost placating you into leaving the radio on. You want to, the voice is a comfort in this vast expanse of silence, but you cannot take your chances. The dial begins to turn, you have to be careful, but Sameen makes you hesitate again.

"I should play some music. That might work. Hold on."

There's a brief silence and you almost smile. She is terrible at her job. What radio host lets dead air play for several long seconds? A large billboard catches your eye and you look up to read 'JESUS ILL WA H AWAY YOUR S NS.'

This is No Man's Land. Wild Country. The air is heavy with history and tomorrows. A girl on the radio, alone in a station, isn't going to be a great host. She can't know all the rules. Your fingers loosen on the dial. Can you blame her for wanting to leave this place?

"Well," Sameen says, startling you, "there is no music to play in this place. What would help? Come to the station. I'm super fucking hot…Oops."

You grin and move your hand back to your steering wheel. She's cursed on the radio, clearly inexperienced, and you feel disarmed. The sun shines around you, reminding you that this is not the cold, dark night, there is nothing nipping at your heels, and you could see the danger around you if it were there. You'll listen to Sameen and let yourself have company.

"You know what? Don't come. They can suck it." There's a long silence again. Then her voice comes back and it's so quiet that you have to turn your radio up. "You know what would be great? If I knew anyone was listening. Right now, I'm just…talking to a void. I wonder if I could take callers. Oh, I don't have a phone."

The description of this ramshackle station has you curious. Who is Sameen and what is the name of the station? 107.1 FM doesn't tell you too much. is it a music station? It might be if Sameen wanted to play music. It could just be talk radio, or news. You wish Sameen had a phone so you could ask.

A couple thumps come through the radio and you hear a soft 'shit.' Sameen coughs. "This is, ah, a music station. I suppose. I don't have music to play. If someone would like to bring me some, I'll play that. Keep an eye peeled for our billboard. It's not too far from you."

Another billboard passes you by and you lean forward to read it. "Devil's Tower; Ten Watertowers High." Another chill runs down your spine. You have driven past the Devil's Tower before and you know it to be a holy site, held in reverence by the Native Americans and others. You know that the name is a misnomer, a misinterpreted relic of past explorers. You know that it is nowhere near where you are now and you wonder why there is a sign here.

"Here's a hint," Sameen rasps, voice like the gravel that rolls beneath you, sliding from the radio to brush against your cheeks, "it's past the Devil's Tower sign, but before the 'Jesus will was away your sins' sign. No wait. It's after the Devil's Tower sign, but before…I can't remember. The exit has three crosses near it."

This makes you perk up. Ahead of you are three towering crosses made of wood, seemingly faded to white by the suns harsh glare. Calvary. You wonder at the symbolism. Are you going to meet Sameen?

You glance at your dashboard. Your gas is now at half a tank. The dial reminds you again of your run-in last night, the deep breath that made your radio work, and you hesitate. Without your brain, your foot pressed on the brake pedal, and you slow to a stop, several hundred feet before the Crosses of Calvary.

You know what they mean, your Catholic upbringing still colors your mind like sun through stained glass, but you aren't sure if the crosses warn of your death or counsel you to have faith. You have already turned off the main road once. It led to your fright, to your freezing breath, to your winding trail through an exceptionally cold Wyoming November. Should you turn off the road again?

"Ok," the voice in your radio growls at you, "since no one has shown up, I'll assume no one is listening. Fucking great."

Your foot is moving without your consent again and the steel cage that holds your whole life is barreling forward as if it never stopped. You spin the wheel, throne rattling as its tires turn it onto a dirt road. Its hardly a road, more of a place between fence posts, and you stare, wild-eyed, out your front windshield as you head towards a woman you are not sure exists.

A truck comes toward you on the other side of the dirt path, appearing out of a could of dust, and you think that someone did make it to the radio station and what were the odds that they were leaving now. You try to squint ahead and see the driver, but it is not until they are mere inches ahead that you can see the person.

It's a woman, her hair black as pitch, and her teeth white as they are bared in a snarl. She meets your gaze as you slide past each other, and her eyes seem to widen when they see you. It's the woman you saw last night, the one who broke into your lungs and your truck. Then she is gone and your truck is still and everything is quiet.

Only dust exists outside your windows and only the sound of your ragged breathing fills the pressing silence. You have made a mistake. Your knuckles are white around the smooth leather of your steering will. You made no mistake. Your body moved while you were still deciding, her voice lured you into weakness, and now you stare at swirling dust as it desperately searches for the ground.

The radio is silent. Thinking that there was no other choice, you ease your foot onto the gas, not sure when it left the pedal, and slowly move your gear shift into first gear. A thought passes through your mind. When did you stop? When did you put your truck in neutral? Why is your gas tank back to three quarters when you've gone miles and miles since you woke?

The questions dissipate like the dust around you and you stare forward at a radio station that couldn't have been in front of you earlier. You brake. You breathe. You begin to understand the magnitude of your mistake.

Putting the car in park, mere seconds after you took it out of neutral, you unbuckle your seat belt. You're already at the station, you might as well get a closer look. You might even meet Sameen. The sound of your truck door opening, a squelch of rubber and groan of steel, echoes across the desert around you. Your feet thud on the iron steps as you leave your throne and climb to the ground.

A distant fog in your brain tells you that you should be cold, that it's a Wyoming November, that there should be snow on the ground, that you should be wearing a coat, that you should be cold, but you feel nothing. The wind whips around you, twisting your hair into knots and blowing your clothes around you. You are not cold.

The station in front of you is clear now. The paint on the wall is crumbling off, bare, red brick visible behind it, and where the door should be is only a hole. From beside your truck, it looks like a one room home. A small wooden porch rots in front of the entrance and a square of plywood covers the window instead of blinds.

How could a voice have projected from here? The satellite dish is cracked, but still points up towards the clear blue sky. You sigh and move forward, not bothering to close your truck door. Who would steal it here?

The ground crunches beneath your boots, then the wooden porch groans and shakes. It tries to knock you off, tries to keep you out, but you jump over splintering boards with ease, your long legs covering distance easily. Your hands catch the door frame and pull the rest of your body inside, your feet back on solid ground.

Inside the station, it is dusty. Your footsteps kick up years of dirt and you think you should be coughing. There is nothing in the station but dust and frayed wire and the feeling that something is just behind you. You spin in the center of the room, but you are the only one there. Almost white posters of bands and landmarks line the walls and seem to move as you turn in place.

When you are satisfied that this room is safe, you move further inside. The dust settles a bit and you find yourself staring at a rectangle of grey that seems different from the grey walls around it. It's hard to move through your memories, but eventually, you can recall that a radio station needs a recording booth, some room that is quiet and peaceful.

Your hips bump against something and you look down. It's a soundboard, rows and rows of dials and knobs, and it makes this whole moment more real. This is a place that should be used for something. You press a button, only half-expecting a light to appear, but nothing happens. There is nothing here, but you and this rectangle of grey.

You run a finger across the smooth static and the grey clings to you, leaving a trail of clear glass behind. It is a window. The thought spurs you on and you sweep the grey dust away with both hands creating a cloud around you, but you feel no need to cough, the desire to see inside keeping you safe.

When the rectangle is clear, your long arms reaching every corner of the frame, you can see inside. It is, like you suspected, a recording booth. The walls are covered in fabric to mute echo, a piano as dusty as you are sits in one corner, and at the center, on a stool, in front of a microphone suspended from the ceiling, is Sameen.

She looks small in the booth, angry and tired. Her face is drawn, dark circles under her eyes, lips red from frustrated teeth. She sits slumped on her stool, one hand on the seat in front of her holding her up, the other wrapped around the hanging microphone.

She lifts her hand from the seat to wave at you. "Hi, Root."

Then, you remember.

The Wilds. The Wolves. The Witch. A Wyoming November an eternity ago. The promise you made. The compromise you made. The responsibility to remember and the unwavering power that makes you forget. Death. Bargaining. Rebirth.

"Hello, Sameen," you say, pressing a hand against the glass. "I'm so sorry."

She shrugs, then she tenses. "How many times do you think?"

You don't know. Every time feels like your first life, but then you remember and it feels like forever. Your hand slides down the glass, leaving smudged prints that will be covered soon enough.

"I'm not sure."

Sameen nods, lets go of the mic, climbs to her feet. "Felt longer than usual. What were you doing?"

You smile, knowing that she'll like your answer. "I was a trucker."

"A trucker?" she repeats, eyebrows raised. "Like…deodorant and tampons?"

"Baby toys, but yes."

"Wow."

You stare at her, drink her in, because you don't know when the next time you'll meet is. "Do you think time moves? I mean, are we repeating the same years? Because I don't remember Ancient Rome, but we don't live in space, either. Is this even the real world at all? I mean, how can it be-"

"I don't really give a fuck, Root." Sameen stands close to the glass, now. You aren't sure when she moved, but she's there now, so close to you. "If this world were real, I think I would love you."

It burns, her comment, but it's only fair in the scheme of things. It had been miraculous that she'd loved you at all. Now, in this place that is no place, so many lives that were not lives, what was left of them?

"Yeah," you breathe, putting your hand against the glass again, "If this world were real, we'd be in love."

Sameen frowns at your palm, then presses her own hand against yours. "Tell me again what happens if we stop?"

You take a deep breath. "It all ends. We die back when we started. Just…Just try to remember this time. Go back to the Wilds. Give back the medal. Apologize."

Sameen turns her head and you follow her gaze. There's a door beside your rectangle and you aren't sure how you didn't see it before. It tugs at you to open it, but you stay where you are, stay in this moment a little bit longer.

"I can't do that unless you give it to me, Root. You know that."

You lick your lips, suddenly starving. The pain makes you drop to your knees, but you keep your hand on the window for Sameen to touch. It's too much. It always is when they wait too long. You just always want more time.

"Would it be so bad?" Sameen says so softly that you barely hear it. You look up and she is staring down at you with dark, empty eyes. "If we stopped?"

"Everyone will die."

"Who cares?" she asks.

You laugh because you don't. You don't care about the people you have met or the lives you've lived. You don't care about your promise. You don't care about your soul. You don't even know if you have one anymore or if it was a one time deal and you lost it long ago.

Your stomach clenches painfully, your time is running out, and you laugh, the sound empty and dusty like the world around you.

"Ok."

"Ok?"

"Let's do it." You climb to your feet, groaning, and stare at her with determined eyes. "You and me and no one else."

Sameen grins wolfishly and it scares you, but you enjoy the fright now. You think back on the wolves beside you fondly, their bite reminding you of Sameen, and you're glad for her constant tap at your home, even if you couldn't put it together at the time. You're happy that you're scared because it means that you still have time together.

Maybe you should fear the cold that creeps inside your body. Maybe you should worry that you've lost your compassion and the beat of your heart. Maybe you've learned to let it all go and focus on something tangible and real. Maybe it's time to stop.

You drop your hand from the glass and walk to the door. It is smooth beneath your hands, the wood unaffected by time, kept whole by its evil purpose. The metal lock is cold in your hands and you turn it, unlock it, let it sit ready.

Three steps and you are back in front of the mirror. "I'm going outside," you say to Sameen, fists tight against the pain in your stomach. "Meet me out there."

Sameen nods and you turn your back to her, feeling the weight of her behind you. Stepping quickly through the dust, you leave the room, leave the decaying station, and you jump over the ruined porch. Your feet hit the desert ground with a hard thump and you stand, squinting into the midday sun.

Nothing seems to have changed in the world. Your truck sits where you left it, door open and outside turning pale yellow with the clinging dust. There are no wolves around you, no cemeteries that will steal your breath, you hear no tapping or howling or silence. There is only a gentle breeze, a slight chill, and the world's end ahead.

The porch creaks behind you and you turn to see Sameen, full of life again, standing straight, only a slight grimace to show that she was feeling the same pain that you feel. You want to kiss her, throw your arms around her, touch her for the first time in a thousand lives, but she stares at you with wild black eyes and you don't.

"I'm driving," she growls, stomping past you and stepping into the cab of the truck.

You run, heading for the passenger seat, pulling open a door that hasn't open in years, wincing at the creak. In a second, you pull the cooler from the seat, drop into its place, shut your door. There is no need for seatbelts because death is coming anyway and you turn to watch Sameen as she expertly drives your home of steel around to face the road.

"I think we'll be in love again," you say confidently, ignoring her scoff and the rumble of the engine as it shifts into first gear. "Someday anyway."

Your cage jumps forward, racing down the small dirt road. Dust spreads into the air surrounding you and blocks your windows, blinds you, traps you in. After these years of driving, years of calling to no one from a small station in a perpetual Wyoming November, you are not claustrophobic. You think you maybe used to be, when you were always in danger, always trapped. Now, it doesn't bother you.

Sameen can't see anything either, you're sure of it, but she pressed her foot down on the gas, hurtles you both into the unknown, and she glances at you.

"Yeah, Root," she says, knuckles white around her steering wheel. "Maybe someday."