Chapter 2
Oh The Weather Outside is Frightful
Stiles hoped the snow would let up soon. Not long after leaving the rest station it began to come down, first in soft delicate flurries progressing quickly into a near white out. Lydia had been dozing while Stiles navigated the treacherous roads. He was growing more concerned, especially since he couldn't remember the last time he'd seen another car. He pulled carefully to the side of the road and decided to see if he had any cell phone signal. Again there were no bars, his IPhone was stuck in roaming and might as well have been a paperweight for all the good it was doing him.
Lydia stirred noticing they'd stopped. "Stiles?" She said sleepily. He bit his lip, something about her saying his name while half asleep was hot as hell.
"Yea." He answered back a little gruff from lack of use.
"Where are we? Are we there?" She asked as she sat up and stretched it was all Stiles could do to keep his mouth from falling.
"No we aren't there. I'm not even sure where we are. It's pretty nasty out. I haven't seen a car in ages. I don't have any cell signal so I think I'm going to try for the next exit and see if we can find some place to wait out the storm." He said sounding far more confident than if he felt. He would have much preferred the stability of his old Jeep. The four wheel drive and new tires he'd had put on her after the wreck would have been invaluable in the mountains. Instead he was stuck driving her newer sedan that weighed so little it often skidded with the slightest road covering of snow.
"Okay." She said more awake. She reached for her tea and took a sip as Stiles navigated back on to the road. She turned the cd off that had been playing softly in the background and switched it to the radio. At first she got nothing but static but switching it to the AM band she was able to catch the weather.
"A Severe Winter Storm Warning is in effect for the area. Road conditions may be hazardous and officials are encouraging people to stay off the roads unless completely necessary. Road crews are out but conditions may turn severe rapidly." The recorded broadcasting began to repeat again and Lydia switched it off and plunged the car into silence, the only sound was the occasional squeak from the wipers.
They were crawling at a snail's pace now. Barley doing twenty on a highway that people usually cruised 70 on. The snow was thick and the wind in this part of the mountains whipped it making the road disappear in front of them. Stiles had both hands on the wheel, his knuckles were white from gripping it so hard in his concentration. He hunched forwarded and squinted as if he could see through the snow that way.
Finally, after a silent and tense ten minutes they came to an exit sign. Stiles signaled and slowly pointed the car in the direction he hoped the exit was. The exit was a steady incline and the car spun half way up. Stiles muttered curse words to himself but stayed focused. He managed to gain enough traction to reach the stop sign. "Now where do we go?" He asked Lydia. There were no signs at the intersection and no signs of life. Lydia was trying to view a map on the GPS to figure out where they were. The GPS had conveniently lost signal sometime after they had gotten back on the road from the rest stop.
She bit her lip in concentration and scrolled along the map. "I think we're here." She said pointing to a little blurb on the map. "But that just an educated guess." She said as she nervously pushed her hair behind her ear. She scrolled along the road in either direction but nothing close to civilization seemed to be visible. "Well I guess your guess is as good as mine." She said as she looked to Stiles for an answer.
His heart felt like it was going to leap from his chest. She looked up at him with wide innocent eyes as though she expected him to him to keep her safe, to take care of her. And he would, no doubt, do anything for her, he just didn't know what he was leading them into. What if he chose the wrong direction and they ended up stranded? What if they crashed? His hands shook as he released the steering wheel. The tremor didn't go unnoticed by Lydia who grasped both of his hands in her small ones.
"I don't know Lydia, this isn't good. We could be stranded. I don't know where to go." His voice betrayed him, he was trying to feign indifference, play it cool, so of course his voice cracked in the middle.
Lydia took one of her hands from his and brushed his cheek and rubbed her thumb against his cheek. "We'll be okay Stiles. I mean it's you and me. We'll be okay. I trust you." He covered her hand with his for a moment before deciding which direction to head.
When he turned back to face the road she dropped her hands and he placed his back at ten and two on the steering wheel. "Okay, let's try right. We go for a little bit and if we find nothing we can turn back around and go the other way. We can't wait this out in the car, we'll freeze." He eased the sedan forward and carefully turned right down the barren snow covered road.
They crawled slowly forward before the slope of the road began to decline. They hadn't seen a house or sign so they had no idea how far they were. "I wonder if the bus made it through this?" Lydia asked breaking the silence.
"Well they are pretty heavy and if they had enough of a head start they might already be there. We weren't too far ourselves… maybe 45 minutes or so… well on a good day." He offered her a self-depreciating smile before turning his eyes back on the road. They drove a few more minutes before they came to a stop in front of a sign that read: Road Closed Due to Snowfall.
Stiles and Lydia both sucked in a defeated breath. Without a word Stiles carefully turned the car around and began driving back the way they had come. Both of them were tense, Stiles gripped the wheel his brown eyes unblinking as he stared at the road, Lydia gripping the sides of her seat with her well-manicured hands.
They started back up the hill and only made it part of the way before Stiles began to feel the back tires start to spin. He bit the inside of his cheek. If he couldn't find traction they were stuck. He managed to make the car climb another twenty yards before it started sliding towards the ditch. He let off of the gas hoping the momentum would stop them in the road but the car was on an icy patch and slid backwards and right in to the two foot ditch.
He managed to yell Lydia's name and pull her closer to him as they slid shielding her with his arms. If it had been his Jeep he might have had a chance to maneuver out of the slide, but not with her car. Thankfully once in the ditch the car stopped sliding backwards, but Stile's heart was pounding and this time it wasn't from holding Lydia Martin against his chest. This time he realized they were in serious trouble.
"Are you okay?" He asked her as he pulled her face into his hands and looked at her. She was trembling and he could see the tears welling up in her eyes but she bit her tip and nodded taking a deep breath to gather herself.
"Yea, you?" She asked her voice wavering but growing stronger.
"Hah, trapped with Lydia Martin… I'd say that's a dream come true. I'm great!" He tried joking but she could see through him as she leaned in and threw her arms around him.
"What do we do now Stiles?" She asked.
He sat for a moment with his arms around her and took stock of their situation. The gas gauge was at three quarters of a tank, and the battery looked like it was holding its charge for now. The car leaned as the whole passenger side of the car was in the ditch.
"I'm going to just get out real quick and make sure we aren't going anywhere or if I can get us out. See if you by some miracle can get a cell signal. I'll be right back." She nodded as he eased the car in park and turned back to get his hat and gloves. As he opened the car door they were hit with a frigid blast of cold wind. Lydia shivered as Stiles climbed out into the accumulating snow. She watched him circling their car for a moment before she remembered she was supposed to be checking for a phone signal. She pulled her phone off the charger and simply saw "roaming" on the screen. Perfect.
Stile brought even more worrisome news as he clamored back into the car. His cheeks and nose were tinted red, his hat and coat covered with a dusting of snow. He shivered a bit as he shut the door. "Well your car looks okay but we aren't getting out of here without a tow, we're stuck good, looks like we'll have to wait till the snow clears to be able to drive back up this hill though. Any luck with the phone?" His eyes were hopeful as they looked to her. Lydia simply shook her head no and tried to keep from freaking out.
"Okay. This officially sucks." Stiles said before switching the radio back on. "Let's see if we can get any news on the weather to see how long this thing is going to last."
Finally the broadcast began again. "This is an Emergency Alert Broadcast. The National Weather Service has issued a Severe Storm Warning for the entire broadcasting area. Heavy snow falls of up to 1 inch per hour or more are expected with high winds making travel dangerous. Accumulations of up to ten inches are expected through this evening and will continue into tomorrow with an additional accumulation of another 4-6 inches. Snow will taper off by Sunday evening or early Monday morning."
Lydia let out a squeak at the news and launched herself around Stiles not even caring that he was getting her wet with snow.
"What are we going to do Stiles?" She asked no longer even keeping appearances of being cool.
He brushed his gloved hand against her strawberry blonde hair and inhaled the smell of her perfume. "I don't know Lydia. But we're going to be okay. We are."
A/N: So here is chapter 2 and our couple looks to be headed into some serious trouble. Hope you are all enjoying this ride… Leave me some love if you are… any predictions? Chasechick! Just FYI I plan on writing this fairly quickly and will finish before Christmas (hopefully at least). Let me know if you like where it's heading!
