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Chapter Seven
Abbie got herself together. She could not head back to her small room in the bar without some kind of food. It was too cold and too far to walk. A wasted trip could not be afforded. On the way back to the bar, she passed a car sitting in someone's front yard and she knocked on the door and asked about purchasing it. It cost her fifteen hundred dollars, nearly half of what she had saved and she had to make a trip to the bank to get cash since the man refused to take a check from her. But it was worth it and she would not have walk for hours in the cold and soon she would be able to go anywhere she wanted.
Leaving town was the best idea she'd had in awhile. Even if she didn't have money to live on when she got where she was going, she made plans to use what she had left for gas and was going to drive until her money ran out. She didn't care if she had to sleep in the old Chevelle. She needed a new start in a place where no one assumed they knew her.
She had never driven on snow covered roads before, but the first half of the trip was easy and the road seemed clear, but she would be mistaken. Black ice, unseen to the eye even in the light of day, took control of her vehicle and slammed it into a large snow bank. It staled and she could not get it going again. The snow trapped her inside her vehicle as well, so she was unable to continue on foot.
"Great." She accepted her situation, made herself a sandwich and settled back in the seat to wait patiently for someone to pass by and help. Nightfall came before help and so did another round of snow. Although she was cold she resisted the urge to check and see if the heat worked. Sleep was her only escape from the cold.
That night the town was hit by a strong blizzard. Everyone was sure the worst was over and no one, including the ones who had lived in the town fifty years or more, had ever seen a storm of its strength. Abbie slept through it. Her body to cold to function, making her tired and unable to hold her eyes open for than a few minutes. Once, twice, she stared up at the snow covered windshield, but the third time she thought she was being carried; her body bounced slightly sending her again into slumber.
"There she is. I was wondering if you were going to open your eyes."
Abbie's eyes fluttered open. She was warm. Too warm. She looked around and found she was covered with several thick blankets and a man she had never seen before sat beside her.
"Who are you?"
"This is Randy." John entered the room with a steaming hot coffee mug and sat beside her on the sofa. "He was heading into town when he found you. Drink this, it will help."
Abbie was starving, but her throat was tight, making even the soup hard to get down, but the more she drank, the better she felt.
"Lucky the highway got bad and I was so close to Johns." Randy laughed. "I don't think anyone would have found you by morning."
"We're snowed in." John explained. "We're in the middle of a pretty bad storm."
"I'm stuck here." Abbie sat straight up and took in the familiar sight of John's lake house. He still hadn't unpacked.
"I'm sorry. I knew you would not be happy about that." He grinned. "But I'm glad you're here. Now I don't have to worry about you."
"Why would you worry?" she snapped, not willing to give him a break. She stormed away as fast as her body would allow and slammed the door to the bedroom that would have been hers if she had not quit. She wanted to blame John for the entire situation, even though there was no way he could be responsible for her running off the road into that snow bank. Yet, she blamed him for it all. The awful job, the storm, her being stuck in his home with him and one of his friends who no doubt was just like him.
She barricaded herself in the room until late that night. She didn't want to sleep. She had slept enough, but she was still hungry, so she made her way out to the kitchen after listening for a moment. The silence was welcoming. The bar was never quiet with the music playing continuously.
John's kitchen was stocked with tons of junk food. Anything that he could open and eat right out of the package or throw into microwave. She opened the freezer and saw that most the things she had bought on her last trip to the store for him was still there. She shook her head. The man was a disaster and completely lost when it came to taking care of himself.
"You're welcome."
She whirled around. Behind her Randy leaned on the bar, drinking a beer. Had he been there the entire time.
"Ok." She ignored him and went on searching for her snack.
"I mean it was big deal pulling you out of your car. Which I had to dig out of the snow with my bare hands I might add. Then I carried you to my car and all the way in here on slippery ice." He groaned and tipped his beer up until every drop was gone. Then he tossed it across the room and into the trash can. He watched her a little longer making her feel uncomfortable, then pushed himself between her and the refrigerator door and pulled more beer from inside. He turned and gave her one. "The only thing there is plenty of in John's house is beer." He was right. The entire fridge was full of it. Every rack, every drawer and on the door as well with no room to fit anything else until one was removed.
"I don't drink." She lied, settled on a bag of tortilla chips and headed back to her room.
"And I hate to drink alone." Randy handed her the bottle anyways. "I know you hate John, but I'm not him. I was just about to watch a movie and I found some nacho cheese that I just heated." He snatched the bag of chips from her hand. "And I'm not about to let you leave the room with the only bag of chips."
Cheese to go with the chips did sound good and it was something she hadn't had in a while.
"We got it made. Can't go anywhere which means we don't have to go to work tomorrow. The power is down in the entire town, but we have a generator and lots of junk food, so we have an excuse to pig out and do nothing." He chuckled.
Randy seemed harmless, but Abbie would not let her guard down, sitting on the opposite side of the couch. After awhile she relaxed, kicked her feet up on the coffee table and watched the movie. She deserved it, she thought.
