Disclaimer: I don't own The Gifted!

Chapter 12

"We don't have snow chains."

"Do we need them a lot?"

"Snow chains might help us not die."

John tightened his grip on the steering wheel and rolled his eyes. "We're not going to die," he said calmly, interrupting Riley and Norah's pessimistic discussion. With four-wheel drive, they weren't in too much danger, but Marcos and Lorna were in a little car and James didn't have years and years of experience driving. He reached up to rub his hand over his mouth and chin, and Clarice leaned over and gave him a look.

"What?" he asked, glancing over at her.

"You're doing that thing."

"What thing?"

"The thing." She gestured at her own face and leaned back against the passenger side door. "You cover your mouth and brush your chin when you're frustrated or worried. Like this." She demonstrated, rubbing her hand over her mouth and then across her chin, her eyebrows slanted in a broody frown. He didn't look like that...did he?

"Or mad," Riley piped up from the backseat.

"No, I don't," John said, almost reaching up to touch his chin again. He drove his hand back to the steering wheel and smiled tensely.

"Sure, you don't," Clarice said.

"It's snowing really hard," Norah said, her voice higher than earlier. "Shouldn't we stop?"

"Well, this is a really big truck," Clarice said, "So I don't think we're in any danger."

"Is James okay?" Riley said, reaching forward to touch John's shoulder. "The Jeep isn't as big."

"We're going very slow," John replied. "Everyone is. He'll be all right."

Outside, every vehicle had slowed to a crawl as they kept going through the onslaught of snow that no one had been expecting. Hazard lights blinked in the grey haze. The light snowfall was closer to a blizzard now, and it pelted the truck's windows without letting up as they inched past a stopped tractor trailer.

Marcos and James were driving in front of him so he could help them if one of them slid off the road, but he didn't like the idea of it coming to that. Marcos was going about ten miles per hour, which would probably be all right as long as he didn't try to slow down. That would be when he would start fishtailing. But if they tried to stop now, he wasn't sure they would make it back to Westchester.

"Can we call Mama D again?" Norah asked, leaning up.

"Sit back," Clarice said, her tone holding a touch of tenseness. She apparently didn't like the weather either. "Just in case."

"You just said we're not in danger," Norah said.

"That doesn't mean you should go around testing your seatbelt," Clarice said. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and handed it back to Norah.

"You've got a lot of notifications," Norah said, "From Instagram."

"I'll look at them later," Clarice said, looking out the window.

John turned his full attention ahead as their lane of traffic kept slowly moving forward. It wasn't dark yet, but the overcast sky had made everything dimmer and it was hard to see through the snow. He had turned off the music so he could focus better.

"Hi, Mama D!" Norah said, breaking the brief silence, "We're still on the road…Mhmm…No, we're driving."

"Tell her we're going so slow a snail would be able to pass us with ease," Clarice said.

John half-smiled, his eyes on the taillights of the Jeep. James had skidded once earlier, but he seemed to be doing fine now. Still… "Maybe we should stop."

"Here?" Clarice asked. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her turn toward him. "We're not near anything."

"Not here, but maybe we could find somewhere to stay for the night," John said. He glanced up at the mirror, fully aware that both James and Riley were his responsibility right now. And Norah was there, and the other teenagers in the Jeep, and then there was Marcos and Lorna and Clarice. He didn't want to imagine anything happening to any of them. "It might be safer."

"Mama D says that Dan Keller on the news said it wasn't going to get any better," Norah said, "She said we should find somewhere to stop."

"I could look up some hotels," Clarice said after chewing on her bottom lip for a minute.

"Here's Mama D, she wants to talk to you." The phone was passed back up to Clarice.

"I can tell the Jeep!" Riley said. She had the radio in her hands, and John saw her wave it at the mirror before it crackled to life. "We're stopping! Over."

"Riley?" It was Alison's voice. "What was that?"

"We're going to stop, over," Riley said into the radio again. "Clarice is going to find us a place, over."

A soft laugh escaped from John. "You don't have to say over until you're actually done saying what you need to say, Riley." Hadn't some discussion like this happened on the way to the Christmas tree farm?

"I know…"

"Good, I'm glad to hear that," Alison's voice popped over the radio, "I think we could use a break. Over?"

"Can you ask her if everything's okay?" John said, narrowing his eyes at the back of the Jeep.

"Are you okay?" Riley asked, "Over."

"Yeah, there's just a lot of snow and it's hard for us to see," Alison said, "But James wants John to know that he's fine, but the rest of us want to stop. Because apparently we're cowardly wusses who can't deal with bad weather? Really James—"

Mmm, which probably meant that James was angrily stressing out and driving the rest of them crazy. And he was going to regret saying that to Alison.

In the passenger seat, Clarice was on her phone, the glow dancing around her fingers. "There's a hotel about twenty minutes up the road," she said, "So I think it'll take us about forty-five minutes to get there."

"Do they have a pool?" Riley asked, "And dinner?"

"Why would we need a pool?" Norah asked.

"So we can swim," Riley said, "And we really need dinner. Everything needs to eat."

"Are we really stopping?" It was Lorna this time, her voice emanating from the radio. "Because the car wasn't made for this. Over."

"Tell her yes, we think we have a place now," John told Riley.

"Let her know it's a Holiday Inn, and I'll book some rooms for everyone," Clarice said.

"Don't use your own card for that, Clarice," John said.

"I'm just going to book the rooms, we can figure out the bill later."

Suddenly the radio was right beside John's head. "You tell them. I don't know what you want me to say."

John took the radio from her and pressed the talk button. "Lorna, Alison, we're going to keep going until we reach the Holiday Inn. It'll be about forty five minutes at this speed, and we're going to call to get rooms for everyone. Do you copy? Over."

"So official," Lorna teased, "But we copy. Over."

"Copy, over," Ali said a second later, her answer sharp-edged.

"Sounds like the Jeep is having a good time," Clarice said with a low whistle. "Bet James is wishing he could take back that name-calling right about now."

John nodded. James was going to have to apologize for that eventually, though knowing him, it wouldn't be immediate. It would take him a little while to realize exactly what he had done wrong and then see that the fault was his.

"Is Ali mad?" Riley asked.

"Sounds like it," Norah said.

"All right, I'm calling the hotel," Clarice said, raising the phone to her ear. "I'll ask if they have dinner."

"Ooo, yay!" Riley said, "Thank you."

"You're welcome—yes, hi!" Clarice started talking to the receptionist on the other end of the line while the girls went quiet in the back. John's mind spun as she managed to three rooms. Sounded like they were going to have to squish all of them into those three rooms.

"We have two rooms with queens, and one with a king," Clarice said, putting the phone down in her lap. "I guess Lorna and Marcos will take the one with the king, and the rest of us can split up guys and girls."

"Are we having a sleepover?" Riley asked.

"Looks like it," John said. He would have to call Aunt Evelyn once they got to the hotel to let her know they were all okay. She was probably worried by now, but he didn't want to call and drive at the same time and letting Riley tell her what was happening seemed like a bad idea.

He flicked his gaze over toward Clarice. She was sitting forward in her seat, one hand on the dash, dark green eyes narrowed. She turned her head and met his gaze, offering a small smile.

"You got this, Superman?"

John smiled as he looked back at the road. "Definitely."