Mom rounds the island, stopping when she’s pressed up to my side, and bends down so she’s in the camera’s view. They exchange small talk, and I stay quiet. There’s been a shift in our relationship, although it has been hard to put my finger on it. Since finding out about their financial trouble, I’ve felt oddly parental toward them. I want to scoop them up, keep them safe, the way they did to me so many years ago. And then there’s another part of me that feels disappointed in them. In my dad, really.
“She’s insisting on driving that old Bronco out there,” my mom complains, and I glare at the screen.
“What else should I drive out there? My Porsche? I’m not trying to show up in Sierra Grande like a princess. Besides, the set director thought the truck would be great in the film, so Pearl might just become famous after this.”
“Infamous,” my mom mutters, and I gently nudge her in the ribs. She smiles at me, but the smile doesn’t move much of her face. All that Botox and filler. Needles will start coming toward my face soon too, if I stay in this business any longer. It won’t be long before I’m considered old, and the roles I’m offered will become that of the mother.
“Anyway,” I say pointedly, signaling it’s time to move off the subject. “Start talking, Jasper. Take the heat off me.”
Jasper tells us about spring in New York City. It’s nothing we don’t already know, having been there ourselves, but we enjoy the description, nonetheless. Changing seasons makes me wistful.
We maintain a few more minutes of chatter and then it’s time to go. I say goodbye to Jasper and blow her a kiss, and she tells me to try and not get murdered on my drive through the California desert to Sierra Grande. I stick out my tongue and close the laptop, the virtual equivalent of hanging up on her.
Mom pulls a previously frozen quiche from the oven and sets it on the stove. She’s not adept in the kitchen, and her personal chef is no longer around. She tried to tell me she wanted to learn to cook and that’s why she let the chef go. Trial by fire, she’d said in this forced flippant tone. Even then I didn’t believe her, and that was before I’d found out about the financial woes.
My dad walks in just as we’re sitting down to eat. He kisses the top of my head on the way to his seat, and I want to ask him where he’s been. What he’s been doing. If he’s sinking them even further into this pit they’re in.
Before I’d overheard their argument, underground gambling had just been a thing I knew existed somewhere out there in the ether, like the mafia and organ trafficking. Things people talk about, but they don’t feel real.
Until it hits you squarely in the center of the forehead, and you learn it has swept away all your parents’ financial resources and your father has an addiction. I feel badly for assuming the worst, for being suspicious with how he spends his time. I’ve read about it, and trust is one of the most difficult parts for the family members of addicts.
“I saw Pearl out front,” he says, setting a slice of quiche on his plate. “So I checked her fluids and tire pressure. Made sure you have an emergency kit in the back and plenty of water.”
My heart swells with love, and a wide streak of guilt runs alongside it. “Thanks, Dad.”
He smiles, his teeth perfect and white. “It’ll be good for you to drive out there alone. Clear your mind a bit. Things look different when you add distance.”
Mom makes a disapproving sound around the fork in her mouth. Dad winks.
By the time I’ve climbed into the Bronco and buckled myself in, they’ve each hugged me five times and wished me luck.
I pull out of their driveway, leaving the wind and surf behind. By the time I hit Palm Springs, I find my dad was right. Away from the glitz and glamour, the world feels different. Tate and my bruised ego are but a memory.
At the next gas station, I put the top down, secure my hair to the top of my head, and drive.
This is not what I was anticipating.
I set up the last of my bright orange road triangles and tent a hand over my eyes, peering out in both directions.
There is nothing for miles. Nothing, nothing, nothing. And the cacti don’t count.
“Shit,” I mutter, kicking my tire. If this were a comedy, I’d yelp and grab my foot as if I hurt myself. This, however, is real life, so my foot is perfectly fine.
I dive into the front seat, reaching across for my bag and fishing out my phone. My optimism crumbles when I look at it.
No Service.
This isn’t a surprise. It’s not like I had service the other ten times I looked at it. I sigh and sit in the driver’s seat, one leg dangling out of the open door, and lean my head back against the seat.
I’m two hours from Sierra Grande. In between towns, from what I can recall from road signs. I stretch my memory, trying to remember the last sign listing the miles to the next town.
It’s useless. I wasn’t paying attention. Fleetwood Mac was blaring from my phone and I was tapping my fingers on the steering wheel when my car began to sputter and jerk. I’d barely made it off the road when Pearl took what I hope is not her final breath.
I groan and push the hair back from my eyes. The strands are ratty from the windy drive and sweat has soaked through the band of my bra. On the bright side, I still have a majority of the case of water bottles my dad wedged between suitcases in my back seat.
I fight to get one out, then open it and drink half. Within five minutes, my bladder tells me what a bad idea that was. I look around, but since this is the desert, there is literally nowhere to hide and pop a squat. My luck, a person would drive by at the exact moment I drop my shorts. Maybe Tenley Roberts Naked On Roadside would be the headline to finally knock my breakup with Tate from its top spot.
I’m seriously considering pouring the other half of the water on my head to cool down when I hear it. An engine. I leap from Pearl and rush to edge of the road, arm stuck out. Not a thumb like a hitchhiker, but more of a wave.
The truck slows. It’s white, new, with four doors and a set of double rear tires. I think there’s a name for that, but I can’t remember what it is.
It pulls off the road slowly, dirt billowing around the tires. I can’t see the driver from here, but I know it’s a man. He wears a ball cap. I walk a little closer, and he cuts the engine and gets out.
“Car trouble?” he asks, coming closer. He stops five feet from me, probably to let me know he’s not a psycho who’s going to kill me and wear my skin. Try not to get murdered. Jasper’s words float through my mind.
But if this guy is the one doing the murdering? What a way to go.
He’s arguably the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen, and I think my opinion is pretty solid considering I spend a vast majority of my life around pretty people. His eyes are the color of toffee, and they twinkle. He’s tall, broad-shouldered, his body tapering down to his hips. His jeans are on the right side of tight, and his T-shirt has the letters HCC on the left side of his chest.
“I think so,” I answer, suddenly very aware of my rat’s nest hair.
He inclines his head toward Pearl. “Mind if I take a look under your hood?”
I press my lips together and shake my head. Gesturing to the Bronco, I say, “She’s all yours.”