Story of My Life (Story Lake #1)

5. Knight in shining gas station

5

KNIGHT IN SHINING GAS STATION

HAZEL

I can’t believe we’re doing this,” I said, poking buttons on the car’s touchscreen, trying to find a station that wasn’t sports ball radio.

“I can’t believe I’m letting you drive,” Zoey said dryly from the passenger seat, where she was gripping both the door handle and the center console.

“Don’t be so dramatic. It was just a curb.”

“A curb, a city bus, and four traffic cones. Not to mention the thirty-seven potholes you bruised my spleen with.”

Her hungover judgment of my driving wasn’t going to dampen my newfound enthusiasm for life.

“That was in the city. It doesn’t count,” I said confidently. It had been a while since I’d been behind the wheel. As in years. I’d never even owned a car. But my third stepdad, Bob, had taught me to drive, carting me to empty parking lots and small towns in Connecticut after I turned sixteen. Besides a few short stints behind the wheel since, Driver’s Ed Bob had provided my most extensive driving experience.

But now, I was officially in Hazel Adventure Mode, which meant taking risks…like driving and buying houses online. And it felt damn good. I felt alive and not just in the one-step-above-comatose way.

The tires reverberated as the car drifted onto the shoulder of the highway.

“Whoops,” I said, overcorrecting and veering across the dotted line.

Zoey slapped my hand away from the radio. “My God, woman. If I promise to find an appropriate playlist, will you please promise to keep both hands on the wheel and both eyes on the road?”

“As long as it’s a good one. No emo depressing shit.”

She buried her head in her huge tote and surfaced a minute later with her phone and a power cord. She fiddled with the dashboard until she found the right port and plugged in her phone.

“Take the next exit,” the GPS barked through the speakers, startling me.

“Hazel!”

“What?” I asked innocently. “It was a tiny swerve. I didn’t even leave the lines.”

Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust” came on as I guided us onto the exit ramp. “Very funny.” Zoey’s lips quirked under her hangover sunglasses.

Rural Pennsylvania in August was bright, beautiful, and a little crispy from the sun. Trees and rolling hills stretched out in front of us. Traffic was minimal. And I hadn’t seen a single person urinating against a building since we left the city limits.

We were minutes from our destination when the low fuel light came on. I swung into a conveniently placed gas station. Zoey got out and stumbled toward the convenience store—a Wawa—muttering something about snacks and vomiting.

When I got out of the car, I realized that the gas pump was on the passenger side and that the hose thing wouldn’t reach. So I got behind the wheel again and looped around the pumps. But I’d taken the turn too wide, and now I was blocking the parking lot traffic.

“Crap.”

I tried backing up and straightening out, but I turned the wheel the wrong way and ended up even more crooked. A pickup truck the size of a tour bus roared into the second pump, putting us bumper to bumper. The driver got out and shot me a derisive look. He was a weathered-looking Marlboro man type in overalls.

“Dumbass city drivers,” he grumbled, before spitting what I could only assume was tobacco in my direction and reaching expertly for the pump.

I cleared my throat and gripped the wheel tighter. I wasn’t going to let some monster-truck-driving, tobacco-spitting local ruin Adventure Hazel’s day.

Throwing the car in reverse, I turned the wheel the opposite direction only to discover—from an aggressive honk—that a sedan had pinned me in from behind. “Damn it,” I muttered, shifting into drive again.

I pressed the gas, and nothing happened. So I pushed it harder. The engine revved high and loud, but still the car stayed where it was.

“Think you’re in neutral,” came a friendly observation.

I glanced up to find a man standing next to my car. He was backlit by the sun like some hero on a movie screen. Tall and broad-shouldered, he wore jeans and an extremely well-fitting T-shirt. Medium-brown hair curled yummily atop his head.

I tore my gaze away from him and looked down at the gearshift. It was indeed aligned with the N .

Well, that was embarrassing.

Mr. Observant leaned down. Wow. He was really good-looking. He also looked vaguely familiar. Maybe I’d seen him on the pages of a fashion magazine or in some cologne ad? Maybe he was a model who just finished an outdoorsy photo shoot in the Poconos? I had a vague flash of memory of curling up with the L.L.Bean catalog as a teen and salivating over the bearded, flanneled men carrying canoes around. This gentleman lacked the beard, the flannel, and the canoe, but it didn’t detract from his wholesome hotness.

“Need some help?” he asked.

“No. I’ve got this,” I said, trying to sound like someone who drove cars on a regular basis.

I shifted to the D and pressed on the gas. Unfortunately, I pushed a little too hard and smacked soundly into the gleaming truck bumper.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing?” the driver demanded, looking red enough that I worried he’d swallowed his tobacco.

“Relax, Willis,” my window-side hero called. “Bet it didn’t even scratch the chrome.”

“Where’d you learn to drive? The goddamn bumper cars?” the man allegedly named Willis demanded as I started to climb out of the car.

“Might want to put that in park,” the outdoorsy stranger suggested with a wink.

Adventure Hazel couldn’t decide if my knees were going to melt out from under me or if I should just shrivel up like a raisin. I shifted into park and got out, squinting in the sunlight.

The three of us studied the situation. The sexy, winking stranger was tall and muscular, while the truck driver rolled in an inch shy of me even in his cowboy boots. The truck’s bumper remained flawless. My rental hadn’t fared quite as well. The plastic grill had a crack down the center.

“Looks like you escaped unscathed, Willis,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if you were right about that lift kit, but looks like it already paid off.”

Willis grunted.

I had no idea what a lift kit was, but Willis looked a little less pissed, so I too was grateful.

The sedan behind me honked again.

“Might as well go around, Ms. Patsy,” the handsome stranger said, waving to the driver.

The driver’s window rolled down. “But that’s my lucky pump. I almost always win on my scratcher when I pump from number four,” complained the white woman with a hairdo that hinted at a beehive and wraparound sunglasses that fit over her regular glasses.

“I’ll buy you an extra scratcher if you loop around to number one,” my hero promised, unfazed.

We were in the middle of nowhere, and these three gas station customers all knew each other by name. I definitely wasn’t in New York anymore.

“Better be a five-dollar one. I ain’t no cheap date,” Ms. Patsy warned, before whipping her wheel around and expertly maneuvering to another pump.

Willis grunted and spat again. “Guess it is kinda a hassle to call the insurance company.”

“How about this pretty lady buys you a Mountain Dew and we call it even?” my hero suggested.

Willis gave me one last fierce frown, then nodded. “Make it a two-liter and you got yourself a deal, Lawyer Man.”

“Deal,” I agreed hastily. I hurried back to the car and dug through my purse for my wallet before he could change his mind. “I only have a twenty. If you have change?—”

Willis snatched the bill out of my hand. “Nice doin’ business with ya,” he called as he marched toward the store.

“Don’t mind Willis,” my hero said. “He hates everyone and everything.”

“I’m from New York. He’s my people,” I quipped.

“What brings you into rural Pennsylvania, Big City?” he asked.

“Midlife crisis. I take it you live here?”

“Nah. I’m just real good at guessing names,” he teased.

I felt my face doing something funny. I was smiling. At a man. I hoped it looked like a real smile and not one of those drooling grimaces after a trip to the dentist.

“Well, I appreciate the mediation,” I said.

“It’s a pleasure. And nothing would make my day brighter than you letting me move your car.”

I opened my mouth to argue, but he held up a hand.

“I can recognize a smart, strong, independent woman when I see one. And I am by no means making any statement about any gender’s ability to drive. But my highly developed observational skills are suggesting you might not be as experienced behind the wheel as I am. You also look like the kind of person who appreciates efficiency and the least amount of legal troubles possible.”

Oh, he was good. Very good. I could absolutely imagine him riding to a heroine’s rescue on the page.

I studied him. “This might be close enough to the truth,” I admitted.

“There are times and places to learn how to maneuver gas stations. And unfortunately for you, this isn’t either one of them.”

“You’re just hoping I’ll move on without driving into any more of your neighbors.” Was I actually using the potential for vehicular manslaughter as a way to flirt? I wasn’t just rusty. I was rotting in a flirtation junkyard.

“There is that,” he agreed with another easy smile.

“Fine. But let the record show that I could have figured it out myself.”

Eventually , I added silently.

“I have no doubt. But think of the favor you’re doing me. I haven’t ridden to the aid of a beautiful stranger all week.”

“Wow. Does that line usually work?”

“You’ll have to tell me after I impress you with my driving skills.”

“By all means,” I said, opening an arm and gesturing at my rental.

He had to move my seat back all the way to accommodate those long denim-clad legs. It took him less than fifteen seconds and two efficient turns of the wheel to have the car straightened out against the pump and the gas door open with a button I never would have found under the dash.

Before getting out, my hero squinted up at the sun and then back down at the dash. He pushed another button, and the convertible top released. “Too nice of a day for the roof. Might as well enjoy the sun while we’ve got it.”

Hmm, presumptuous, but also not wrong.

He shut off the engine and climbed out. “Well?”

“Can confirm. The line combined with the driving skill works. If I were looking for a small-town attorney to flirt with, you’d be at the top of the list,” I assured him.

“My mama raised me to be too polite and gentlemanly to say, ‘I told you so,’” he said, handing me the keys.

“I always liked that about you.”

His grin went straight to my chest. “Now, do you want me to pump your gas, or do you think you can handle it without causing any explosions?”

“I think I can handle it from here,” I said.

“All right now. I’m gonna go buy Ms. Patsy that scratcher. Don’t use the green handle pump. It’s diesel. You’ll just end up sitting on the side of the road.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I assured him.

“Nice meetin’ you, Big City.”

“Nice meeting you, Small-Town Hero.”

I waited until he headed into the store before pulling up a YouTube video on how to pump your own gas. I managed to get it handled and was leaning as casually as possible against the fender when Willis came back out with a two-liter bottle of Mountain Dew and a bag of snacks.

He didn’t bother looking in my direction when he reversed away from the pump and roared out of the parking lot.

“It’s okay. You can keep the change,” I called after the truck.

The air here was thick with mid-August humidity, which was working its supersizing magic on my hair. But at least it didn’t deliver any of the wafts of sewer Manhattan treated you to. It wasn’t delivering Manhattan vibes at all. Across the street from the gas station wasn’t a city block of buildings—it was a cornfield with glossy green leaves and blond tufts of silk rolling out in orderly rows over a gentle hill. Beyond it, forest. Nature wasn’t confined and penned in by penthouses and skyscrapers. It unfolded infinitely…well, at least as infinitely as my eyes could see.

The store door flashed open, and Zoey wandered out, holding up a hand to block the sun.

“You barf?” I asked her.

She nodded, looking ashen. “Think I’m done now.”

The pump clicked off, and I replaced the nozzle in its cradle.

“Look at you pumping gas like a real driver,” she observed.

“Piece of cake,” I fibbed.

We got back in the car, and I pointed us in the direction of Story Lake.

“What happened to the roof?” Zoey asked two minutes into the ride.

“Fell off,” I joked.

“Huh. I like it. The air makes me feel less saturated with alcohol.”

My supersized hair whipped out behind me in the wind as we cruised down the sunny road toward my new future.

“This is starting to feel less crazy. You know? Kind of like we might be on the right track,” I said over the wind.

“Really? I was just thinking this looks like the end of Thelma and Louise ,” she yelled back.

“Har har, smartass. I’m driving us toward our future, not off a cliff.”

A black piece of plastic from my slightly smashed grill chose that exact second to smack into the windshield, startling us both.

“What the hell was that?” Zoey demanded.

“Nothing. A bug,” I said, trying to turn on the windshield wipers to scrape the chunk of grill off the glass. I found the high beams, the seat warmers, and the hazard lights before the wipers came to life.

“Fourth time’s the charm,” my hungover companion muttered from the passenger seat.

“Excuse me, I think I’m doing a pretty good job. Look. I got us all the way here.” I pointed at the Welcome to Story Lake sign ahead. Some of the letters were missing, and someone had gotten cheeky with a can of red spray paint, leaving behind more of a We me Snory Lake situation. To the left, we were served up our first glimpse of glistening lake waters.

“Catastrophe-free. Just like I promised.”

I should have kept my mouth shut. Because at that moment a pterodactyl-sized shadow fell over us.

“What the fu—” Zoey’s question was cut off by a wet thwap .

Something shiny, silver, and slimy hit me in the face, and then Zoey was screaming.

I swerved blindly and stomped on the brake. Gravel slid under the tires and a powerful rush of air moved my hair as something cold and slick rubbed against my forehead.

Crunch.

I jerked forward then back as my seat belt locked up when the car came to an abrupt and unscheduled halt.

For a second, there was silence as a dust cloud billowed up around us.

“How did you hit a fucking fish ?” Zoey screeched.

There was something wet and red in my eye. I tried to brush it away but only managed to smear it into my hair.

“Am I bleeding?” I demanded.

“There’s a fish in my lap! Get it off me!” Zoey howled.

I tried to look down, but between the red stuff, my tangled hair, and the dust, it was impossible to see anything.

An eerie, high-pitched whistle cut through the screaming and the dust cloud. “What the hell is that?” I coughed out, peering behind me through the dust cloud at the unholy apparition.