13 Moonage Daydream #2
“I don’t think you can take anything he did at face value.
I’ve read articles that said the song was a metaphor for exploitation, others claimed it was an allegory about drugs.
” He grows more animated as he lays out his argument.
“I don’t know what his true intentions were, but I do know Bowie spoke out against racism his whole career. ”
Ignoring his theories, I arch an eyebrow and glare at his profile. “That doesn’t change the fact that I had to listen to it for more than four hours straight when it jammed in the 8-track.”
Dash grins and breaks into a bad rendition of the chorus.
“Noooo ...” I press my hands over my ears, trying not to laugh. “You can just shut your mouth. If I never hear that song again, it’ll be too soon.”
“Aw, come on, Zoey.” He nudges my arm, giving me puppy dog eyes. “It’s a classic.”
A prickle of heat settles low in my stomach, and I look away, pretending his beautiful face didn’t strike the match. “I heard even he didn’t like playing it. There had to be a reason for that.”
Dash snickers. “Maybe it got jammed in his 8-track.”
My gaze snaps to the alert flashing across the car display.
Stay below 55 mph to reach your destination.
I straighten in my seat and point at the screen. “What does that mean?”
He blinks, as if trying to decide how to respond. “Battery’s getting a little low. But we should be fine.”
The red, glowing battery icon calls him a big fat liar.
“Five percent? You call that fine?” I take a deep breath and stare into the dense thicket lining the road on both sides. “How far are we from the next charging station?”
“Maybe twenty miles to the supercharger in Cookeville. But don’t worry.” He flashes a reassuring smile. “I’ve cut it closer than this.”
As we crest the top of the hill, Dash’s smile slips, and he curses under his breath.
The Tesla slows to a crawl as we approach a line of state police cruisers with lights flashing and an overturned tractor trailer blocking the road ahead. The trooper directing traffic from the middle of the road detours the line of vehicles off the highway.
Another alert pops up as we turn onto a rural road, following an old minivan and a newer pickup filled with trash bags.
I look up from the display and meet his gaze. “Are we going to make it?”
“We’ll be okay,” he mutters, as if trying to convince himself as much as me.
A mile or so down the road, the minivan turns onto a gravel drive, but Dash sticks with the pickup, following it up a winding hill for several more miles—and several more alerts.
The truck pulls into a church parking lot, then whips around and heads back the way we came. My stomach plummets. In the twenty minutes since we left the highway, we’ve passed three churches but not a single gas station, convenience store, or any other signs of civilization.
“Should we ...” I gnaw on my bottom lip.
“It’s too late to turn around.” Dash points at a winding line on the navigation panel. “This road should circle back to the highway at some point.”
My fingers drift to a loose string on my shorts. “If you say so.”
We pass a small barn, where an old man loads a wire crate onto a rickety trailer hitched to a faded-green pickup. Several yards past that, with nothing but open road and rolling hills as far as the eye can see, Dash slows to a stop on the gravel shoulder.
I jerk my head around. Other than the old man with the green truck, the road is deserted. “What happened? Why are we stopping?”
Dash drops his head to the steering wheel with a dull thud and points at the battery icon.
The little red triangle winks, mocking me.
“It died ?” My heart jumps into my throat. “But you said—”
“I know what I said.” He bangs his forehead against the wheel. “I was wrong.”
“You were wrong ?” I gape at him. “Well, don’t just sit there! Do something!”
“Do what?” He lifts his head and glares at me. “Give it CPR?”
I refuse to dignify his snarky comment with a response. Maybe he’s content castigating himself all day, but I can’t sit and do nothing.
I rifle through the clutter in my tote. “Jeanie’s Triple A card is in here somewhere. A good jump should buy us a few more miles, right?”
“Triple A doesn’t service Tesla batteries.” He fixes his gaze on me. “But they could tow it to the supercharger.” He grabs his phone from the console and flips it open, then stares at the tiny screen for the longest time.
“What?” I uncurl my fingers from my palms, itching to shake the answer out of him.
“No service,” he croaks.
I check mine for a signal. Not only do I have no service, but my battery is almost dead. “Okay, so we go with plan B.”
This is where he’s supposed to come up with a brilliant, rich-college-graduate contingency plan. Where he reaches into his black bag of tricks and MacGyvers us out of our current situation, saving the day yet again. Right?
Wrong.
He throws his phone into the cup holder and drops his head to the wheel again, defeated. “I didn’t think I’d need a plan B.”
This is bad. Armadillo-in-the-radiator bad. But sitting here staring at the dead battery icon on my phone won’t solve anything.
With a loud huff, I shove Mom’s diary into my tote, unbuckle my seat belt, and throw open the door.
Dash jerks his head up, gaping at me. “Where are you going?”
“Unlike you, I’m actually going to do something.” I climb out of the car, ignoring the stench of manure wafting through the air. “One of us has to.”
“Zoey, wait!”
Tuning him out, I march toward the man in the green truck. Dash catches up to me halfway there, skidding to a stop in a cloud of dust.
“Oh, so now you want to rescue me.” I cross my arms. “Hate to break it to you, buddy, but you’re not actually Superman.” I jab a finger into his chest. “And I don’t need to be rescued.”
He flinches. “I wasn’t trying to rescue you, I ...” He glances toward the old man and lowers his voice. “Were you really planning on leaving without me?”
Was I?
I frown, unwilling to consider the idea. “You’re here now, so come on.”
Dash and I walk the rest of the way together. The farmer has his back to us, fiddling with the chicken cages in his rickety trailer when we approach.
I clear my throat. “Excuse me, sir?”
The man lifts his gray head, his gaze alternating between Dash and me. “Y’all need something?”
“Actually, yes.” I release a relieved breath. “Our—well his —car broke down, and we’d—”
Dash steps in front of me. “We really just need to call a tow truck.”
I dial up my smile and elbow Dash out of my way. “But a ride to town would be great, if you’re going that way.”