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The sun is setting over the horizon when I can’t take his silence anymore. I turn the radio down.
“It’s okay if you return the clothes. I didn’t actually want them. I was just getting even for you forcing me to go there.”
The car squeaks again before he responds.
I turn my head in the direction of the sound. “Did you hear that?”
Shane glances my direction then back to the road. He’s distracted and lost in thought. That much is obvious.
“Didn’t hear a thing, and you can keep the clothes. The cost doesn’t bother me.”
He turns the radio up, ending the conversation.
A few more hours pass without a single word spoken between us. The squeak is still intermittent, but the intervals are getting closer.
Night has fallen, and we’re heading through South Carolina when a strange vibration I hadn’t noticed before starts beneath my feet.
I turn the radio down. “I think something is wrong with the car.”
Shane yawns and stretches one arm out his open window. “There’s nothing wrong with the car.”
It squeaks again, more like a quick grinding sound.
“You didn’t hear that?”
He shakes his head.
My heart beats faster when I hear it again. “Nothing at all. You heard nothing?”
Finally, he looks my direction for a brief second, his head tilting toward the sound. “I did hear that. What the fuck?”
It happens again, the vibration a little stronger.
“I think it’s the tire,” I say, worry creeping over me because of the speed we’re traveling.
Shane appears unconcerned.
“I doubt it’s anything. Probably the shocks. I have to piss anyway, so we’ll pull over at the next exit, and I’ll take a look.”
I panic when the sound happens again, my head turning that direction. Outside the window, the landscape continues to rush past.
“Maybe we should slow down until we’re sure,” I suggest.
Nonchalant, he shrugs off the suggestion.
“The car is fine, Brin. I practically built it. I’m sure the sound is nothing to worry about.”
He’s wrong.
I know he’s wrong.
Thankfully, the next exit is only five miles away. I practically hold my breath until we reach a gas station and park, releasing it when I unlatch the seatbelt and climb out of the car.
Shane doesn’t even bother to look. He keeps walking through the parking lot and into the store to run to the bathroom, I assume.
I look around the car but don’t know enough to tell if anything is wrong. There’s nothing for me to do except follow him.
After we both use the bathroom and grab some drinks and snacks, I follow Shane again as he meanders back to the car. He leaves his bag on top of the car then kneels down to check beneath the car.
