Life is Strange, page 3
“Don’t have any in the back. Whatever we’ve got is out front.”
Jesus, this guy is cranky. Why the attitude? We’re paying customers after all. I feel my eyes narrow, involuntarily. Whoops. But I can still feel the anger welling up.
“There is no oil out front,” I say, catching the snip in my voice. I soften. “You’re all out.”
Clearly, I’ve said something earth-shattering because everybody freezes. Everyone. Elias’s hands stop working on whatever he’s working on. Silas’s eyes do a slow sweep from Elias to me, and then to Steph. And then something softens in Elias’s face.
He sighs, like a teacher who was about to reprimand a student for talking out of turn and then realized they made a good point.
“I’ll see if I have more in the back—”
“We might! I’ll check,” says Silas with one foot already out the door. “If we’re out, maybe Jonah’s caravan has a bottle we can use.”
And Silas is out.
Whrrr, whrr. Elias immediately pours himself back into his mysterious project.
“Woah, Alex, look.” Steph stands and wanders to the wall of shelves, where more photos of classic cars rest, all of them in black and white and dusty. Elias must be really into cars. Like, more than a hobby. It looks like cars are his whole life. They’re to him what music is to me.
Steph leans forward to examine a little red box with gold trim, and I get up to join her, but my eyes remain on Elias’s back.
It couldn’t have been the oil, could it? Who gets that worked up over running out of motor oil? Maybe the simple act of Silas leaving? Leaving Elias alone with his thoughts? Or… wait, no…
It feels like something deeper.
I glance at Steph one more time before stepping forward, hand outstretched to Elias’s back. Something about this man, about how a single sentence can send him into such deep sadness that I can see it around his head—feel its temperature, almost taste it—ignites a curiosity in me that I can’t extinguish.
I can’t just ignore his pain.
Cold seeps into my fingertips, trickling up my fingers and into my palm, my wrist, my forearm, like water defying gravity. I clench my teeth as the blue hue travels up into my chest, and I shut my eyes, sinking into Elias’s feelings.
I step into the aura.
I’m still in Barbazal, but outside. Red, white, and blue flags flutter in the wind, strung along pennants weaving through the town square. There are people. Everywhere. Like, more people than I thought could live in a town as empty and off-the-map as Barbazal. I’d never even heard of this place before today.
And yet there are crowds, bunching up along the side of the main road we just drove through, eager to reach the barriers keeping them from throwing themselves into the street. I crane my neck and stand on my tiptoes to get a better look. I’m already short, and the arms in the air cheering on whoever’s over there aren’t making this any easier.
I can hear cars crawling past. Flashes of shiny red, glittering chrome bumpers, and brilliant white rims with white walls indicate that these are classic cars. Is it some kind of car show?
The crowd swells from cheering into straight-up shrieking in excitement, and soon I see why. A gigantic balloon float pulls up the rear of this… parade?—I don’t know what else to call it—at least ten feet high. Two smiling women in white blouses and jeans with cowboy hats and red lipstick toss candy into the crowd. Only the youngest out here bend to find it. And when I look back up at the float, I see him—the subject of everyone’s worship. A man in a navy-blue blazer with a lighter blue necktie, tied perfectly, dark jeans, white cowboy boots, and a matching white cowboy hat. His glistening smile is warm, charming. He must be at least in his forties. He’s actually incredibly handsome, in a Ken doll sort of way? Like if Ken owned a farm and never had to actually farm anything a day in his life.
Jonah Macon will bring home the bacon, reads the banner along the side of the float as it passes. I look around at all the smiling faces, and I think back to Elias. Why would such a joyful scene make him so profoundly sad?
And then I look around for him. Wait… where is Elias?
I look over my shoulder and find Elias’s shop across the way, just as worn down as it was today when Steph and I walked in. This must be a recent memory.
There he stands, wearing the same overalls, downing the last of a bottle of water which looks like it had only a few drops in it to begin with. He tenses—I feel the tightness in my shoulders with him—then crushes the empty bottle in his hand, and hurls it to the ground. Then he marches back inside.
I look back up at Jonah, expecting to see that movie-star smile, but instead I see something else.
His smile has fallen as he looks toward Elias’s shop. He’s… broken. Just a little. That political mask he’s wearing—that all politicians have to wear at least sometimes—cracked for a moment. Did anyone else see it? Or are they all mesmerized by the banners and the free candy and the fact that he’s already back to smiling and waving again?
Whatever’s up with Elias, it has everything to do with Jonah Macon.
Whooooosh!
I’m back in the shop. I’m staring at the ground. I hear the faint tinkling of music, like the world’s tiniest xylophone, playing a song I recognize. It’s a song my mom used to hum all the time when I was little, a song that she kept in her back pocket her whole journey to America with my dad.
When all the world is darkest,
You’re alone and feel forgotten,
Know the road ahead is there.
Even if the fog is thick,
You’re lost and feel alone,
Know the road ahead is there.
The rain can make the journey slick,
You’re insecure and unsure,
Know the road ahead is there.
And so am I.
I’m staring up at Elias’s back. No, his face! He’s looking at me!
“Uh,” I say, lowering my hand and weaving my fingers together sheepishly behind my back. “Just… wondering what you’re doing over there.”
But he’s peering past me, at Steph.
“Don’t touch that,” he growls, marching past me toward her.
Panic sets into my chest and creeps up my neck. My heart races as he nears her, marching, fists balled, red fireball erupting over his head, growing so huge it burns my eyes. Is he going to hurt her?
“Steph!” I yell. Steph looks up at me in alarm, and then to Elias, and jumps out of the way just before Elias slams his hand down on the now open red box. Just before it shuts, I catch a glimpse of a bright red classic car under the lid, rotating slowly.
The music stops as abruptly as it started.
Steph and I look at each other, and then I look at Elias.
“Sorry,” offers Steph, “it just looked so pretty. I wanted to see—”
Elias’s hands curl into fists on the table.
“I’m… really sorry,” continues Steph.
That gets Elias to soften again. The red aura vanishes. I see my way in.
“Elias?” I ask. “Earlier, when Silas brought up Jonah Macon, you seemed upset. Who is he?”
He scoffs. Steph looks at me like, Why the hell are you asking that?
I know, Steph, get the oil, get the hell out. But I have questions! Important ones! Ones with answers that might only lie here, right now, in this room, with Elias.
“Jonah Macon—” says Elias. He speaks like the name burns on his tongue. “—is the lowest, vilest sellout I’ve ever met.”
He turns and looks at me.
“He’s all anyone talks about ’round here anymore, now that he’s back from his fancy office in Denver, suckin’ up to conservatives, callin’ himself a ‘centrist.’ He’s a damn liar.”
“Why the fanfare then?” asks Steph.
“Because these people of Barbazal are too gullible to know what’s good for ’em. They think ol’ Jonah Macon will fix our drought, bring us our water supply back after they dammed up the river. Well, I tell you what.” He takes a step closer, and I flinch before I realize he’s walking past me. “Jonah Macon won’t ‘bring home the bacon’ until he makes it rain.”
A dam? They’re in the middle of a drought and someone dammed the river?
I glance at Steph, who nods at me. We both catch that Elias may have meant “make it rain” literally and figuratively. But even with all the venom spewing from his words, Elias’s aura still glows blue. There’s more to this story. People who have it out for politicians often seethe with rage, boil with anger with no place to put it. Elias… something about Jonah makes him sad.
Not just sad.
Hopeless?
Silas bursts back into the room with a triangle-shaped yellow bottle in his hand and takes one glance at Elias before analyzing the whole situation.
“Aw, hell, you got him talkin’ about Jonah, didn’t you?” he asks me, setting the bottle on the table, shoving his hands in his pockets, and sighing.
“Actually, you did,” chuckles Steph. “You said Jonah’s entourage might have some oil with them.”
“Well, luckily I don’t have to ask,” he says, nodding at the bottle. “Besides, his little club is impossible to get a minute in with anyway. Damn politicians are so hard to talk to.”
“See?” hisses Elias. “Ain’t got time for nobody, no common folk anymore. Jonah’s too good for us now.”
“Aw, Elias, don’t say that,” Silas encourages. “You know everything he does is spelled out for him—what he says, what he wears, hell, how he shapes his beard. They probably don’t even let him wipe his own ass anymore.”
I believe Silas on that one. People in positions of power, bought or not, are often highly curated. I once saw a TikTok from an ex-advisor to the White House talking about the rounds of analysis that go into choosing a politician’s socks.
Who pays that much attention to socks?!
“Well,” says Steph, bringing the conversation back around, “thanks for the oil.” She holds out a ten-dollar bill, Elias takes it, and just like that, we have a precious bottle of oil in our possession.
I exchange a smile with her, and her face says it all. We’re getting out of here.
“Thanks, Elias,” nods Steph. “Thanks, Silas.”
And we turn to leave.
But just before we reach the door, I hear Elias’s voice behind us.
“Hey, uh, ladies, how’d you know to pull over for oil? Most cars don’t give an indication that it’s low.”
I turn and feel my cheeks growing hot with embarrassment. I scratch the back of my neck and chuckle.
“I, uh… kind of let the engine die.”
“What?” asks Elias.
Silas bursts into laughter. “Oh hell, you might need a whole new engine then!”
“What?!” cries Steph.
“What kinda car is it?” asks Elias, bringing the conversation back down from hysterics.
“2001 Saturn SL.”
Elias whistles and shakes his head. “Yeah, I don’t even know if they make parts for those anymore, girls. I wouldn’t even know what I was lookin’ at if I did take a look.”
“Let’s see,” says Steph, pulling out her phone and showing it to Elias. “I took a picture of under the hood just in case I needed to… I don’t know… compare… oils…? Or something.”
Silas stifles another laugh, but Elias just furrows his brows and squints down at the phone.
“Hard to tell from just a photo, but… those pistons look scratched to hell.”
“What are pistons?” asks Steph. “And ‘scratched to hell’ doesn’t sound good.”
“Long story short,” Silas chimes in, “they keep the car runnin’. But again, you’re not gonna find twenty-som’n-year-old pistons here. Maybe not even online.”
“So,” I begin, “we have more oil now, but if we can’t get new pistons, then…”
I finish the sentence in my head, hoping against everything that the answer is no.
Are we stuck here?
“Prob’ly won’t run.”
I think back to Steph’s drum kit in the sweltering heat, the skins warping, the pedals loosening. I hope it’s okay. If it hasn’t been stolen.
We covered it up well enough, but if people see an abandoned car and decide to poke around inside, they might find the drum kit anyway. Renewed vigor grips my heart, and this time I finish Steph’s sentence out loud.
“There has to be somewhere else we haven’t tried.”
“I’m the only mechanic in a fifty-mile radius. I can see about ordering specialty pistons for ya, but that’ll take at least two days.”
“Two days?!” exclaims Steph. “But that’s Saturday! We have a show in Fort Collins Friday night!”
“Silas,” I ask, “what if we… I mean could we… could we borrow your truck? Just to get us to Fort Collins for the show, and then we’ll bring it right back. Promise. You could even keep collateral. Um…”
Steph raises an eyebrow at me like, What the hell do you mean by collateral?
She’s right, we don’t own anything. A granola bar doesn’t exactly scream collateral. We’d have to bring along all our instruments for the show, and even the most expensive thing we have—the car—is a piece of shit on four wheels.
Maybe fewer wheels than that by now.
Silas gives me the saddest smile I’ve seen in a long time.
“Sorry, ladies, no can do. I’ve got some sheetrock to haul up to the dam tomorrow night. Even if I did trust y’all—no offense, but we’ve only just met—”
“None taken,” says Steph, but I can hear the disappointment in her voice.
“I can’t.” Silas holds his hands out and purses his lips apologetically. His head glows purple. He’s nervous.
Probably at the fact that two complete strangers just asked to borrow his car.
But Elias’s blue ring around his head has disappeared, and he chimes in.
“Y’all can stay at the Crown Inn for the night, since you’re stranded. Ask for Jude, tell him I sent you. He’ll give y’all a room. On the house.”
“Really?” asks Steph eagerly. “That’s amazing, thank you!”
She’s right, that really is amazing. Elias must be super dialed into the neighborhood to be able to just whip up a hotel room like that, especially with all the huge crowds here to see Jonah.
“Thank you,” I say, and I mean it. It’s great to have a place to stay. Beats having to sleep in the car. Miles away. Alone. In the dark. In the middle of nowhere.
Steph has gone suddenly silent after that expressive thank you she uttered only moments ago, and she clasps her hands and stares at the ground, lost in thought. Her aura glows blue, and my heart sinks. I know exactly what’s wrong.
“Oh, Silas?” I ask before he steps out the door. He turns to look at me.
“Would you… mind driving us back to our car tonight? We left something important in there.”
I glance at Steph as her face lights up. That blue ring hovering around her beanie fades into the brilliant gold from earlier. I’m sure I’m smiling the biggest, dumbest smile right now, but I’d do anything for Steph.
We’re getting that drum kit before it melts.
“Sure thing!” exclaims Silas. He keeps talking, but his words fade into the background for me as I notice Elias leaning on the worktable. Hands balled. Staring at that music box.
3: The Hotel
The motor oil is now in the car. And it still won’t start. Elias was right. We need new pistons, and they don’t make them anymore.
But at least now, Steph’s drum kit is safely in the back of Silas’s truck. Silas and Steph are standing here with me in line in the lobby…
…and the hotel is an absolute zoo.
Photographers, with cameras as big as my guitar, stand lingering around, keeping their eyes moving. Clearly, they’re here to catch a glimpse of Jonah Macon, but who knows if he’s even staying here? Silas said he has an “entourage”—you’d think he’d have his own trailer parked somewhere secretive in the woods. Rock stars have tour buses, don’t they? Why not politicians?
“Hey,” whispers Steph, “you really think Elias can get us a room here?”
She looks way more relaxed now that we’ve got her other best friend in tow. Her drum kit is in pristine condition. Well, at first glance anyway. It’ll be impossible to tell until we can see it up close, and once it’s cooled down from the heat.
The sunset outside the window just behind her is glowing a brilliant orange, and I smile up at her.
“He seemed pretty sure of himself,” I reply, but I hope the answer is yes.
If not here, where else will we stay?
We’re about to find out.
“Yes. Are you here for emergency water bottles or do you need a room. Because we don’t have either right now,” drones the weary young man at the counter, clicking through something on his keyboard faster than I’ve ever seen anyone type before. Clearly he’s too busy to even make eye contact.
But I clock the mention of emergency water bottles. Silas wasn’t kidding.
“Uh, hey there, Jude,” Silas cuts in from behind us. “Busy night?”
Jude gives him a smirk that seems to half say, Are you stupid? and half say, “Ha ha, very funny.”
“I reckon you don’t need a room for tonight?” asks Jude, all formal politeness and non-Barbazalian accent gone from his voice. He’s with a friend now, or at least a contact.
“I don’t,” says Silas, “but these two ladies do. Courtesy of Elias, if you please.”
Something changes in Jude’s face as he turns to me and Steph.
“Silas, I can’t—”
“Elias says you have a spare room.”
“Well, it’s not really available—”
“He insisted.”
“Silas,” Jude is snapping now. “May I speak to you over here please?” He turns to us and dons that front-desk smile again. “Pardon, ladies, so sorry for the trouble.”
“It’s Steph and Alex, thanks,” says Steph.
“Damn,” I say to her as the two walk away.
“What?” she asks. “If I get referred to as one of two ‘ladies’ tonight again, I might scream. Might as well say, ‘These two humans with tits would like to have a word with you.’”
Jesus, this guy is cranky. Why the attitude? We’re paying customers after all. I feel my eyes narrow, involuntarily. Whoops. But I can still feel the anger welling up.
“There is no oil out front,” I say, catching the snip in my voice. I soften. “You’re all out.”
Clearly, I’ve said something earth-shattering because everybody freezes. Everyone. Elias’s hands stop working on whatever he’s working on. Silas’s eyes do a slow sweep from Elias to me, and then to Steph. And then something softens in Elias’s face.
He sighs, like a teacher who was about to reprimand a student for talking out of turn and then realized they made a good point.
“I’ll see if I have more in the back—”
“We might! I’ll check,” says Silas with one foot already out the door. “If we’re out, maybe Jonah’s caravan has a bottle we can use.”
And Silas is out.
Whrrr, whrr. Elias immediately pours himself back into his mysterious project.
“Woah, Alex, look.” Steph stands and wanders to the wall of shelves, where more photos of classic cars rest, all of them in black and white and dusty. Elias must be really into cars. Like, more than a hobby. It looks like cars are his whole life. They’re to him what music is to me.
Steph leans forward to examine a little red box with gold trim, and I get up to join her, but my eyes remain on Elias’s back.
It couldn’t have been the oil, could it? Who gets that worked up over running out of motor oil? Maybe the simple act of Silas leaving? Leaving Elias alone with his thoughts? Or… wait, no…
It feels like something deeper.
I glance at Steph one more time before stepping forward, hand outstretched to Elias’s back. Something about this man, about how a single sentence can send him into such deep sadness that I can see it around his head—feel its temperature, almost taste it—ignites a curiosity in me that I can’t extinguish.
I can’t just ignore his pain.
Cold seeps into my fingertips, trickling up my fingers and into my palm, my wrist, my forearm, like water defying gravity. I clench my teeth as the blue hue travels up into my chest, and I shut my eyes, sinking into Elias’s feelings.
I step into the aura.
I’m still in Barbazal, but outside. Red, white, and blue flags flutter in the wind, strung along pennants weaving through the town square. There are people. Everywhere. Like, more people than I thought could live in a town as empty and off-the-map as Barbazal. I’d never even heard of this place before today.
And yet there are crowds, bunching up along the side of the main road we just drove through, eager to reach the barriers keeping them from throwing themselves into the street. I crane my neck and stand on my tiptoes to get a better look. I’m already short, and the arms in the air cheering on whoever’s over there aren’t making this any easier.
I can hear cars crawling past. Flashes of shiny red, glittering chrome bumpers, and brilliant white rims with white walls indicate that these are classic cars. Is it some kind of car show?
The crowd swells from cheering into straight-up shrieking in excitement, and soon I see why. A gigantic balloon float pulls up the rear of this… parade?—I don’t know what else to call it—at least ten feet high. Two smiling women in white blouses and jeans with cowboy hats and red lipstick toss candy into the crowd. Only the youngest out here bend to find it. And when I look back up at the float, I see him—the subject of everyone’s worship. A man in a navy-blue blazer with a lighter blue necktie, tied perfectly, dark jeans, white cowboy boots, and a matching white cowboy hat. His glistening smile is warm, charming. He must be at least in his forties. He’s actually incredibly handsome, in a Ken doll sort of way? Like if Ken owned a farm and never had to actually farm anything a day in his life.
Jonah Macon will bring home the bacon, reads the banner along the side of the float as it passes. I look around at all the smiling faces, and I think back to Elias. Why would such a joyful scene make him so profoundly sad?
And then I look around for him. Wait… where is Elias?
I look over my shoulder and find Elias’s shop across the way, just as worn down as it was today when Steph and I walked in. This must be a recent memory.
There he stands, wearing the same overalls, downing the last of a bottle of water which looks like it had only a few drops in it to begin with. He tenses—I feel the tightness in my shoulders with him—then crushes the empty bottle in his hand, and hurls it to the ground. Then he marches back inside.
I look back up at Jonah, expecting to see that movie-star smile, but instead I see something else.
His smile has fallen as he looks toward Elias’s shop. He’s… broken. Just a little. That political mask he’s wearing—that all politicians have to wear at least sometimes—cracked for a moment. Did anyone else see it? Or are they all mesmerized by the banners and the free candy and the fact that he’s already back to smiling and waving again?
Whatever’s up with Elias, it has everything to do with Jonah Macon.
Whooooosh!
I’m back in the shop. I’m staring at the ground. I hear the faint tinkling of music, like the world’s tiniest xylophone, playing a song I recognize. It’s a song my mom used to hum all the time when I was little, a song that she kept in her back pocket her whole journey to America with my dad.
When all the world is darkest,
You’re alone and feel forgotten,
Know the road ahead is there.
Even if the fog is thick,
You’re lost and feel alone,
Know the road ahead is there.
The rain can make the journey slick,
You’re insecure and unsure,
Know the road ahead is there.
And so am I.
I’m staring up at Elias’s back. No, his face! He’s looking at me!
“Uh,” I say, lowering my hand and weaving my fingers together sheepishly behind my back. “Just… wondering what you’re doing over there.”
But he’s peering past me, at Steph.
“Don’t touch that,” he growls, marching past me toward her.
Panic sets into my chest and creeps up my neck. My heart races as he nears her, marching, fists balled, red fireball erupting over his head, growing so huge it burns my eyes. Is he going to hurt her?
“Steph!” I yell. Steph looks up at me in alarm, and then to Elias, and jumps out of the way just before Elias slams his hand down on the now open red box. Just before it shuts, I catch a glimpse of a bright red classic car under the lid, rotating slowly.
The music stops as abruptly as it started.
Steph and I look at each other, and then I look at Elias.
“Sorry,” offers Steph, “it just looked so pretty. I wanted to see—”
Elias’s hands curl into fists on the table.
“I’m… really sorry,” continues Steph.
That gets Elias to soften again. The red aura vanishes. I see my way in.
“Elias?” I ask. “Earlier, when Silas brought up Jonah Macon, you seemed upset. Who is he?”
He scoffs. Steph looks at me like, Why the hell are you asking that?
I know, Steph, get the oil, get the hell out. But I have questions! Important ones! Ones with answers that might only lie here, right now, in this room, with Elias.
“Jonah Macon—” says Elias. He speaks like the name burns on his tongue. “—is the lowest, vilest sellout I’ve ever met.”
He turns and looks at me.
“He’s all anyone talks about ’round here anymore, now that he’s back from his fancy office in Denver, suckin’ up to conservatives, callin’ himself a ‘centrist.’ He’s a damn liar.”
“Why the fanfare then?” asks Steph.
“Because these people of Barbazal are too gullible to know what’s good for ’em. They think ol’ Jonah Macon will fix our drought, bring us our water supply back after they dammed up the river. Well, I tell you what.” He takes a step closer, and I flinch before I realize he’s walking past me. “Jonah Macon won’t ‘bring home the bacon’ until he makes it rain.”
A dam? They’re in the middle of a drought and someone dammed the river?
I glance at Steph, who nods at me. We both catch that Elias may have meant “make it rain” literally and figuratively. But even with all the venom spewing from his words, Elias’s aura still glows blue. There’s more to this story. People who have it out for politicians often seethe with rage, boil with anger with no place to put it. Elias… something about Jonah makes him sad.
Not just sad.
Hopeless?
Silas bursts back into the room with a triangle-shaped yellow bottle in his hand and takes one glance at Elias before analyzing the whole situation.
“Aw, hell, you got him talkin’ about Jonah, didn’t you?” he asks me, setting the bottle on the table, shoving his hands in his pockets, and sighing.
“Actually, you did,” chuckles Steph. “You said Jonah’s entourage might have some oil with them.”
“Well, luckily I don’t have to ask,” he says, nodding at the bottle. “Besides, his little club is impossible to get a minute in with anyway. Damn politicians are so hard to talk to.”
“See?” hisses Elias. “Ain’t got time for nobody, no common folk anymore. Jonah’s too good for us now.”
“Aw, Elias, don’t say that,” Silas encourages. “You know everything he does is spelled out for him—what he says, what he wears, hell, how he shapes his beard. They probably don’t even let him wipe his own ass anymore.”
I believe Silas on that one. People in positions of power, bought or not, are often highly curated. I once saw a TikTok from an ex-advisor to the White House talking about the rounds of analysis that go into choosing a politician’s socks.
Who pays that much attention to socks?!
“Well,” says Steph, bringing the conversation back around, “thanks for the oil.” She holds out a ten-dollar bill, Elias takes it, and just like that, we have a precious bottle of oil in our possession.
I exchange a smile with her, and her face says it all. We’re getting out of here.
“Thanks, Elias,” nods Steph. “Thanks, Silas.”
And we turn to leave.
But just before we reach the door, I hear Elias’s voice behind us.
“Hey, uh, ladies, how’d you know to pull over for oil? Most cars don’t give an indication that it’s low.”
I turn and feel my cheeks growing hot with embarrassment. I scratch the back of my neck and chuckle.
“I, uh… kind of let the engine die.”
“What?” asks Elias.
Silas bursts into laughter. “Oh hell, you might need a whole new engine then!”
“What?!” cries Steph.
“What kinda car is it?” asks Elias, bringing the conversation back down from hysterics.
“2001 Saturn SL.”
Elias whistles and shakes his head. “Yeah, I don’t even know if they make parts for those anymore, girls. I wouldn’t even know what I was lookin’ at if I did take a look.”
“Let’s see,” says Steph, pulling out her phone and showing it to Elias. “I took a picture of under the hood just in case I needed to… I don’t know… compare… oils…? Or something.”
Silas stifles another laugh, but Elias just furrows his brows and squints down at the phone.
“Hard to tell from just a photo, but… those pistons look scratched to hell.”
“What are pistons?” asks Steph. “And ‘scratched to hell’ doesn’t sound good.”
“Long story short,” Silas chimes in, “they keep the car runnin’. But again, you’re not gonna find twenty-som’n-year-old pistons here. Maybe not even online.”
“So,” I begin, “we have more oil now, but if we can’t get new pistons, then…”
I finish the sentence in my head, hoping against everything that the answer is no.
Are we stuck here?
“Prob’ly won’t run.”
I think back to Steph’s drum kit in the sweltering heat, the skins warping, the pedals loosening. I hope it’s okay. If it hasn’t been stolen.
We covered it up well enough, but if people see an abandoned car and decide to poke around inside, they might find the drum kit anyway. Renewed vigor grips my heart, and this time I finish Steph’s sentence out loud.
“There has to be somewhere else we haven’t tried.”
“I’m the only mechanic in a fifty-mile radius. I can see about ordering specialty pistons for ya, but that’ll take at least two days.”
“Two days?!” exclaims Steph. “But that’s Saturday! We have a show in Fort Collins Friday night!”
“Silas,” I ask, “what if we… I mean could we… could we borrow your truck? Just to get us to Fort Collins for the show, and then we’ll bring it right back. Promise. You could even keep collateral. Um…”
Steph raises an eyebrow at me like, What the hell do you mean by collateral?
She’s right, we don’t own anything. A granola bar doesn’t exactly scream collateral. We’d have to bring along all our instruments for the show, and even the most expensive thing we have—the car—is a piece of shit on four wheels.
Maybe fewer wheels than that by now.
Silas gives me the saddest smile I’ve seen in a long time.
“Sorry, ladies, no can do. I’ve got some sheetrock to haul up to the dam tomorrow night. Even if I did trust y’all—no offense, but we’ve only just met—”
“None taken,” says Steph, but I can hear the disappointment in her voice.
“I can’t.” Silas holds his hands out and purses his lips apologetically. His head glows purple. He’s nervous.
Probably at the fact that two complete strangers just asked to borrow his car.
But Elias’s blue ring around his head has disappeared, and he chimes in.
“Y’all can stay at the Crown Inn for the night, since you’re stranded. Ask for Jude, tell him I sent you. He’ll give y’all a room. On the house.”
“Really?” asks Steph eagerly. “That’s amazing, thank you!”
She’s right, that really is amazing. Elias must be super dialed into the neighborhood to be able to just whip up a hotel room like that, especially with all the huge crowds here to see Jonah.
“Thank you,” I say, and I mean it. It’s great to have a place to stay. Beats having to sleep in the car. Miles away. Alone. In the dark. In the middle of nowhere.
Steph has gone suddenly silent after that expressive thank you she uttered only moments ago, and she clasps her hands and stares at the ground, lost in thought. Her aura glows blue, and my heart sinks. I know exactly what’s wrong.
“Oh, Silas?” I ask before he steps out the door. He turns to look at me.
“Would you… mind driving us back to our car tonight? We left something important in there.”
I glance at Steph as her face lights up. That blue ring hovering around her beanie fades into the brilliant gold from earlier. I’m sure I’m smiling the biggest, dumbest smile right now, but I’d do anything for Steph.
We’re getting that drum kit before it melts.
“Sure thing!” exclaims Silas. He keeps talking, but his words fade into the background for me as I notice Elias leaning on the worktable. Hands balled. Staring at that music box.
3: The Hotel
The motor oil is now in the car. And it still won’t start. Elias was right. We need new pistons, and they don’t make them anymore.
But at least now, Steph’s drum kit is safely in the back of Silas’s truck. Silas and Steph are standing here with me in line in the lobby…
…and the hotel is an absolute zoo.
Photographers, with cameras as big as my guitar, stand lingering around, keeping their eyes moving. Clearly, they’re here to catch a glimpse of Jonah Macon, but who knows if he’s even staying here? Silas said he has an “entourage”—you’d think he’d have his own trailer parked somewhere secretive in the woods. Rock stars have tour buses, don’t they? Why not politicians?
“Hey,” whispers Steph, “you really think Elias can get us a room here?”
She looks way more relaxed now that we’ve got her other best friend in tow. Her drum kit is in pristine condition. Well, at first glance anyway. It’ll be impossible to tell until we can see it up close, and once it’s cooled down from the heat.
The sunset outside the window just behind her is glowing a brilliant orange, and I smile up at her.
“He seemed pretty sure of himself,” I reply, but I hope the answer is yes.
If not here, where else will we stay?
We’re about to find out.
“Yes. Are you here for emergency water bottles or do you need a room. Because we don’t have either right now,” drones the weary young man at the counter, clicking through something on his keyboard faster than I’ve ever seen anyone type before. Clearly he’s too busy to even make eye contact.
But I clock the mention of emergency water bottles. Silas wasn’t kidding.
“Uh, hey there, Jude,” Silas cuts in from behind us. “Busy night?”
Jude gives him a smirk that seems to half say, Are you stupid? and half say, “Ha ha, very funny.”
“I reckon you don’t need a room for tonight?” asks Jude, all formal politeness and non-Barbazalian accent gone from his voice. He’s with a friend now, or at least a contact.
“I don’t,” says Silas, “but these two ladies do. Courtesy of Elias, if you please.”
Something changes in Jude’s face as he turns to me and Steph.
“Silas, I can’t—”
“Elias says you have a spare room.”
“Well, it’s not really available—”
“He insisted.”
“Silas,” Jude is snapping now. “May I speak to you over here please?” He turns to us and dons that front-desk smile again. “Pardon, ladies, so sorry for the trouble.”
“It’s Steph and Alex, thanks,” says Steph.
“Damn,” I say to her as the two walk away.
“What?” she asks. “If I get referred to as one of two ‘ladies’ tonight again, I might scream. Might as well say, ‘These two humans with tits would like to have a word with you.’”
