He drove out of town with a dozen knives in his back.
Scott, you’re too angry. You’re so selfish. You’re too needy. You’re abusive.
He’d lived by a motto to own up to your mistakes, but no matter how many times he admitted he was wrong, there was always another person to demand another apology, another admission. As he crept along in the moving van, the rain continued to pour. The windshield wipers struggled to keep up with the deluge and he leaned forward, peering over the steering wheel. He didn’t have a problem apologizing or admitting he was wrong, but he had a real problem with people who couldn’t do the same acting like he owed them something.
Things had been terrible for years in his marriage and everything had recently come to a head. He decided to split from his wife, packed his belongings into a moving truck, and headed across the country to start a new life.
It was the most painful, difficult decision he’d ever made, and it had not gone according to plan.
What day is it?
Anna could not remember. Every day seemed to blend into the next in her parents’ backwater diner, and she had long ago stopped counting relentless days of monotony. Every morning was the same as the last in the store — the products, the customers, the sunrise. All the same.
Even Anna was the same. She did not smile or laugh. She did not send text messages to her friends, or post Tik Toks for the world to see, because Anna did not have friends, and the store was her world.
“Anna!” her mother called from their adjoining apartment, and the young woman flinched. “Anna!” she shouted again, insistent. Anna parted a bead curtain in the doorway and hustled to see what the old woman was yelling about this time.
The floor creaked as she went down the hallway and before she had even arrived in her mother’s room, the old woman was already barking.
“Anna, my bed is soaked!” the woman cried. “Soaked again!” she said with an accusing tone.
Anna rounded the corner and saw her mother sitting up in bed, her formerly thick black hair now thin and streaked with gray, in disarray, her nightgown wet and matted to her body.
“Anna, how can you let this happen to me?” the woman cried. “To your own mother?”
“Evelyn, it is what it is,” Anna said in a matter-of-fact tone. “We do this every day,” she said as she stepped forward to gather the bedding. She had stopped calling the old woman “mom” years ago.
“How dare you treat me this way.” Evelyn’s eyes blazed.
“I’m not treating you any way,” Anna replied. “You just wet the bed, that’s…”
Her reply was interrupted by the loud crack of the old woman’s open hand across her cheek.
“How dare you,” the old woman spat. “Your father would never have let this happen.”
Anna stood motionless, her face downturned, a red welt rising on her cheek.
My father would not have let a lot of things happen.
An electronic sign on the highway blasted an unexpected message into the night at a million candlepower — Interstate 29 Closed at Exit 54. The sign flipped to display a second message that began “use alternate route via” but before he could see the rest of the message in the driving rain, Scott had passed it.
What the fuck? Since when do they close the interstate?
He had encountered plenty of lane closures, sure, but he couldn’t remember the last time the entire freeway was closed. He was using two navigation units, and he tried to keep one eye on the road while he checked them. Both agreed — there was a detour ahead.
He reluctantly followed instructions and left the highway on a detour through several small towns along a lonely two-lane road. After an extended effort attempting to find gas and a meal, and a stop to repair a wheel-well liner that was rubbing on the truck’s tire, the detour cost him four hours. He was way behind schedule. He’d expected to arrive at his destination by 11 PM, a late hour for him, but it was already past 1 in the morning and he still had hours to go.
The abuse began when Anna’s father passed away. He hadn’t been in the ground a week when her uncles, who had not been part of her life growing up, suddenly started coming around and trying to present a protector visage to her mother.
Anna was sure her mother knew what they were really up to and did nothing to stop them. It went on for some time, and Anna told her mom, but the evil old woman blamed it on Anna.
Her mother said she liked it.
She asked for it.
Each accusation was crushing to the young woman. Anna was completely bewildered that someone who was supposed to love her could say such a thing. Who did a child have if she did not have her mother?
Then it happened.
While her father was on his deathbed, family gathered at the hospital. In a quiet moment, Anna’s aunt Sara explained that there was something very special about her family. Sara told Anna when she reached the right age, something might happen to her.
“You’ll be able to feel it,” Sara said. “It skips generations sometimes. Your dad is dying, so we know it skipped him.” There was sorrow in Sara’s eyes, but also an intensity that frightened Anna.
Sara stepped close to the young woman and lowered her voice.
“The gift comes with a terrible price,” she said. “A terrible price.”
“I don’t know what you’re…” Anna began.
“I know you don’t know,” Sara said. “But you will, okay? So just listen to me and remember a couple of things.” She put her palms to Anna’s shoulders and smoothed her sleeves.
“Strangers,” her Aunt Sara said. “Travelers. People without family. The more you watch for them the easier it will get to spot them, and the more you use the pull, the more powerful you will get.”
That had been three years ago — three years during which Anna did not age a day. Anna’s aunt had been right. Something happened to her. She could feel it, and the more she used her gift, the better she got.
Her uncles paid dearly for their actions.
It was intoxicating.
The rain let up, but it was past 2:30 am and Scott’s eyelids were heavy. He’d turned the radio up and tried to headbang his way out of his fatigue. He rolled the windows down and froze his ass off. Nothing was working.
Then, just when he started to worry that he might have to pull off the road and sleep in the truck, he saw a light in the distance. In the inky black pre-dawn wilderness, there was a clearing, and a mom & pop all-night diner.
Scott pulled his truck into the parking lot and he could see a young woman behind the counter as a neon sign advertised hot coffee.
What a welcoming gesture.
Scott climbed down out of the cab of his truck and strode toward the entrance and a cup of hot black coffee. He ascended the three short steps and entered the diner. The bell over the door tinkled like breaking glass.
Scott had a feeling things were about to change.
Troy Larson is a writer, digital content creator, and broadcast veteran with hundreds of podcast and broadcast credits to his name. Reach out on Facebook and on Instagram.
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