Mila Santos Is (Not) Dead

xviii: less dead/more dead

MILA DIDN'T KNOW MUCH about Indiana. What little she knew came from Parks and Recreation. Lots of borderline racist white people. Probably the most boring state. Mila toyed with the radio, thumbing through the channels until she found one she liked—a local pop rock station.

    "Gooooooood morning, Greenfield!" the station's host chirped.

    "Oh, shut up," Mila responded. "Nobody should be that happy to live in Indiana." Mila wasn't a morning person. She wasn't a night person either. She was barely even a person at all.

    She moved her hand back to the steering wheel. It took more effort than usual, like her arm was made of lead. No, it wasn't that her arm was made of lead—it was her head.

    She shook her head, squinting at the flat, sleety road. Even the cars seemed to be moving slower than usual like they were also made of lead. She rubbed her eyes. Nope. The cars were still moving too slowly.

    Mila turned to check her blind spot. She felt like she was moving in a strobe light, like everything happened several times before it really did happen, and by then it had taken far too long. It was like she'd woken from a deep nap, when you wake up and it's dark out and you don't know who, where, or what you are. What's wrong with me? she wondered. And then it hit her.

    She'd taken motion sickness medicine this morning. She'd never been in the driver's seat before, so it'd never caused problems in the past, but her motion sickness medicine was effectively a tranquilizer. It could knock her out for days.

    She considered pulling over, but even her thoughts came in slow motion. She looked at her speedometer. Fifty. The speed limit was... she searched for a sign. Seventy.

HHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNKKKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A car flew straight toward her.

She was in the whole-ass wrong lane.

Mila screamed and yanked the wheel to the right, her car careening back into the right lane. She needed to pull over. She was going to get herself killed.

Red and blue lights flashed behind her. A siren screamed.

    "FUCK!" Mila howled.

    She scanned the road. There weren't that many cars out at this time of day, but there were enough to hide her. She could gun it, weave through traffic, outrun the cop. But what was she thinking? That was a surefire way to get herself killed, even if she was at full capacity. But getting stopped by the police would squash her plan before she could even...

    Mila glanced in her rearview mirror. The cop wove his way through traffic, trailing behind her. He lifted one hand off the wheel and pointed sideways, gesturing for Mila to pull over. Her stomach turned. Of course the cop would be a white man. Sweat pooled beneath her palms, making it impossible to get a solid grip on the wheel.

    She needed to decide, like, yesterday. Before the cop suspected her of anything other than bad driving.

    Mila swallowed her fear. Her foot itched to slam on the gas, but she pulled over to the side of the road, slowing to a stop amid all the slush. The cop followed her and parked behind her. He walked to Mila's car. She rolled her window down and said a prayer.

    "Hey." The cop gave her a fish-eating grin. Or—no, it wasn't fish-eating. It was flirtatious. This was Mila's worst nightmare.

    "'Morning, officer." Mila looked at his name tag, read it, knew what it was. Refused to call him by it, even in her head. He was just the cop. A depersonalized entity.