the imprint of your smile stuck to my heart

Driving had never exactly been something Namjoon excelled at and the circumstances he'd found himself in didn't make it any easier.

His car's radio had always been notoriously sketchy so he'd been forced to pull up Spotify to entertain him on his drive home and he'd always forgotten how much of his cell phone battery the app ate through. Google Maps interrupting the best parts of his favorite songs didn't exactly help the battery situation and by the time he had pulled onto the interstate the snow had started. He'd promised his mom he'd be home before the snow, but that was also yesterday when the forecast had promised snow by nightfall. But there it was, snow at 4 in the afternoon, which, this time of year, may as well be nightfall for how dark it had gotten already.

But that's entirely beside the point.

So with the snow having come early, Google Maps and Spotify running simultaneously, and Namjoon having left his sketchy gas station quality car charger in his dorm room, of course his phone battery drained faster than it normally would. Namjoon should have predicted disaster and instead found himself walking right into the midst of it. But he liked to look on the bright side of things and disaster simply was not included. Disaster belonged in the dark, hidden away at the bottom of a dumpster. Not the interstate. Not on the day Namjoon was trying to make it home for the start of his winter break.

When Namjoon first pulled off the interstate, taking the exit that led him to a brightly lit gas station, it hadn't even crossed his mind to buy a replacement phone charger for his car. He had another charger tucked away in his laundry basket anyway, the one that plugged into a wall outlet. And he had foolishly thought he'd be home in a few-ish hours. So he'd paid for his gas at the pump and watched miserably as the small snowflakes fell from the sky. They weren't even that big, to be completely honest. If he unfocused his eyes he could convince himself it was just raining. In the Midwest. In the second week of December.

But maybe, just maybe, by the time he'd finished pumping his gas and gotten back onto the interstate... the snowflakes were a little bigger?

And maybe after a few more minutes the wind had started to pick up? The roads weren't icy yet or anything and the snow hadn't even really begun to stick, so Namjoon wasn't too concerned. Just... cautious. He told himself to be more aware as he hummed along to his playlists.

He tried, he really did, but between focusing on the vaguely familiar drive and the act of actually driving, Namjoon forgot to pay attention to the snow. That is, until his phone let out a horrible screeching tone. The alert was like a shock to his system and he noticed, worriedly, that the snowflakes had gotten bigger, were falling faster and in clumps. The wind was really going now, pushing at his car as he drove on. He pulled to the side of the road to read:

Weather Advisory in effect for Cook County, Lake County, Marion County, and Springfield County until 6PM. Severe Winter Storm Advisory for Cook County, Lake County, Marion County, and Springfield County until 8PM.

Namjoon looked at the clock. It was 4:58 PM.

"Fuck," he mumbled, thumbing the alert away. He was currently in Lake County and had to drive the rest of the way home, which was, as his luck would have it, smack dab in the middle of Cook County. If he wanted to get home he'd have to travel through just about every affected county. On a day that wasn't threatening him with a snowstorm he could easily be home in two hours. But in these conditions? He was still a new driver, still very cautious. He could easily take twice that amount of time to get home.

Just as he was trying to figure out what to do, face in his hands and phone back in its stand on his console, it vibrated. Loudly. Picking his head out of his palms, Namjoon saw it was a text from his mom.