Descending Star

SECOND DESCENT

Zoey sent most of her camping gear back with her parents, since she had the apartment above the Newtons' outdoor supply store. Jacob had jammed the trunk to bursting and had stacked the back seat all the way to the ceiling, but they had the front seats, to kick back. Zoey had her bare feet up on the dashboard.

Jacob drove. She tried very hard to let him do his thing. He drove like a dweeb. He revved the riceburner engine at stoplights, crawled up peoples' butts, stood on the brakes when irate people ahead brushed him off, did this slalom thing with the steering wheel to alleviate boredom, as though he were on a motorcycle, to intimidate drivers on his tail.

At one stoplight, three men challenged Jacob to get out of the car. Zoey pacified them and headed off the certain road rage incident by apologizing for him. "He can't help it. He's half-blind for one thing, and his mother's dying. We're very sorry. We'll let you go ahead."

He started to protest, with impressive resolve to get himself killed. She kicked him in the flank to shut him up.

He seethed when the light turned green, and she compelled him to count slowly to five, so that his erstwhile combatants could get a good head start.

"I kind of like your face," she informed him. "Get it busted up, and I'll dump you flat. Hey. You wanted to take the Sierra Nevada. You can thank me now, for voting to slum it along the Pacific Coast for a few days." Her original plan had been to escape Kira and Caz by hightailing it to Forks, to look for a summer job and cobble together temporary living arrangements. With Micaela's call, those problems were solved, so now she wanted to amble up California's North Coast, work on her tan, and stop at every greasy fish shack on the way. She told him, "There's some kind of massive pile-up, ten miles deep. Freak jet crash. No one dead but the pilot, no body. They think it might have been a botched emergency landing. They found the black box. Both engines were cut before the crash. Maybe an engine fire or something."

"Ten mile snarl? Maybe Ben's caught in that."

"He'll be fine," she muttered dismissively, sun on her face like glitter. "He's got his babysitter."

Jacob drove and silently stewed for a minute, while she preened and sunned herself, unperturbed. Both she and Ben constantly insisted that they were only friends, and had only ever been friends, but they were closer than any brother and sister Jacob had ever met, almost like they had ESP or something, and even now, with Zoey alone in the car with him, he felt like a third wheel. He couldn't discern if this was her fault, due to her constant jabbing innuendo, or whether it was his own flare-ups of irrational jealousy.

He said, "Edythe's really not that bad. She's good for Ben, you know. And she's really great, if you give her a chance and get to know her."

"Yeah," Zoey snipped, "I got a chance to look at her. She has two or three amiable qualities that she can shake at a boy. I'll grant her that."

She looked down over her virtually flat sports bra at her deeply corded stomach, shook her head with disgust, and went back to her phone.

Jacob muttered under his breath. She ignored him.

He suggested, "Still, you should call them. Make sure they're okay."

Zoey glowered at him. If they weren't okay, what did Chief Jacob expect to do about it? Spin this deathtrap around and ride to the rescue of the fair damsel and her besotted doofus boyfriend?

He seethed. They were only three hours into this roadtrip, and he already detested the contemptuous looks that she gave him all the time.

"Oh, cool!" she suddenly exclaimed. "Mandy Hartness must have finished her story for Outside. Their editors are offering to let me read it." She swirled her finger over the phone in a death spiral, and brought it to a crash with a tap on Decline. She laughed and said, "I don't care what they publish. I'm on vacation."