Page 27 of His Curvy Distraction

“So gross,” I groaned.

I’d cleaned up vomit and wiped noses. I’d dealt with spilled food and even the occasional bathroom accident. But none of that was on me.

“Roll, roll, roll,” I whispered to myself as I tried to get myself out of the hole.

With zero success.

“Dammit!” I shouted, again to absolutely no one.

Panic was setting in, and exhaustion and fear were right there cheering the panic on. If I didn’t get the hell out of there soon, I was going to go headfirst into a panic attack.

I had no choice. Rolling out of the hole wasn’t an option with my foot wedged in. The mud at the bottom sucked my boot deeper with every move I made to pull it out.

Putting another boot down there wasn’t appealing. But neither was staying there all afternoon and freezing to death.

I pushed myself upright again, trying to work my foot free. It moved a little, but not enough to get it out of the hole. The squishy sound told me I had to overpower the soft mud that I was so thankful for when I started digging because it was better than frozen ground.

“Fuck you, mud,” I muttered.

Another deep breath. Ignore the tangy scent of dirt and the feel of mud caked onto every inch of my body. Ignore the panic clawing at my throat and desperate to come out. I was going to do this.

I pushed my free foot down into the hole, wedging it on the side instead of letting it go all the way to the bottom.

“Gah!” I shouted, the pain so much worse than I expected it to be.

“I got this. I have to. Okay. One. Two. Three!”

I pushed with my bad foot, using my arms and leg to pry my good foot out of the damn hole.

I rolled to the ground, laughing and relieved and covered in mud, but free from the ground.

There had to be some slap in the face lesson about falling into a hole of my own creation, but all I cared about at that moment was getting up and getting less frozen.

I moved to stand and collapsed to the ground again.

“Ow!” My ankle was not okay. I couldn’t stand up. Which meant I could either crawl to my car or try to use the shovel as a crutch.

“This will be interesting.” I used the shovel to help me stand, keeping my foot off the ground as much as possible. It hurt to even graze the ground, but I had to get out of there. I had to get back to my car.

Each step was slow. I stabbed the shovel in the ground, then hopped on my good foot, the one that was soaked all the way through and squished between my toes. One step. Then another. And another.

I finally made it to my car and realized I had a whole new problem. I was covered. Head to toe. There wasn’t an inch of me that didn’t have mud on it. And I had nothing to protect my car from myself.

Daisy and my mom and everyone I knew in the area said always keep a blanket in your car. Create an emergency kit. Be prepared.

I didn’t go anywhere. Work and home. My parents’ house sometimes. The grocery store and bookstore and out to eat. All local places. Nowhere I needed an emergency kit to get to.

I should have listened to them. And now my seats were going to be ruined because I hadn’t.

I opened the door and debated. I shook my head and laid my coat over the seat, hating that I was going to destroy it but knowing it could be washed. Probably. Hopefully.

The drive home was not fun, but I made it. I parked in the driveway and was extremely grateful Daisy wasn’t home to watch my hobble-stomp-grunt walk to the front door. I let myself in and pried my muddy boots off, wincing when I had to get it off my injured left foot. My socks were almost as muddy as my boots, and my clothes were no better.

“Daisy?” I called out, hoping my suspicions were correct and her car not in the driveway meant she was not home. “Are you here?”

Silence met my questions, and I chewed my lip for a minute. I checked outside again and decided it was for the best to strip to my underwear right there at the door and carry my clothes to the laundry room instead of risking getting the entire house muddy.

I scooped up all my clothes and cringed at the feel of the muddy fabric against my skin, but it was better. I hurried, as fast as my ankle would allow, to the laundry room next to the kitchen and stopped.

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