Page 4 of Escaping Our Reality

About fourteen months ago is when things changed. Which would have been about eight months before she disappeared. That’s when Carrie started driving all the way across the county to shop at this one particular gas station.

And then six months before she vanished is when she disabled the GPS tracking system in her car. That was one of the first things that Marcum and Leary did. They tried to obtain all of the GPS data from her SUV. But it had been manually disabled. This was also around the time she started turning off her cell phone for large stretches of time, rendering that form of GPS untraceable as well. There was no answer for any of that. And it wasn’t like any of us knew that she’d done that as we weren’t in the habit of following her every move.

It didn’t take me long to realize that I needed answers.Real answers.

I was banging on the girls’—Hannah, Catie, and Dakota’s—apartment door before school this morning, begging and pleading for any information. They claimed not to know anything, but I have a distinct feeling that they’re hiding something. I went to Caleb’s apartment next, and he finally confirmed my suspicions. Something was—something is—going on at the gas station. He wouldn’t divulge more than that, but his eyes did hold a new pain I hadn’t noticed before.

And then he shut the door, telling me to go to school.

But only after begging me to drop it. Begging me to let this go and just live my life.

Of course, he knew I wouldn’t. That’s probably why he shut the door… because revisiting past demons first thing in the morning is obviously a hard pill for him to swallow.

I tap my fingers on the steering wheel and glare at the overhead signage reflecting in the rearview mirror.

Travis Boys Gas and Country Mart.

The warm January sun of the late afternoon has me quickly breaking into a sweat as I sit in the driver’s seat. Typical Alabama winter. It was forty-five yesterday, and today the high is sixty-eight.

And… now, I’m fixating on the weather in a pitiful attempt to talk myself out of something monumentally stupid.

Chapter 3

ELLA

Here I still sit, twenty minutes later, building up the courage to step inside the gas station that may hold secrets to the whereabouts of my big sister. Acid churns in my stomach like the swells of stormy ocean waves, and my temples throb with pressure. With one last deep breath, I tightly grasp my phone and my paisley wristlet in my right hand and step from my vehicle, locking the door behind me. There’s nothing unusual about the outside of the station. You can tell it’s been remodeled within the past few years, and there are eight gas pumps divided into two lanes. One pump is currently occupied by a black sedan where a gentleman patiently fills his tank.

I slowly walk from the side of the station, where I parked, to the front door, searching the spattering of surrounding buildings. Across the street is a dollar store and a fast-food restaurant, and on the same side of the street, just down a small alleyway is a body shop. Harlan’s Garage and Automotive. I’m about to head into the station when something catches my eye at the body shop.

Rather,someonecatches my eye.

A tall, muscular man leans over a car, working beneath the hood. He’s wearing boots, blue jeans, and a stark white T-shirt, which contrasts nicely with his unseasonably tanned skin. His shoulders and upper back are broad and his waist is trim. I can see the muscles that run the length of his arms flex and pull as he grabs something from the vehicle’s engine, looks at it, and puts it back. There’s a ballcap on his head so I can’t really make outthe color of his hair, but I’m pretty sure it’s brown. Maybe dirty blond.

He reaches around to the rounded globes of his firm backside and tugs a white hand towel from his back pocket. He wipes his hands and then tucks the rag back into place. An unusual, soft tingle rolls from my belly down to my groin and ends up in a pool in my toes.

I shake my head, clearing my lust-fueled thoughts. I better head inside before he turns around and completely shatters the illusion.

Not to be judgmental, but based on the track record of people from this part of town, he most likely has only three teeth in his head, an eye patch, and a tattoo of a snake on his face. At least that’s what the guy looked like who was dumpster diving at the fast-food restaurant earlier.

The door emits a soft, electronic chime as I push it open. The smell of fried food and Clorox overwhelms my senses. A woman with bright red hair buys a bag of chips and an apple juice, while a little boy with equally bright red hair tugs at her pants leg. They finish their transaction, and I step to the side, making room for them to pass, and watch them walk to the waiting black sedan.

There’s one guy standing at the register. He looks to be in his mid-twenties. His light brown hair is a little on the greasy side and a little on the long side. He’s tall and thin with nice bone structure and big brown eyes. Maybe, he’d be handsome if he weren’t so... skanky.

I can’t tell if he uses drugs or drinks and smokes too much, but something is definitely going on with him. Something has eaten away at his boyish good looks and healthy stature.

He eyes me suspiciously so I quickly smile and politely nod, walking away before my monstrous nerves get the best of me. I meander down the aisles, aimlessly picking up concessions here and there in an attempt to disguise my investigation of thestore. I surface on the drink aisle and freeze mid-step. Slayton’s Southern Blackberry Tea offensively stares back at me from the glass refrigerator door. I grab the bottle from the cooler with shaky hand and make my way back to the register.

“How you doing? That’ll be all?” The man’s voice is scratchy and his tone disinterested, but interestingly enough, there’s a pulse between us.

A hum. Like he’s dying to say something but doesn’t.

Needing an excuse to stay longer, I add food to my order. “Can I get a fried chicken breast too, please?”

“To go?”

I glance over my left shoulder to see a row of dining booths lined against the window. “For here.”

He says nothing as he places a large, golden fried piece of chicken on a paper plate and calculates my total. “That’ll be $7.56.”

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