Page 27 of Exit Lane
I scan my body, like I’m doing a guided meditation, grateful for every inch unscathed. Then I catapult into fix-it mode, transform into Work Marin. How can we get from A to B most efficiently?
“We need to get the car out of here before any more snow falls.”
Teddy nods. His relief when I take over is palpable. When I turn to look at him, really look at him, I see that his hand is shaking, but his breath is slowing. I can feel my brow crease, and I’m flooded with the desire to take careof him. To demonstrate that I can. “We’d be very stupid to get back on the interstate at this point. We’ll pull off and check in to whatever hotel is closest. I’ll just keep checking the weather so we can leave the second the snow stops.”
Teddy runs his fingers through his hair, laughing to himself. “Funny how you’re great in a crisis as long as it’s not personal.”
“I’m sorry, Teddy. Did you say something?” I shoot back. Like I wasn’t just having the same thought.
“Just remarking on how you can get us out of a literal ditch but broke up with me because I told you I had cancer. That’s all.” His tone’s cutting. Even though I know I deserve it, the sentence slices.
As if on cue, a towering pickup truck whose bed is bigger than the room I rented when I moved to New York pulls up to us, blinding us with its headlights. The matte black finish rules out the possibility of law enforcement. Without a chance to check the bumper for right-wing political sentiments, I’m paralyzed, but I try to be optimistic at this turn of events. At the very least, I’m grateful for the large-scale distraction from the conversation I’d like to put off as long as possible.
The headlights dim. A silhouette capped by a cowboy hat makes its way to the driver’s side door.
“Haven’t we been through enough today?” Teddy sighs.
“I’m handling this.” I move closer to him, and my core clenches involuntarily.
The figure motions for us to open the window, and Teddy closes his eyes and grits his teeth as he does. Thefrigid outdoors spills into the car, along with a considerable amount of snow.
“Y’all need a tow?” the mysterious shadow yells, his profile aglow in the car lights. Two perfectly plucked brows and an orange paisley button-down under a full-length down parka greet us with a beaming smile. “Watched you spin out and thought I’d see what I can do. If you’re keen, I can get you hooked up and on the road in a minute or two.”
Relief and a renewed faith in the universe wash over me. Teddy looks like he might cry, so before we can all bear witness to male fragility, I lean over him and respond. “That would mean the world to us. Here, I can pay you?”
The Danish krone and pile of five-dollar bills I pull out of my monogrammed wallet makes our hero laugh. “Doesn’t count as an act of kindness if you’re compensated, now does it? Stay put, and when I honk, you hit the gas as hard as you can.”
He disappears back into his pickup to string an impressive setup between our two vehicles.
“What?” I roll my eyes at Teddy. “I’m not going to question it. I’m just going to accept it as some sign from the universe and go along for the ride.” Heat radiates off of him, and I wonder if our somehow-minor accident unlocked a well of rage. “What other option do we have?”
I retreat to my seat and buckle back in. Our unfinished conversation looms between us. But getting out of a ditch tops getting closure from a breakup on Maslow’s hierarchy. As promised, we hear a honk, and Teddy leans on the gas.Snow flies out from under the back tires, but in an instant, we’re back on the road, like we never left it in the first place.
Our friend comes to say goodbye, and now Teddy’s regained his composure enough to thank him politely and profusely.
He brushes us off. “You were stuck, and I could help. You two make a great couple, by the way. I’m always offering to help people get their cars unstuck—part of the fun of driving a pickup. So many of the couples I come across are fighting and screaming too loud to hear me honk the horn to drive.”
We smile politely, and I grab Teddy’s hand. “I’m lucky. I mean, we’re both lucky.” There’s no reason for me to convince this stranger that we’re actually together, but the opportunity to touch Teddy and act like it’s all for the bit wins out. Teddy’s glare softens, which makes me wonder if maybe he doesn’t mind—if I still have the ability to charm him, whether he likes it or not.
With a tip of his hat and a wave, our savior is back in the cab of his truck. As he pulls away, I watch “Follow me to the gay bar” and “Honk if you’re letting the soft animal of your body love what it loves” bumper stickers recede into the distance. “We were visited by an angel,” I whisper as I reach for my phone, desperate to find a place to sleep, get some food, and have my ass handed to me for the biggest mistake of my life.
Teddy
I should be thinking about where we’ll spend the night, how we’ll get to Iowa City, and all the apologies I want from the former love of my life for the hundreds of ways she let me down.
But while Marin’s fixing things from the passenger seat and I’m driving ten miles an hour in the right lane, I find myself wondering, for the first time, what forgiveness would look like. It’s been three years of promising myself to never let Marin back in, trusting that there was nothing to resurrect. But all it’s taken is a few hours back in the car with her for me to start questioning everything all over. I know I’m not the same person who stood under the willow at Tivoli, but is she? I guess the worst that can happen is she breaks my heart. And I’ve survived that and cancer already.
Marin laughs, and it’s louder and higher than the sound I know. “You’re not going to believe this,” she says with her hand over her mouth. “I swear this is the closest option. Pinky promise it is.” She reaches to loop her little finger into mine on the steering wheel, and it’s one of those moments of tenderness I know I’ll replay over and over. Her guard slips for a split second, and she’s just a person delighted by the odds that dropped us in this snowstorm in the first place.
“Exit here, then turn right.”
As I coax the steering wheel, I feel anticipation laced with dread.It can’t be, I think.
But then, like a switch has been flipped, the uneasedissipates. All of me, every cell, hopes my guess is right, and as I pull past a row of trees, there it is. Envy’s Pub—aglow in the snow, a warm beacon of nostalgia and excellent bar food and full bottles of Ranch dressing. “No fucking way,” I whisper.
We’re out of the car in a daze, and when we cross the threshold of the bar, it’s as if we’ve been gone for hours, not years. Pockets of people nod in our direction, raising beers in what feels like a hometown welcome. “Shut the damn door!” someone yells, and my heart warms.
“I just love being back in the Midwest,” Marin whispers and winks, taking my coat from my shoulders and hanging both of ours up in a makeshift closet next to the jukebox.
