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onaipwolf

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Hayley and Brennan headed down the blacktop road, the sun high in the sky. The flat prairie grasslands filled their view, a sea of greenish brown as far as the eye could see, the road a black strip, cutting the monotonous scenery in two. They had talked for awhile, and in the course of their conversation never once did Hayley ask where they were going, and Brennan hadn’t offered an answer. At this point in time it didn’t really seem to matter. Now a comfortable silence filled the air, surrounding them.

The baby started kicking against her bladder and Hayley inwardly groaned. She had hoped that by not drinking anything she would have been able to last longer before they had to stop. “I have to go to the bathroom.” Hayley said.

“We’ll stop at the next town. It’s not too far away.”

“Ok, that’s good.” Hayley said; the steady, agonizing rhythm increasing her need to go as time went by and she tensed.

Finally after several minutes, the small town that stood on the horizon grew closer. Brennan pulled into the first gas station he passed and parked next to the curb in a parking spot by the front double doors. He stepped out, letting Hayley by, and then got back in the truck.

“I won’t be long.” Hayley said, as she turned towards the front door.

“I’ll be waiting here. Oh, and could you get me something to drink. I’ll pay you back.”

“Sure. And you don’t need to repay me. It’ll be fine. What do you want?”

“Coke sounds good.”

“Ok.”

As Hayley entered through the front door of the convenience store, she had a brief moment of déjà vu as she heard a familiar jingle from the door, and half expected a counter to the left flanked by a lighted hallway. But this store looked much different from the place that she had resided for the past two days. The building looked like it had recently been remodeled. The walls were a bright white with a cheerful kelly green zigzag running along the center of it. To the left were four rows of shelves and upright coolers filled with various beverages were lined up on two walls behind glass doors. The cashier stood behind a counter off to the right that was the same color green as the walls. She stepped up to the counter, looking at the greasy-looking man standing behind it as she did so. His long, dark, scraggly hair hung down across his shoulders. He was dressed in some work jeans and a faded blue tee shirt that hung loosely on his skinny frame. As she approached the counter she smelled the scent of cigarette smoke in the air, and had to consciously stop herself from covering her nose. Since becoming pregnant she had developed an extreme dislike for the smell of cigarettes.

“Hi. Do you have a restroom I could use?” She said, trying to sound more pleasant than she felt.

“Sure do.” He replied. She was surprised to hear the friendliness in his voice. He pointed a slim finger to his right as he continued. “Right there. See the sign?”

Hayley looked where he pointed and saw what he was gesturing towards. A green and white sign hung from the ceiling over a hallway that opened up halfway down the length of the wall. “Oh, ok. Thanks.” Hayley said as she headed towards the hallway. She located the women’s bathroom without any problems. She used its facilities, and stepped up to the sink to wash her hands. She could see the stress of the last few days in the circles beneath her eyes, and the tousled mess her hair was in. She ran her fingers through the length of her brown locks in an attempt at taming them, but only managed to get her fingers entwined in a mess of snarls. She gave up on her hair, washed and dried her hands, and entered the main portion of the store once again.

Hayley decided to get some snacks in addition to the drinks and perused the snack aisle of the convenience store, looking for something appetizing. After looking up and down the rows of brightly colored packaging for a few minutes, she finally decided on a bag of Doritos chips and a mini-sized box of Oreo cookies. She pulled them from the shelf, the bag crinkling in her hand as she did so. She looked up and caught some movement out of the corner of her eye. The cashier was staring at her, silently. She felt a sense of foreboding run through her as she realized he had been watching her for the last few minutes. She turned to look at him, and he smiled. The grin on his lean face seemed oddly out of place, almost as if there were some ulterior motive behind it. It gave her chills.

She walked up to the coolers and gazed at the drinks stored inside. The labels seemed to blur together in her mind. His eyes dug into her back, twin daggers. Finally, opening the glass door, she made her choice. Cold spread out into the air, causing her skin to prickle and her breath to cool. She grabbed two bottles of dark pop and closed the door. She tried to calm herself down as she brought her purchase up to the front counter to pay.

He continued to smile at her as he scanned the few items. He started making small talk, but Hayley could barely concentrate on his words. She found herself feeling nervous. Did he know something? She couldn’t tell.

Two middle-aged women chatting freely amongst themselves got in line behind her. Hayley began to listen passively, her thoughts floating somewhere else. The woman off to her left was at least one hundred pounds overweight with foundation one complexion too dark caked on her round face, and bright red lipstick smeared across her lips. Her eyebrows had been drawn in with light brown eyeliner in a harsh arch above her dark, round eyes. She wore a pair of black spandex pants that were anything but flattering on her figure and a pink, and blue flowered shirt. The other woman was as small as the other woman was big. She also sported heavy makeup with dark maroon lipstick, which only served to accent her harsh features. She was dressed in tan Capri’s with the waist line at least two inches above her belly button, and a plain baby blue long sleeved shirt. Both women held matching dark green coats and large hand bags in their arms.

“Did you hear about that murder that happened during the storm?” The heavyset woman asked her friend.

“No? What happened?” The other woman said, her interest obviously piqued by her friend’s gossip.

Hayley froze. How did the news travel so fast? They had only left Wilmur four or five hours ago. She fixed her ears on their conversation, her breath suspended in her lungs.

“Well, Mike was driving through Wilmur this morning, and the Stop and Go gas station there was all roped off with that yellow police tape. He said he stopped and asked the police what happened and they said ‘a murder.’ Isn’t that just horrible? It just makes you wonder at the world we’re living in now. Just to think, what if he had driven through there earlier? He could have been killed as well.”

“‘Redeeming the time because the days are evil.’ You never know what might happen tomorrow, the world being as wicked as it is now. We just have to remember to be prepared for Eternity.” Said the small-framed woman as she raised her eyes heavenward.

“But of course.”

The cashier paused his scanning, and looked at her expectantly. Hayley realized he had asked her a question. “Huh?”

“Is this everything?” He asked her again. He had a strange look in his eye, almost like he meant something other than what he said. God, she was getting paranoid now. She tried to clear her mind and focused on him.

“Oh. Yeah, that’s it.” Hayley said, wanting to get out of there as soon as she could. This situation was making her feel very tense; she could feel her muscles beginning to seize up.

He told her the price, but he mind couldn’t seem to register his response into any coherent meaning. She handed him a five, grabbed her snacks off the counter, and turned to leave. He said something else to her and in response she said, “Keep the change.”

“You’re thirty cents short. Ma’am. You’re not finished paying.” The cashier called to her, the words finally falling into place in her mind.

She turned to him, and fished two quarters out of her pocket, while still trying to hold onto her purchases. “Here. Keep the change.” She handed him the money. Their hands touched briefly, and she felt an odd sensation run through her. One word came to mind in the fleeting contact: suspicion. She pulled her hand back, as a young child might after being burned on a stove, and the coins clattered onto the countertop. “Sorry.” She mumbled and flashed a smile, attempting to display a gaiety she was nowhere near feeling. “I guess I’m just clumsy today.”

“No problem. Are you feeling alright?”

The women behind her intruded into the conversation, chiming in their own concern for her. “Yes, you do seem a little flush dear.” Said the overweight one, her wide face peering into Hayley’s. Hayley took a step back in an attempt to regain her own personal space.

“Yes, I’m fine.” Hayley said, but the look on the faces surrounding her indicated that they weren’t convinced. She attempted a lie. “It’s just the baby has been kicking a lot today. It can be quite painful if he kicks the right spot.”

“Oh, congratulations and how far along are you?” The skinnier woman with an almost hungry look on her face asked.

“Five months.”

Then they started shooting questions at her, volleying back and forth between the two of them. She felt like she was being interrogated.

“Oh, is it a boy or a girl?”

“I don’t know.”

“Decided to wait until the baby is born then? Sometimes that is the best. I know when I had Mike, I didn’t know, and it added to the occasion. More suspenseful that way.”

“So when are you due?”

“July 25^th.”

“Ah, a summer baby. Those can be the best. So are you from around here?”

Hayley began to realize these women weren’t going to let her out of this place until they got every last detail, and that she definitely wasn’t willing to do. “No, I’m from out of town. But I really should get going.”

“Ok dear. It was nice meeting you.” The skinny one turned to her friend and started to talk to her instead. “Babies are such wonderful creatures.”

“I completely agree. A gift from God.”

“Oh yes. ‘Every good thing comes from above’ you know.”

“But of course.”

Hayley turned from the two women and walked out the door. As the door began to shut behind her, she heard one of them comment, “She sure had a small frame for being five months pregnant. I could barely tell.”

Hayley sighed and walked up to the truck where Brennan was leaning on the hood waiting for her.

“Feel better now?” He asked with a smirk on his face.

“Yeah.” Hayley replied sarcastically, stepped into the truck, and pushed herself across the bench seat to her side. She placed the snacks on the middle seat, and handed Brennan his drink as he entered the vehicle. “Here. I accidentally got Pepsi. Sorry.”

Brennan took the drink, and frowned. “Ok then.” He got in, started the truck, and pulled back onto the highway. The once comfortable silence had chilled considerably, as Hayley sat staring silently at the blue and red label on her bottle. The road hadn’t been repaved in several years, and the truck bounced a little as they headed down the highway. She ignored the movement as she focused all her energy on tracing the lines on the label with her finger.

 Without turning her gaze from the now warming drink in her hand, she asked Brennan, “So, what are we going to do?”

“About what?”

“About what happened at the gas station.”

Brennan paused for a moment before answering, “I don’t know.”

“Well shouldn’t you know?” Hayley asked, getting annoyed at him.

“Why should I? I didn’t plan this.”

“That’s beside the point.”

“Really, I think it is the point.”

They glared at one another, the words still buzzing angrily in the space between them. Hayley spoke again. “Forget it. Let’s just drive until we run out of gas and money. Who needs a plan?”

Brennan glared at her. “What’s really going on? You’ve been pissed ever since we left that convenience store.”

 Hayley looked up at him, tears suddenly springing to her eyes as she spoke. “I felt like the cashier knew something. Like he could read my mind just by staring at me. And there were two women in there that kept asking me all sorts of questions. I guess I just didn’t know I was going to be so paranoid about things. I mean, what are we going to do now? We can’t just keep driving forever. We have to stop sometime. And I have doctor’s appointments I have to go to. And neither of us has a job anymore, so the little money that we do have isn’t going to last very long. What if we get caught?” Hayley broke down into tears, ending her tirade.

Brennan, now realizing the problem, placed a hand on her knee. “Hayley, listen to me. You don’t have to stay with me. I never said you had to. I can just drop you off at the next town, and you can call whoever you want to come pick you up. I’ll understand.”

Hayley looked at him. She hadn’t really considered it before. “Are you sure?” She asked him. Really she was asking herself what she really wanted to do. It would be so much easier to just go, but she didn’t want to leave him. She felt closer to him than anyone else in her whole life. To give that closeness up so soon after finding it would be difficult.

“Yes I’m sure.”

Hayley unconsciously bit her lip, caught in indecision.

“Well?” Brennan prompted.

Hayley looked at him, and realized the answer. She opened her mouth and told him her choice before she could change her mind.

Author's Note: I was just going to end my Encounters story where it was, but I've decided to keep writing on it. I hope you like it. This is section two to the story. I'm not sure yet if I'm going to have two parts, or three. I guess we'll see where the story goes from here. Hope you enjoy it and thanks for reading!