Chapter 79 Squirrel Food

Chapter 79 Squirrel Food

Blake

Annabelle reached for her phone with the exhausted composure of a woman who had just discovered her car had betrayed her on a stretch of interstate where the scenery consisted mostly of trees, pavement, and the occasional billboard advertising fireworks.

“It’s fine,” she said, though her voice suggested she was already mentally adding this incident to a list of reasons she hated adulthood. “I have roadside assistance.”

James immediately leaned back in his seat like all was once again right with the world.

“See? This is why I date responsible women.”

Annabelle glanced at him while scrolling through her contacts. “You date me because I’m hot.”

“That too.”

“And because I feed you.”

“Also important.”

“And because you would lose your own head if it weren’t attached.”

James considered that for a second, then nodded. “Historically possible.”

She shook her head, but she was smiling as she lifted the phone to her ear and gave the roadside assistance operator our location. I watched her read off the mile marker with a confidence I absolutely would not have had because I’d been too busy staring at Shannon during the last several miles to notice useful details like where we were or whether civilization still existed nearby.

The call took longer than it should have. There was hold music. There was confirmation of the policy number. There was a moment where Annabelle’s smile tightened in a way that told me some poor stranger on the other end of the line had just said something unhelpful. 

Finally, she ended the call and dropped the phone into the cupholder.

“Well?” Shannon asked.

Annabelle rested both hands on the steering wheel and stared through the windshield at the line of highway stretching ahead of us. “They said a tow truck should be here in about ninety minutes.”

For a moment, nobody spoke.

“Ninety minutes,” I repeated carefully, as if saying it slower might make it less offensive.

“That’s what they said.”

James looked at the clock on the dashboard. “An hour and a half.”

“Yes, thank you,” Annabelle said. “I do understand time.”

“I just wanted to make sure we were all suffering with the same information.”

The next ten minutes passed in a strange kind of silence. Not uncomfortable exactly, but thick with the awareness that none of us had anywhere to go and absolutely nothing to do. Cars rushed past us every few seconds, making the parked car tremble slightly each time the wind from a passing vehicle slapped against it. The sun had started lowering toward the trees, turning the edge of the highway gold and making everything look far prettier than a roadside breakdown deserved to look.

My stomach growled.

Loudly.

James turned around slowly.

“Was that you or are we about to get eaten by a bear?”

“Me.”

“Impressive.”

“I played a full game, almost got in a fight, and then survived a vehicular betrayal. I require food.”

Annabelle glanced at me through the mirror. “Vehicular betrayal?”

“I’m workshopping it.”

Shannon reached down for her backpack. “I have snacks.”

My head turned toward her so fast my neck nearly cracked. “You do?”

She smiled with the smug confidence of a woman who had apparently prepared for this exact emergency. “I always have snacks.”

“Please tell me one of them is a cheeseburger.”

“No.”

“Pizza?”

“No.”

“A rotisserie chicken?”

She laughed as she unzipped the bag and started digging through it. “Why would I have a rotisserie chicken in my backpack?”

“I don’t know your life.”

Her hand disappeared deeper into the bag before she finally produced a bag of trail mix and a few granola bars. She held them up like she’d just pulled a Thanksgiving feast out of thin air.

“I came prepared.”

I stared at the food. Then at her. Then back at the food again. “This is your emergency supply?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Yes.”

“This is woodland creature cuisine.”

“It is not.”

I took the bag of trail mix and examined it with the seriousness it deserved. “This is absolutely what squirrels meal prep.”

“They’re healthy snacks.”

“They’re twigs with raisins.”

“They’re almonds, cashews, dried cranberries, and dark chocolate.”

I pointed at the bag. “Those cranberries are just raisins in witness protection.”

James nodded from the front seat. “I’ll allow it.”

Annabelle sighed. “I swear to God, if we spend the next hour and a half litigating dried fruit, I’m walking into traffic.”

“Don’t do that,” James said immediately. “You have the roadside assistance membership.”

She turned slowly and stared at him.

He smiled.

“Also, I love you.”

“Better.”

Shannon tried to take the bag back from me. “If you’re going to insult my snacks, you don’t get any.”

I held it out of reach. “I didn’t insult them. I merely questioned their species classification.”

“You called them squirrel food.”

“I’m willing to apologize to the cranberries.”

“They don’t accept insincere apologies.”

I placed a hand dramatically over my heart. “Dear cranberries, I regret that I failed to recognize your contribution to this survival situation.”

Shannon’s mouth twitched.

I kept going because making her almost laugh was quickly becoming my favorite sport. “You are small. You are wrinkled. You are doing your best.”

She lost the battle and laughed, leaning back against the seat as the sound filled the car. “That was terrible.”

“But effective.”

She handed me one of the granola bars with the long-suffering patience of someone indulging a very annoying child. “Eat before you start chewing on the seatbelt.”

“I wasn’t going to chew on the seatbelt.”

The granola bar was fine. Not exciting. Not life-changing. Definitely not a cheeseburger. But Shannon kept handing me little pieces of trail mix while pretending she wasn’t doing it, and somehow that made it taste better than it had any right to.

By the time the snacks were gone, boredom had returned and settled into the car like an unwelcome fifth passenger.

James had already checked his phone six times. Annabelle had reorganized her purse. Shannon had stared out the window long enough that I started wondering whether she was actually watching the traffic or simply lost in her head. I knew that look now. The quiet one. The one she got when she was thinking too much and trying not to let anyone see where her mind had gone.

I nudged her knee lightly with mine.

She looked over.

“Bored?”

“Painfully.”

I held up my hand. “Thumb war?”

Her eyebrows lifted. “Seriously?”

“What else are we supposed to do?”

“We’re adults.”

“We’re adults stranded on the side of the highway with squirrel food and no entertainment.”

She considered that for a second before placing her hand in mine. “Fair point.”

The second our fingers laced together, my brain went inconveniently quiet.

It was stupid. Ridiculous, actually. We weren’t holding hands. We were preparing for the least dignified competition in human history. But her hand was smaller than mine, warm against my palm, and the easy way she let our fingers lock together made something in my chest tighten.

“One, two, three, four,” she said, her eyes fixed on our hands, “I declare a thumb war.”

She attacked immediately.

I laughed. “Wow.”

“What?”

“No hesitation.”

“You’re the athlete. I have to use strategy.”

“Your strategy is violence.”

“My strategy is winning.”

She pinned my thumb before I had a chance to recover.

“Ha.”

“That was a practice round.”

“That was a victory.”

“That was an ambush.”

She smiled like she was very proud of herself. “Best one out of one?”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Seems fair to me.”

“I demand a rematch.”

James glanced into the rearview mirror. “Are you two seriously playing thumb wars?”

“I’m being hustled,” I said.

“You’re losing to a girl in the backseat.”

Shannon looked offended on my behalf and hers at the same time. “Excuse you.”

James lifted one hand. “Respectfully.”

“There was nothing respectful about that,” Annabelle said.

“Fine.” James adjusted in his seat and reached back for the hood of his sweatshirt. “You know what? I’m going to use this as a privacy curtain between the front and back seats.”

Annabelle’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

“So you two can mind your business back there.” He wiggled his eyebrows with absolutely no shame. “I need Annabelle to give me an oral lesson.”

For one perfect second, there was silence.

Then Annabelle smacked him hard enough that the sound echoed through the car.

“Ow.”

“You deserved that.”

“I meant public speaking.”

“You did not mean public speaking.”

“I’m passionate about education.”

“You’re passionate about being ridiculous.”

“That too.”

Shannon had dissolved into laughter beside me, one hand over her mouth and her shoulder pressed against mine. I tried very hard not to think about how good it felt to have her leaning into me like that. I failed immediately.

James turned his head just enough to look at me. “You understand, right?”

“I understand that I support consenting adults making their own choices.”

“Thank you.”

“But if your educational seminar starts a foot in front of me, I’m getting out and walking.”

Shannon laughed even harder, her forehead briefly dropping against my shoulder. “Educational seminar.”

Annabelle pointed at James. “Nothing is happening.”

He sighed dramatically. “This is censorship.”

“This is survival,” she corrected. “Because if you keep talking, I’m throwing you into traffic.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I have roadside assistance.”

James thought about that. “Valid threat.”

The laughter faded slowly, leaving behind something softer than before. Shannon’s hand was still close to mine on the seat between us, and neither of us had completely shifted away from the other. Outside, the sky had turned deeper orange, the kind of color that made the world look briefly less real. Traffic continued rushing past, but inside the car the air felt warmer. Easier.

For the first time all week, I didn’t feel like I was trying to guess what she wanted from me.

I wasn’t chasing.

She wasn’t running.

We were just there, stuck in the backseat of a disabled car, laughing over snacks and thumb wars and James being incapable of behaving like a normal person.

And somehow, it felt like progress.

A flash of amber light appeared in the side mirror.

James sat forward immediately. “Please tell me that’s our guy.”

Annabelle checked her mirror as the tow truck eased onto the shoulder behind us, its lights throwing gold across the interior of the car.

I looked over at Shannon.

She was still smiling.

“Looks like rescue has arrived,” I said.

“Finally,” James muttered from the front.

The tow truck rolled to a stop behind us, brakes hissing softly in the evening air.

And just like that, our weird little roadside bubble came to an end.