cheeks puff out with smoke. Then coughing erupts from his lips, and smoke billows out in every direction. The cigar shoots out of his mouth and hits the floor. I stare at the lit cigar for a second, burning into the carpet by his foot. This is my chance.
In one movement, I grab the burning cigar and shove it into his leg. He howls, wrenching the wheel to the side. We skid off the road, and there’s this moment that stretches on and on, where all is silent, and we’re slowly careening toward the earth, before the car flips. Then glass shatters around me, and I can’t hear my screams over the screech of steel crushing; the ground and sky are switching places, the world breaking into pieces. We flip again. And again.
When it stops, I’m folded into the ceiling. Every muscle in my body hurts. I hear Scars groaning beside me. He’s trapped behind the steering wheel, bleeding from the forehead. There’s a nasty hole in his leg, the skin already bubbling up around it. He pounds the steering wheel with his fist, and the smell of his burned skin mixes with thick smoke. The cigar must still be burning .
I pop off my seat belt, drop to the floor, and kick the door open. Coughing tears from my throat as I breathe in the smoke pouring from the engine. It’s not the cigar: the engine’s on fire.
“Vivian!” Scars screeches, letting out a horrible, wounded animal sound. He grabs my hair, and I whip around and bite his hand as hard as I can. He screams, letting go of my hair. I climb out of the car and scramble up the rocky hillside.
Without the shade of the forest, sun pounds down on the rocks, heating them like the inside of a dry sauna. My fingers burn from grabbing them, and my knees feel like they’re bleeding from scrambling over their searing edges. Behind me, Scars’s angry voice races up the rocks, grabbing at my heels as I sprint up the mountain.
The boom of the explosion stops me in my tracks. The vile stench of gasoline fills the air and smoke climbs up the sky with its grasping paws. The burst of heat rolling over me singes my skin.
Nobody could live through an explosion like that. Even so, for a long time after his voice dies and the smoke settles, I keep running. Scrambling. Crawling. I don’t stop running until my side pulses with pain, until rocks have ripped through my jeans and torn most of the skin from my knees.
Chapter Thirteen
I’ VE BEEN HIKING UPHILL A couple of hours now, away from Scars and (hopefully) toward Rosales. But my head is aching, and it turns out that hiking isn’t anything like the Outdoor Channel says it is.
There aren’t any spectacular vistas to look off into the horizon and I haven’t seen any perfectly placed boulders or pretty wildflowers. There are just crabby bushes that scratch my ankles when I walk past them, scary moving bodies under rocks, boulders that slide when I step on them. I’m grimy and my legs hurt and sweat drips into my mouth, and my jeans are so hot I want to tear them off my body, but they’re stuck to me like a layer of skin.
See that mountain? I hear Nick say. Rosales is at the very top . I force myself to keep climbing rock over rock, trying not to stare into the late-morning sun. If Nick’s dead, it’s my fault . Guilt slides over me, sticky and wet as tar. Don’t think about it or you’ll die right here, alone, on this mountainside.
I’ve slowed my walk to almost a crawl when I reach a dirt road. The road is empty and silent, like no one’s driven on it in years. The only car in sight is a yellow truck, lying fifty feet down the steep embankment. The front teeters precariously over the brink, a drop of hundreds of feet. That’s the mariachi band’s truck.
I step off the road and walk down the steep hill toward it. Even though a cool wind is picking up, I feel hotter than ever. Up close, the blue tarp is pocked with bullet holes. The windshield is crushed in, and the driver’s seat is wet with a dark stain.
What happened to the
In one movement, I grab the burning cigar and shove it into his leg. He howls, wrenching the wheel to the side. We skid off the road, and there’s this moment that stretches on and on, where all is silent, and we’re slowly careening toward the earth, before the car flips. Then glass shatters around me, and I can’t hear my screams over the screech of steel crushing; the ground and sky are switching places, the world breaking into pieces. We flip again. And again.
When it stops, I’m folded into the ceiling. Every muscle in my body hurts. I hear Scars groaning beside me. He’s trapped behind the steering wheel, bleeding from the forehead. There’s a nasty hole in his leg, the skin already bubbling up around it. He pounds the steering wheel with his fist, and the smell of his burned skin mixes with thick smoke. The cigar must still be burning .
I pop off my seat belt, drop to the floor, and kick the door open. Coughing tears from my throat as I breathe in the smoke pouring from the engine. It’s not the cigar: the engine’s on fire.
“Vivian!” Scars screeches, letting out a horrible, wounded animal sound. He grabs my hair, and I whip around and bite his hand as hard as I can. He screams, letting go of my hair. I climb out of the car and scramble up the rocky hillside.
Without the shade of the forest, sun pounds down on the rocks, heating them like the inside of a dry sauna. My fingers burn from grabbing them, and my knees feel like they’re bleeding from scrambling over their searing edges. Behind me, Scars’s angry voice races up the rocks, grabbing at my heels as I sprint up the mountain.
The boom of the explosion stops me in my tracks. The vile stench of gasoline fills the air and smoke climbs up the sky with its grasping paws. The burst of heat rolling over me singes my skin.
Nobody could live through an explosion like that. Even so, for a long time after his voice dies and the smoke settles, I keep running. Scrambling. Crawling. I don’t stop running until my side pulses with pain, until rocks have ripped through my jeans and torn most of the skin from my knees.
Chapter Thirteen
I’ VE BEEN HIKING UPHILL A couple of hours now, away from Scars and (hopefully) toward Rosales. But my head is aching, and it turns out that hiking isn’t anything like the Outdoor Channel says it is.
There aren’t any spectacular vistas to look off into the horizon and I haven’t seen any perfectly placed boulders or pretty wildflowers. There are just crabby bushes that scratch my ankles when I walk past them, scary moving bodies under rocks, boulders that slide when I step on them. I’m grimy and my legs hurt and sweat drips into my mouth, and my jeans are so hot I want to tear them off my body, but they’re stuck to me like a layer of skin.
See that mountain? I hear Nick say. Rosales is at the very top . I force myself to keep climbing rock over rock, trying not to stare into the late-morning sun. If Nick’s dead, it’s my fault . Guilt slides over me, sticky and wet as tar. Don’t think about it or you’ll die right here, alone, on this mountainside.
I’ve slowed my walk to almost a crawl when I reach a dirt road. The road is empty and silent, like no one’s driven on it in years. The only car in sight is a yellow truck, lying fifty feet down the steep embankment. The front teeters precariously over the brink, a drop of hundreds of feet. That’s the mariachi band’s truck.
I step off the road and walk down the steep hill toward it. Even though a cool wind is picking up, I feel hotter than ever. Up close, the blue tarp is pocked with bullet holes. The windshield is crushed in, and the driver’s seat is wet with a dark stain.
What happened to the
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