The Road Keeps Winding

(note from GB, this is continued from yesterday, and any future updates will be posted elsewhere, due to the fact that I'm going to start co-writing this project with a friend.)

James had been planning on sneaking onto the next van out of camp for a while, and not quite being able to recognize the person driving wasn't going to hold him back from his goals. Still, once she introduced (apparently reintroduced, and wasn't that embarrassing) herself, he felt much more comfortable. He hadn't been planning on heading far away from camp, just far enough that he could get some cell signal or reach a payphone to call his dad. There was an old payphone at camp, but it dropped calls more often than not, and "I want to talk to my dad, no nothing's wrong" wasn't enough of an emergency for any of the staff or older campers to admit to having a working cell phone. After all, nothing was wrong. It was just that a few weeks ago, when he had been dropped off at camp, his dad had told him that he had a lead on an interesting new story. 

James' father was an investigative journalist, so it wasn't uncommon for him to go running off after a potential lead. However, it was uncommon for him to be so vague about what the topic of the investigation was. James wasn't worried—his father knew how bad the connection was at camp, so he might not have even tried to call—but James was still incredibly curious, like his father had left him at a cliffhanger. Thus, his willingness to sneak out in order to make a call. The counselors probably wouldn't be that annoyed. 

As they traveled, James and Cyntha had fallen into a comfortable near-silence, punctuated only by his occasionally noticing a bird outside the window (so many that he had never seen before, despite the fact that over the years of traveling with his father they had crossed this stretch of country dozens of times). Regardless of previous memories, every time he noticed one such bird, he couldn't stop himself from mentioning a cool fact that he had been told (some by his father, some half remembered from an encyclopedia that he had tried his best to get his eyes to focus on). The first few times, he had been worried that Cynthia would tell him to shut up, given how invested they had seemed in silence, but they had instead restrained themselves to politely interested commentary. Clearly they weren't as interested in birds as James was, but barely anyone was, so he didn't let that bother him.

The hours slipped by, and as his boredom grew and his fidgeting increased, James decided to break the silence. 

"So, sorry if I should somehow know this, but how long have you been at camp?" James asked, turning towards Cynthia and smiling slightly. He did remember seeing her around before, but he couldn't remember a single conversation between them, and so his curiosity had built to a peak. Still, best to start with an inoffensive question, just to tell how much they want to avoid talking. 

"Only a few years. I'm also not terribly powerful, if that was what you were asking," Cynthia replied, eyes steadily fixed on the road. That was, actually, the question that James had been angling towards, but the answer given did imply that he and Cynthia had been living in the same cabin for the past two summers, and yet he still failed to recognize them, which was more than a little embarrassing. Perhaps somewhat justified by Cynthia's being a person of few words, but not entirely justified.

James quickly shook his head, and turned back to the conversation at hand. "Well, I wasn't exactly, but that's something we've got in common!" Cynthia didn't seem particularly interested in continuing the conversation, so he paused for a moment to consider his next foray, if there was anything he knew about Cynthia even in passing that he might be able to use to entice or annoy them into a reply. He ran his eyes over the interior of the car, and they caught on the slight movement of Cynthia rolling her right shoulder. 

"Looks like your shoulder is doing better at least, which is good to see!"

"Ah, yes. It was just dislocated, so it's been mostly better for at least a few weeks. The sling was mostly as a precaution," she replied, and moved her right hand from the wheel to tap the bag that was set between their seats. "I've got it in here in case I end up thinking I need it, but it's better enough."

"What happened? If it's not something personal. I mean, as long as you're comfortable sharing?"

Another pause, this one long enough that James was almost worried that Cynthia was so angry that she was ignoring him, although her face held the same calm, borderline bored, expression as it had at the beginning of the drive. When she finally spoke, her tone was still quiet, not a whisper, but pitched lowly enough that James struggled to identify any hint of emotion. 

"Slipped on some ice a few months ago and caught myself wrong. It's really not that exciting, and as I said it's nearly healed by now," they replied. They paused for a moment, and just as James was about to ask another question, Cynthia sharply tilted their head, glancing at something on the dashboard before looking back up at the highway again. 

"We're getting a little low on gas, so we'll be refueling at the next exit. If you want to use the restroom and get snacks, you should probably do it then, because we won't be stopping again until lunch."

James nodded and looked out the window again. The exit that Cynthia had indicated was sparsely populated at best, and James looked back into the car and began the process of tugging back on his shoes which he had slipped off in order to more comfortably cross his legs. He only looked back up when Cynthia inhaled sharply and tapped him sharply on the shoulder.

In front of them was the first gas station that Cynthia had been able to find, which was attached to a small convenience store. Much more interestingly, in front of the store was a monster. It was tall and bulky, filling the gap between the lone gas and diesel pump. The beast was quadrupedal, with a body that looked like a lion but a long, scaly, shimmering tail that curved upwards and slipped out of sight behind the pump. Most disconcerting, however, was the creature's head, where the lion's body abruptly gave way to a human-seeming face. The humanizing effect was slightly distorted by how the creature quickly whipped around to face the store, and audibly growled at the two figures that were standing near the entrance. 

"I don't suppose you snuck any weapons along with you?" Cynthia asked calmly, their only sign of tension in how their knuckles were turning pale where they gripped the steering wheel.

James shook his head, before quickly realizing that Cynthia wasn't looking at him, and replying in the negative. "I don't suppose your cane has a weapon inside it or something?" he replied, the stark lack of any objects in the backseat in the forefront of his mind. 

"No. Making it both a weapon and a cane would make it worse at being either," they paused for a moment, and one of the figures began moving towards the monster. "I think you should either buckle up or get out right now."