Dead End Paradise

Chapter 1

"Yes, Bell, I understand," I repeated for the seventh time. She once again did not hear what I was trying to say. The phone call had continued like this for over twenty minutes.

"I don't understand why you insist in driving in this," she scolded, "the news is saying there are whiteouts all over the state."

"Mhmmm," I replied, trying to concentrate on the road. She was right of course. I could barely see the road and every so often my back wheels would struggle to grip the icy road. There was nowhere to stop for miles; I had left all the major cities behind an hour ago. The winter storm had started not long after that.

If I had been listening to what my sister was saying, I might have noticed the cell phone reception cut out. I don't know how long I drove with the cell phone pressed to my ear, with no one on the other line. I swore and tossed the phone onto the seat beside me. I would hear about this when I finally made it home. Bell was not someone who liked being cut off when she had something important to say. Wrapping my jacket more snugly around me, I gripped the steering wheel. Every so often my knuckles would turn white from the vice-like grip I had on the steering wheel. It served me right for attempting to drive in this kind of weather.

"C'mon, Marcus," I told myself, "only another little while." This, of course, was a lie. There was no telling how long I had to go until I reached the next town, and how long the storm would actually hold out. I just had to keep driving, one mile at a time. One icy mile at a time. Every one of these miles seemed like ten. It didn't take me very long to drift off into my own head.

With nothing else to do to pass the time, I thought about the things I still had to do for work. At that time, before meeting Amelia, I was an employee chained to a desk. I worked for a construction company creating bad marketing. They weren't very good ads. They all featured "happy" couples, posing in front of their new condominiums. Every single one was fake, including the one I had just unveiled at a new site in North Carolina. When I blinked, all I could see were the glassy eyes and the bleached smiles staring back. And so, with those faces haunting me, I didn't see the patch of ice.

It is one of the scariest feelings you will ever have. When you first realize that you have lost control, your heart leaps into your throat. There was nothing that I could do to stop the inevitable. I slowly slid down the road, unable to get myself stopped without making it worse. Even sliding into the snow bank seemed to happen slowly. Snow flew up around the front bumper, and I was thrown into the deployed airbags. It didn't hurt really. I don't think it could even be considered an accident.

I sat in my car for what felt like forever. I wasn't hurt, but I was too shocked to move. In moments like this, all you want to do is sit and wait to be rescued.But there was no one coming. No one would have been as stupid as I was to venture out in this weather. The car got cold fast. It was when I could see my breath that I realized that I was in trouble. I had to do something, or risk dying of the cold within the hour.