The Amazing Misadventures of This and That

Beginning can be found here

Day 1 (continued)
I spent the rest of the first day sobbing uncontrollably between panic attacks. Jen didn't seem to notice, she was too busy singing to songs that weren't even on the radio at the time and binging on ketchup packets. "I'll save the honey packets for you, because that's the kind of nice person I am," she'd say before tearing into another packet with her teeth and sucking it down.

Night finally rolled around and Jen had fallen asleep at the wheel twice already, so I urged her to pull over. "Since we don't have money for a motel, we can at least sleep in the car," I said while continuously slapping Jen in the face, as she was starting to drift off again. "Or you could just let me drive."

This time, it was Jen's turn to slap me. "What did I tell you about saying stupid things?" She scoffed and continued driving, speeding past several exits we could have taken to find an empty parking lot to sleep in. "You can't drive, Alex, your license is suspended. Remember that DUI you got?"

"...I was cool to drive, they blew that way out of proportion."

"You blew a .23, also known as twice the legal limit. Secondly, if we stop for even a minute, we'll miss that much more of the adventure!" Her eyelids drooped at the end of her sentence and the car began to swerve. I steadied the wheel and she slapped me again.

"The adventure isn't going anywhere, it'll still be there when we wake up!"

She was silent for a minute, in what I hoped was just a stern moment of thought and not her sleeping with her eyes open again. After a minute or so, I snapped my fingers and she seemed to come to. "If I stop for the night, do you promise to quit being such a baby?" She quickly turned to the left to avoid hitting a sign.

"Yes, yes! I promise! Please, just pull over!" Which she did, immediately and suddenly, causing me to run my head into the window with such force that I blacked out.

Day 2
I woke up lying in the grass with a splitting headache. My head appeared to have been bleeding and then poorly bandaged, and for some reason my hands were covered in honey. It was then that I realized that I was moving, even as I lie there on the ground. Jen was pulling me along by the legs, dragging me through the brush and swearing to herself. "What...what's happening?"

"The van may have exploded."

"Exploded?!" I wriggled my way free from her grasp and stood up on my own. The back of my clothes were covered in mud, but now was not the time to worry about that.

"A little bit." Jen directed my attention to a billowing cloud of smoke off in the distance. "See, when I pulled over last night, I may have hit a tree. But that tree had a death wish, it jumped in front of my van, man! It was one seriously troubled Treant," she began miming the tree jumping in front of her van. I'm not sure where the gunfight came into play, but she mimed that, too.

"So after I hit the tree, I'm sitting there like, 'well, this is as good a spot as any,' when I noticed the van was smoking. Then it was on fire, and I realized we weren't messing with an ordinary Treant; this was a Treant wizard. I knew we didn't stand a chance going against it head-on, so I pulled you from the wreckage and tried to rez you, but I guess you'd already logged because you weren't coming back."

"Is that why I'm covered in honey?"

"No, that was in case an owlbear came. You were dead weight, anyway, I might as well make it want you more than me." We stood there for a few moments, silently staring one another down.

"So, what are we supposed to do now? Do you even know where we are?"

"Judging by the amount of mud I dragged you through, I'd say we're somewhere swampy." She threw her nose to the wind, "smells like Alabama."

I raised my finger and opened my mouth, but the words didn't come out. I figured it was best not to ask how she knew. "Okay, we're in Alabama. Where were you trying to get to? I guess we can try to...hitch hike there if we really--"

"I dunno, I was just driving wherever I felt the wind was taking me," she said poetically, turning her head so that her hair billowed dramatically in the wind.

"So what you're saying is we're screwed."

"Not in so many words."

After three more panic attacks and a prolonged period of more open sobbing, Jen finally walked up to me, pat me on the shoulder and said, "We can't waste all day just sitting around here, we need to find someplace to crash for the night."

"You're right." I sniffled, wiped my nose, and stood back on my feet. "We need to get back on the road and follow it to civilization. Maybe we can panhandle some money for a--"

"What? I'm not going back that way! There are Treant wizards out there, and they've got it out for me!"

"SO NOW YOU BELIEVE ME ABOUT THE MONSTERS, HUH?! I told you, Jen! I told you! But we can't go into the bayou, don't you watch television? It's just worse in there!"

"Alex, there is nothing worse than a tree with a grudge. Now grab the ketchup duffel and come on, we're going into the bayou."


Continue on to Part 3

-Alex