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where I belong, watching everyone else from a safe distance in my head.
    And River? He’s a ticking bomb.
    Traffic ahead of us moves suddenly. We shift from failure to success and edge forward. Doors slam all around us as people get back into their cars, fists of triumph in the air.
    The soldiers crush out their cigarettes and disappear into the fronts and backs of the trucks. Wheels start to turn. I look at the dark canvas covers. What’s shrouded beneath them?
    With no explanation, traffic stays in motion. The air pressure seems to lighten as the outside streams past the windows. We’re all silent, afraid to jinx it. Harlan presses buttons and the windows rise.
    â€œOK,” he says, his expression relaxing.
    The AC kicks in, drying my face, the chilled air as welcome as rainbow ices on a summer afternoon. Yes! I want to yell out. Chalk one up for us against Mother Nature.
    Success,
I text Kelly.
Moving finally!
    Us 2. Yay!
    Race u 2 Austin.
    It will be fun to be with my mom’s friend Linda again. She was a book reviewer before she switched to teaching. She has four Siamese cats and a pug named Waldo. Wherever you sit, the whole group wanders over and snuggles with you. At this rate, we should be there in two and a half hours.
    I look at the sky for confirmation that my prayers have been answered, only it’s as gray as a concrete gravestone, like the heavens don’t give a crap about sending out uplifting messages.
    River stretches, momentarily locking his arms around the headrest behind him. I can’t not notice his biceps and the swell of his shoulders. I exhale. It comes out louder than I intended.
    I thought those feelings were part of the past. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. He couldn’t care less. He presses his head against the seat. I’m off his radar screen, an extra piece of baggage taking up space in the backseat, Miss Ho-Hum Next-Door Neighbor, a nonentity of epic proportions.
    I stare at the hands on my watch, fixating on the second hand. One minute. Two. Three. It seems to be in slow motion. I glance at the odometer. When I look again, we’ve gone just over two more miles. How is that possible? We slow to a crawl and stop—again.
    There’s nothing up ahead to explain this, downshifting from success to failure. Five minutes. Ten. Harlan kills the AC. He lowers the windows, and the toxic heat flows in. I stare at his watch, the sun bouncing off the gold, dancing like a tiny Tinkerbell on the perimeter.
    Text from Kelly:
Now?
    Stuck again. Can’t believe.
    Wanna go home!
she says.
WHAAA.
    There’s a little boy in the car in the next lane. He leans out his open car door and throws up. His mom jumps out of the passenger seat and puts her hands on his shoulders, holding him. He heaves again and again and finally crouches down at the side of the hot car, crying. She tries to comfort him, but it doesn’t help. River watches, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, gnawing at the corner of his thumb.
    Stop before you start bleeding , I want to say. But I don’t say anything. The sun shines faintly and then fades like it’s on life support before retreating behind a veil of clouds.
    No, please!
    River raises his sunglasses and stares up at the sky. “Twenty-four to forty-eight hours before it hits?” he says, almost to himself.
    I turn to the other window. “Omigod!”
    A crazy face, just outside my window, staring in at me. He’s got a long gray beard and one eye is entirely milk white.
    â€œA great evil is about to befall you, sinners!” He yells at me. “An evil greater than the Holocaust. You are about to pay for your ways—for your immorality. God is watching us and hearing our lies and we—will—pay.”
    â€œMove on,” Harlan yells, starting the engine and closing the windows.
    But we’re stuck.
    The man stands there and stares through the window. At me. And then at River. I want to