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bond with all of my sisters—you know, that woman’s thing that tells you to be a part of perpetuating the human race!
    My hands gripped the steering wheel. “Yasmine would tell me to get pregnant without being married and have a baby myself, since I’m such a staunch opposer to her abortion!” I said aloud. That thought lingered. “I’m sorry, girlfriend,” I said. “I don’t care what you say, I’m not going with you to that clinic!”
    This whole thing had me talking to myself.
Simone, get a grip
, I was thinking when from the corner of my eye I saw the driver of the blue Ford pick up speed. He put on his turn signal, then pulled out in front of me. As he drew even with me, he threw up his index finger like he was pulling the trigger of a gun.
    The driver was black, middle-aged. His hair was woolly, long over the ears and combed back. His lips were uneven, his top one long and thin, his bottom lip fat. His beard was a scraggly thing that was in bad need of trimming. His complexion was leathery like he had spent a lot of time out-of-doors. The Ford slowed, then shot past me along the deserted road.
    Once the Ford was out of sight, I was alone again. My unpleasant sight of the driver had made me alittle uneasy, but with Nancy’s song filling my car, I was beginning to relax. I thought of how Cliff would react if I was pregnant, what it would do to our relationship. That thought, and a nudge of the tightness still in my stomach, made me shiver. I lowered the air conditioner. “Pregnancy and babies,” I whispered. “All of a sudden my world is filled with both!”
    By that time I had noticed the blue Ford again. It was ahead of me, the driver moving less than twenty miles per hour. I slowed. As I did, he put on his signal to pull off to the side of the road, as if he had a flat tire. I drove past, looking for any sign of car distress. There was none. But as I pulled past, I noticed the baby’s car seat strapped behind him.
    The whole encounter took less than a minute and I wouldn’t have thought any more about it except the Ford soon caught up with me again. This time the driver didn’t pass. He was driving so close behind me that I thought he was going to ram my tail end. I glanced at the rearview mirror. The driver was staring at me unblinkingly. Something in the look on his face told me that this man would hurt me if he ever got the chance. And what I heard next made my heart jump into my throat. There was a thump and a fizz. One of my front tires had blown. I turned down the volume on the tape and took a deep breath. One of the things I’ve learned about panic is that it causes errors in judgment. Things happen fast, and because of the instinct for survival and the desire to get awayto safety, thought usually follows action.
Be calm
, I told myself.
Think
. I knew how to change a tire. Cousin Agatha’s house wasn’t too far away. My eyes went back to the mirror. Just inches behind me, the blue Ford followed. The demented eyes of its driver just seemed to be waiting for me to stop my car. Flat tire or no, I kept driving.
    The Ford stayed close behind me. I felt trapped, stupid. I kept staring back at the car inches behind me, fighting to stay calm, fighting to take deep, even breaths.
Think, think
.
    The roadway was deserted, the silence eerily profound except for the rhythmic thump of my flat tire. There wasn’t another car in sight. I took a deep, careful breath and with my left hand tight on the steering wheel, I opened the car pocket with my right hand. I examined the can of pepper spray I found there. Was it good? The last time I’d used it was during that affair in Bentley a year and a half earlier.
    I glanced into my mirror again. The Ford was still inches behind me. But now, in the far distance, a white car was coming up fast behind both of us. My heart leaped. I whispered, “Thank goodness!” When I eased the Honda toward the shoulder of the road, the driver of the Ford immediately