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are you going? Just pull the car beside him.”
    “I’m just gonna see if he needs help.”
    Her father opened the door and stepped out of the car.
    He’d come within a few feet of the man when he stopped and said, “Jesus, are you okay?”
    The man turned, let out a spitting snarl, and lunged at Mary Beth’s father. Both her and her mother screamed, watching her father just miss the man’s grasp. The man fell to the ground, and her father bolted back to the car.
    Mary Beth looked into the man’s eyes as he worked himself back up to his feet. Pale and empty, just like Susan’s. His skin was further decayed and rotted than hers had been, though. He looked like a monster, not a human.
    “Go, go!” her mother shouted.
    Mary Beth and her mother simultaneously screamed as her father drove the vehicle right at the man. After a crash, Mary Beth looked up, and saw the windshield wipers clearing blood off the glass.
    “I just clipped him. The car’s fine,” her father said.
    “Are you okay?” The voice came from her mother, and Mary Beth looked up to see her looking into the back seat.
    Mary Beth nodded.
    “Put your seatbelt on,” her father said, looking into the rearview mirror.
    Mary Beth moved from the middle of the bench seat, and locked herself in behind her mother.
    Her father veered onto 129, barely slowing down to make the turn.
    ***
    Somewhere between Maryville and Knoxville was where Mary Beth’s life changed forever.
    She looked ahead, the city of Knoxville still far out of sight, and saw a woman and a child standing beside a truck on the side of the road, the woman waving her arms frantically.
    “They need help, Charles,” Maria said.
    Mary Beth’s father looked straight ahead, his hands tightly gripping the wheel. He failed to acknowledge what her mother had said.
    “Are you going to stop? It doesn’t look like any of the sick people are around.” her mother noted.
    “No,” her father replied, short and to the point.
    As they passed by the woman and the child, the freckled boy locked eyes with Mary Beth. When she looked back, the boy held her gaze, and Mary Beth saw the desperate look in the woman’s face.
    “How can you just leave them?” her mother asked. “She had a child, dammit.”
    “Yeah, and so do we,” her father said, raising his voice. “Do you want me to get us to safety, or have you already forgotten what happened to Susan?”
    Mary Beth’s mouth fell open in surprise, and she noticed the instant regret in her father’s face.
    His lips moved, obviously trying to spew out words, and he finally bumbled out, “Honey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
    “Don’t try to backpedal,” her mother said. “You said it.” She drew in a deep breath. “Just keep driving.”
    But Mary Beth’s father had already pressed the brake and cut the wheel toward the median. He found a gravel emergency vehicle path and used it to cross over to the southbound side of the highway.
    The woman seemed to know that he had turned the vehicle around to come and assist her and her child, and she jumped up and down, yelling.
    Mary Beth’s father crossed back over the median and pulled up next to the truck.
    “Oh my Lord, thank you,” the woman said. She spoke in a very country accent that reminded Mary Beth of one of her uncles, who lived somewhere out in the middle of nowhere in Kentucky.
    Her mother’s window rolled down and her father leaned over to look out at the woman.
    “Truck broke down?”
    “Yes, sir,” the woman replied. “Me and my boy here seem to be stuck.”
    “Do you need a ride into town?” he asked.
    The woman shook her head. “I think it’s an easy fix, I just don’t have no knowledge ‘bout cars. You don’t by chance know somethin’, do ya?”
    “A thing or two,” her father replied.
    He undid his seatbelt and opened the door.
    “Be careful,” her mother said.
    Mary Beth’s father looked back to her mother and smiled before stepping out of the vehicle. He