I am going to say that I’d wanted a soup or a simple sandwich, but my stomach yawns and I don’t have the energy to argue anyway. A steak in a diner can’t cost that much. This isn’t L.A. I cut a piece and put it in my mouth. My eyes instantly water as pepper fills my sinuses and tickles my throat. I swallow and cough.

“Guess it didn’t need that additional seasoning,” Victoria observes.

“Told you,” a man says from the kitchen. “Came preseasoned. If you’d let me taste it earlier, I could have told you what seasonings.”

“You’re not licking uncooked beef.” Victoria swings a finger over everyone in the diner. “And none of you are listening to this conversation.”

“No, ma’am,” the trucker says. He focuses on his food with intensity.

Merry reaches across the table and pats my hand. “You finish your dinner, honey. We’ll talk more later, when you’re ready.” She slides out of the booth and saunters toward the back of the diner. I watch her disappear down a hall and think I see the odd haze of light following her, but then I decide that I must have imagined it.

I eat quickly. The faster I eat, the sooner I sleep, and the quicker I leave here. The potatoes are cold and have congealed into solid lumps, but they’re thick with garlic so I eat them anyway. Driving must have made me extra hungry.

The other customers keep glancing at me.

I pretend I don’t notice.

Merry doesn’t return—the diner must have a back door. I’m glad. I don’t want any more conversations tonight. I’ve had my fill of this town already.

Finishing, I look up to catch the waitress’s eye... She is watching me, waiting. “Check, please,” I say. I fish my wallet out of my purse and take out my credit card.

She shakes her head. “Your cards are no good here.”

“Oh, sorry.” I hadn’t noticed the lack of credit card signs. I don’t carry much cash, but I should have enough to cover a meal at a diner, even a steak. I look through my wallet. “How much?”

“It’s on us,” the unseen man in the kitchen pipes up.

“Oh, no, I couldn’t.” This diner can’t possibly serve many tourists. Plus my job may be soul-sucking but it pays me enough for dinner.

“Your money’s no good here. Barter system only, and you have nothing we need,” Victoria says. “You can pay next time, after the Missing Man explains the rules.”

I feel a chill. I don’t like the certainty in her voice when she says “next time,” and I don’t want to know what she means by “rules.” Also, what kind of diner doesn’t take money?

“I don’t know ‘the Missing Man.’ And as I said, I’m just passing through. I won’t be back.” Leaving my table, I cross the diner and press a twenty-dollar bill into Victoria’s hand. “Steak was great, even with the extra seasoning.”

Victoria follows me as I flee to the door. All the customers are staring at me again. “You need to talk to the Missing Man,” she says.

“I need to get some sleep,” I say. “Long drive tomorrow.”

I bolt out of the diner and across the still-unused street. Not a single car drove past during the entire meal. Crossing through the parking lot, I spot yet another wallet on the ground. This time, I leave it there.

Ahead, the forbidden room, room twelve, is lit from within, but its shades are drawn.

At my motel room door, my hands shake as I fumble with the key. I shoot a look back at the diner, its bright lights and garish decorations lightening the dark sky. Above, a fat moon has risen. It hangs above the neon diner sign. Every crater seems to glow brighter than I’ve ever seen it.

I let myself into the room and lock the door behind me, shutting out the town, the diner, the moon, and the road home.

I wake with the feeling that dreams have swapped with reality.

Any second, a dirigible will land on the roof, deploy dozens of alien ninjas who will sneak into every motel room to rendezvous with the lime-green monsters that are camouflaged in the bathroom, and then conquer the world; all the while I am due on stage in three minutes but have never learned my lines. Also, I’m naked.

Except that I’m not naked, because I slept in my underwear.

Oddly, I find that more comforting than the absence of alien ninjas.

I blame the garlic mashed potatoes for the dream, and I roll over to check my cell phone. No messages and no signal. I don’t know how many times Mom tried to call me. I should have used the motel room to call her last night. But I didn’t, and I don’t now, either. Call it childish or stupid or ostrich-head-in-the-sand delusional, I’m not ready to hear her news. Not yet. Instead, I lay my head back on the pillow—an ordinary white pillow. I’d chucked the pile of throw pillows into the corner of the room, where they hulk like a not-yet-formed pillow monster. It’s somewhat surprising that my dreams weren’t haunted by those pillows. I have no idea why I dreamed about a dirigible.

Sunlight streams through the slightly open shades. I blink. My eyes feel crusty, and I think I would have slept better if I’d been home where I was supposed to be.

Officially, this is the stupidest thing I have ever done.

Unofficially...yeah, asinine.

I should be home making coffee, locating my shoes, and brushing my teeth in my own sink while Mom hunts for her hairbrush, the special one that won’t yank out her thin hair. Instead, I lurch out of bed and totter to the motel bathroom. The lime-green sink gleams as if radioactive in the overhead light. It’s good that I’ll be out of here today.

I shower and dress in the same clothes from yesterday. My shirt itches, and my pants are so wrinkled that it looks as if I plan to tie-dye them. I think about taking the toiletries—I liked the shampoo—but I have my own at home. I leave them around the sink.

Ready, I check the room one more time—out of habit, not out of a belief that I forgot anything. I find a condom and a pair of glasses under the bed, both coated with dust, as if they’ve been there for months. Since neither is mine, I leave them, though I stick the glasses on the bedside table. I don’t touch the condom, even though it’s still in its wrapper.

I linger in the room, though I don’t know why. Of course I want to leave this backwater dump of a town, and of course it’s time to head home, way past time in fact, which may explain why I linger. I will have a lot of excuses to make to people once I am back, especially to Mom. She’ll forgive me, of course, which will make it worse. She’s the one who should be angry or sad or scared—she’s the one who may or may not be sick again, not me. It’s entirely selfish of me to expect her to cater to my emotional needs. But she will, and then I’ll feel like I have the soul of a worm. Part of me wishes I could stay here longer, as if that will delay anything bad, as if the world freezes when you close your eyes.

No, I think. It’s time. I’m leaving. Mom needs me. I’ve had my little breakdown, my personal moment, or whatever, and now it’s time to put on my big girl pants and be strong.

Voices drift muffled through the door.

Pressing my eye to the peephole, I see... It’s blurred. Gunk from a hundred other eyeballs is smeared on the peephole glass. I have the urge to wash out my eye.

Instead, I push the curtain window an inch to the side, not too far; I don’t want anyone to notice the movement. Sunlight floods into the room. I am facing east, and the sky is lemon-yellow. Automatically, I open the shades wider and let the sun warm my face. Then I notice the people.

Across the parking lot, a throng of people surround...my car. And the motel clerk, Tiffany, is standing on the trunk of my car, as if it were a podium. She’s wearing a purple prom dress, and she is holding a small suitcase over her head.

I charge outside, my purse slung over my shoulder. I am a woman with a mission, and that is my car and I am leaving this town.