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However, it was at that moment in time that I was thinking that concussions, and being strangled, were two very different things.
Why, you ask, was I being strangled?
I didn’t have any earthly idea.
What I did know was that I’d walked into a situation that I couldn’t get myself out of.
All I’d been doing was intending to go to the grocery store. However, when I’d gotten halfway there, like the idiot I was, I’d left my getting gas until the last second, and I was desperately in need of some.
Since there were only two gas stations in Accident, I’d had zero choice but to go to the closest one, seeing as the other was notorious for allowing water to get into their gas, and blaming everyone and anything but themselves and their lack of due diligence.
And seeing as I liked my car, and couldn’t really afford a new motor for it at the moment, I chose to go to the one that was on the seedier side of town that was closest to the interstate’s path. Which also meant more people that weren’t part of our community.
Like today.
When I’d arrived at the gas station, the overhead light had been flickering.
Like every single woman in this day and age, I actually contemplated getting out of my car or not. I mean, I could probably make it to the grocery store and to work—my stupid milk supplier was seriously getting on my nerves—but I definitely couldn’t get from work to the gas station.
Not without doing the walk of shame with a gas can, of which I was about ninety-four percent certain I wouldn’t be able to do without overexerting myself.
That was my first mistake.
Getting out at the gas station without ample lighting.
My second was the shady-looking guy smoking the cigarette filling up his motorcycle.
I clocked him the moment that I pulled into the station. He was casually holding one hand to the gas pump that was dumping gas into the top tank of his motorcycle. Meanwhile, his other hand was holding a cigarette to his lips.
The third signal that I ignored was when I got out and put my card into the card reader and it said “see cashier.”
It would be at this point that I’d normally leave. I didn’t, under any circumstances, go to a place where I had to see the cashier. If I could’ve afforded to leave in that moment, I would have. Even if I had to pay the extra gas prices for somewhere else.
That was the first way to lose my business. Forcing me to go inside and see a cashier. I didn’t know why, but that was the biggest pet peeve I had.
Locking my car up, I put the keys into my pocket, wrapped my hand around my credit card, and then got halfway across the parking lot when I realized that I’d forgotten my phone.
I hesitated there in the middle of the dark lot before deciding that I would go all the way inside and see the cashier.
Luckily, the inside of the gas station had more light than the outside.
I walked up to the attendant that looked like he’d rather be anywhere but where he was at, and smiled. “Hello. I need to fill up the car at pump four.”
He didn’t bother looking out the window to see which car, just took me at my word as he started typing in numbers. “Can’t fill it up without leaving your card in here. You’ll have to leave it and come back for it.”
I gritted my teeth.
“Okay,” I said. “Then put fifty dollars into it.”
That should get me all the way to full.
But I wasn’t certain, so I didn’t add any more, even though my car was really empty.
“Okay,” he said. “Here.”
He gave me my card back.
I took it with a small smile, then walked back out the door, my eyes on my car, and not my surroundings.
