OPENING SNIPPET

The thing nobody tells you about moving trucks is that their speed is automatically capped at 75mph. This makes two things really difficult. The first difficult thing is passing trucks going seventy on I-40. The second is making it to staff training on time when you planned this trip assuming you’d ten miles over the speed limit at all times.

I should probably be grateful that U-Haul prevented me from careening down the highway in an enormous death trap, but as I climb into my own car and peel out of the drop-off parking lot with no hope of completing the hour drive in fifteen minutes, the only thing I feel is annoyance.

I don’t bother calling to let camp know. The good thing about having a reputation for irresponsibility is that when you’re irresponsible, nobody bats an eye. And if you can look past the fact that I don’t want to have a reputation for irresponsibility, the perks are pretty good. To be fair, it’s a reputation I’ve earned several times over. It was fun when I was a kid, but I wish someone would have told me how hard it is to change people’s opinions once they’re set.

Even if I told Pat, my boss and owner of Fogridge Sleepaway Camp, that I left Waco, Texas two days ago to be here on time, it wouldn’t change his thoughts about my recklessness.

In the past week, I’ve driven two-thousand miles, slept very little, and acquired an outrageous number of bruises from suitcases slamming into my hips. Helping my baby sister move her entire life from Cali to college wasn’t the nightmare I thought it would be. But it was close.

Since I’m going to be late anyway, I swing by a coffee shop. They get my order wrong, but I take it anyway. I’m bone-tired and caffeine is caffeine.

I turn onto Ridge Rd, still a few miles from camp, and glance down——for literally a second, I swear——to grab my coffee. When I look up, I have to jerk my wheel to swerve out of a collision course with a black pickup truck with its hazards on.

“Shit!” I say into my steering wheel as I slam on my brakes. There’s a clatter as a clear plastic bin of friendship bracelet supplies goes flying out of my passenger seat, opening and spilling thousands of colored glass beads onto my floor mat. Great. Can’t wait to spend an hour re-sorting those by color and sifting all the dirt out.

On the pickup’s tailgate, entirely unperturbed, sits a white boy with a book in his lap. He barely acknowledges me.

Now, normally I wouldn’t stop for broken down cars on the side of the road because I’m a woman and I’ve listened to enough true crime podcasts to know men are nuts. But, under his open denim button-up, this boy is wearing a Fogridge staff shirt, so I maneuver my car onto the shoulder.

I swing my door open and walk back to where he sits, leaning my forearms onto the truck. “Need help?”

I don’t recognize him, and he’s definitely someone I would remember. It’s stupid how hot he is. His thick brown hair falls messily around his forehead, casting a shadow over half his face. Full lips, freshly shaven jawline, round wire-rimmed glasses, thick eyebrows. Dang.

He tilts his head up, the edges of his lips curling into a smile. “I’m good. Thanks, though.”

“You don’t look good,” I say, inclining my chin toward his car.

His eyes twinkle. Like, for real; they twinkle. I wonder if he did it on purpose. If so, I want him to teach me. “You a mechanic?” he asks.

I shrug. “Nope.”

“Triple A’s already on their way,” he says, gesturing vaguely with his book. It’s clear he wants to get back to reading, but I persist.

I tighten my ponytail with a tug, suddenly wishing I hadn’t spent the last forty-eight hours eating greasy food and sleeping in the cab of a moving truck. “How long are they going to take?” I ask

He glances down at the phone perched on his right knee. “Uh, like an hour and a half.”

I cross my arms and round the back of the car. “Pat doesn’t like people to be late.”