The next morning the three of us swam in the motel pool, which was in the middle of the parking lot and hemmed in by a low wrought-iron fence painted turquoise — at least originally. Like everything in sight, it had been sun-bleached several shades lighter, like overexposed film. As we swam, the morning grey turned black and the rumble of thunder tore us from the pool, which left a greasy film on our skin. The downpour caught us a few yards from our door, even more ferocious than the Mammoth Cave storm had been, and I have to admit that for a split second the prospect of divine judgement did flicker through my head. As we towelled off we agreed the weather was too dangerous to drive to Vegas in. We also agreed we were starving.

I mentioned having seen a diner about a half-mile down the road the night before, so we scampered for the car and, smelling like wet dogs, drove ten minutes to a truck stop with no apparent name. The glass door chimed as we entered. The place was surprisingly busy given how desolate the area was, but then I figured truckers were opting to stay off the roads until the storm passed. All the orange-vinyl booths were full, so we sat down at the faux-wood-panelled bar. Will sat between Ana and I, and to my right was a guy I assumed was a trucker. He had a bit of a butch-daddy look going for him, and his moustache leant him a seventies-gay-porn-star vibe — though his navy cardigan and polo shirt sort of destabilized that image a little. He gave me a nod as I settled in beside him.

“On a road trip?” he asked me. Ana and Will were ensconced in their own conversation.

“How can you tell?” I replied.

“You look… scruffy.”

“Yeah, we are. How about yourself?”

“Oz and I work out of Berkeley. We had a few days off so we decided to drive up here.” Oz leaned over and gave a little wave. He seemed to be in his mid-twenties, sporting a patchy beard, wire-rim glasses, and a Wu-Tang Clan T-shirt.

“I’m Robert.”

“Jordan, nice to meet you.”

I asked Robert what he did in Berkeley. He said he taught at the university and Oz was one of his Ph.D. candidates. Mostly to be polite, I asked what their area of study was. Oz looked up from his menu and said, with an unexpected British accent, that Robert had “made his name in the nineteen-­seventies” for devising something called the “sentience quotient.” Oz had barely said two full sentences, but I already disliked him. I could tell his insecurity made him pushy, as if he was worried he’d be forgotten in the company of his soft-spoken and sexy supervisor.