She called Steve Carlsberg, who had a car. Steve was happy to take Diane to King City. He was excited to go. He complained about not having received anything from a man in a tan jacket and agreed to skip work. He would pick her up from the bus station and they would leave this very morning.

“Morning?” she said. “What time is it?”

“Eight o’clock. Good and early start. Oh, this will be fun!” Steve said. She could hear the dinging of his car. He was already on his way.

She hung up and checked the time. Her bus had left at 7:00 and had been on the road for at least six hours. It was 8:03 A.M.

Mab pinched out her cigarette and swallowed it. She climbed back into her bus, pulled the doors shut, and drove away.

Diane waited. She bought a coffee and a banana in the station and waited. She bought another coffee and waited. She stared at the arrival and departure screens and waited. She checked the time and waited. It was 9:34.

She called Steve.

“Where are you? Is everything okay?”

“What do you mean, Diane?”

“I thought you were coming to pick me up and we were going to drive to King City.”

“Drive to King City? Gosh, I’d love to. That sounds so exciting. When did you want to go?”

“As soon as you can.”

“Listen, I’ll take the rest of the day off. Where are you?”

“I’m at the bus station downtown.”

“Okie doke!”

Diane waited. 11:15 A.M.

“Steve! Where are you?”

“Work. Why? What’s up?”

Diane called a cab and asked the driver to take her to the airport.

Yesterday, she had called her insurance company. She was hoping she could get a replacement car to drive to King City.

The insurance company had asked her where her car was.

“I don’t know.”

“If you do not know where your current car is, how can we replace it?”

“It was stolen.”

“So you don’t see your car right now?”

“No.”

“If you cannot see a thing, how can you be sure it exists at all? Are you familiar with Schrödinger’s c—”

Diane had hung up and called back, hoping for a different agent.

“You did not answer our question.” There had been only one ring, and the voice had immediately started in. “We cannot replace a vehicle that does not exist.”

“You have my VIN number and all of the pertinent information in your system.”

“This? This is just ones and zeros. This is just lights flashing various colors and shapes. There is nothing physical or real about data. Here. I just changed your middle name to five f’s in a row. ‘Diane Fffff Crayton.’ It says right here on my screen: ‘Diane Fffff Crayton.’ Do you accept that is your name because it is in our quote system?”

“No.”