The pistol. Rose worms her way down the body of the truck. Her head is splitting in two. Her body feels heavy and cumbersome. Her mind spins. If it weren’t for the unforgiving dark, she knows, the world would be spinning as well. When her hands hit the tailgate, she drops to her knees and begins sweeping the floor with her hands. She hits the pistol, and it skitters away. Another sweep, and she has it. Not daring to try to rise, Rose crawls back around the truck on hands and knees, shoulder brushing the metal, then the rubber of the tire. Finally she’s reached the door.

Bless running boards, she thinks as she levers herself up, one hand occupied with the pistol, and scrabbles onto the hood of the truck. It feels as if she is sliding across, sliding down, sliding up. Breath is hard as granite pebbles in her lungs. Grasping the pistol by the barrel, she hammers on the windshield. The gun butt bounces off. Getting to her knees, she raises the pistol over her head and brings it down with all the weight of her body behind it. A crack. This is not safety glass; this will break into a field of knife-edged shards. She strikes again. The butt goes through. Rose bashes and swipes, trying to clear as much of the glass away as she can.

No time. No light. Rose knows she will soon pass out. Then they both will die. Tossing the gun into the truck, she follows it with her body. Clothing snags; skin snags; a leg is captured, then released with a searing pain. She is in. Wriggling to the door, she opens it. “Can you get in?” she asks, not seeing Mel, not seeing anything, not even sure she’s opened the door on Mel’s side.

“I think so.” This is followed with a cough.

Then Rose feels a hand. She grabs it and pulls. Mel comes with it, her limbs and head tangling with Rose’s until they are lying atop one another like wrestlers. Rose wants to stop there, lie there, die there, but she can’t. She pushes Mel off of her and runs her fingers over the steering column. There is no key in the ignition, or it’s been snapped off. She waves her hand, hoping to hit the gearshift. Her hands pass through empty air. Sliding down between the seat and the gas pedal, she feels along the floor of the truck’s cab. A lump, a cone of rubber, the gasket around the gearshift staff. The shift rod has been broken off, leaving nothing but a stump and a bit of rubber.

Frantically, Rose claws at it.

“What are you doing?” Mel gasps.

“Stella broke off the gearshift,” Rose says. Her eyes are burning; her head feels as if it is going to explode. The smell of exhaust clogs her nose and throat, devours the gray matter in her skull.