As I straightened back up, I caught a glimpse of the car waiting so patiently behind us. It was a truck, actually, brown, big and old, a touch banged up, with patches of different colored metal, and a large, heavy bumper that was surely not the original. I stared upward, above all of that, to the windshield, and who, or what, sat behind it.

I sat back up quickly, turning my head to the road in front of us and hitting the gas, for a split second until I heard the horn of the car whizzing by in front of us. As soon as it was past, however, my foot was back on the pedal. I had to slow somewhat while I passed another car, then swerved back into the right lane. But there was the man, still, in the rear view mirror, a lighter in his hand now, as he idly flipped it on and off, for no apparent reason, as I didn’t see any cigarettes or anything.

“It’s just a coincidence,” I told myself, out loud. “He just happens to be going the same way…” So I decided to go another way, pulling over to the left lane, then turning onto the back road I was fairly sure came out somewhere near home. There were a few houses there, near the end, before they started to give way to the woods. I thought I’d heard once that there used to be an old girls’ school somewhere back there, long ago, though I couldn’t say I’d ever went looking for it.

“Shit,” I spat at the sight of the truck in the mirror, a little half-heartedly. Like I’d really thought it’d be that easy. As I hit the gas, tugging sharply on the wheel when the road took a sudden turn, I began to regret my choice. I could have tried to lose myself in traffic on the freeway. On that road, my best bet would be to outrun him, and hope that, in the few times I’d been in the car while my parents drove, I’d learned more about the road than he knew.

Nancy slipped across the seat, bumping into my arm as I made the next curve. She looked quite confused, on the verge of tears. That was just what I needed… A moment later, as the next turn threw her into the door, the floodgates opened. I rolled my eyes, not daring to take a hand off the wheel long enough to try to comfort her. “Why didn’t your costume come with a pacifier?” I grumbled.

The truck was keeping pace easily, so, despite knowing what was ahead, I felt my foot push further down. “Hold on!” I warned Nancy, but of course that meant nothing to her. I flung out an arm, as the road suddenly dipped, keeping her from banging her head on the dashboard, then frantically untangled it from her, brought it back to the wheel to bring the car around the curve at the hill’s foot, so that I didn’t crash into the tree there. I made it, though the rear tires nearly slid into it anyway, just to prove me wrong. Then it was back up another hill, and, for a short time, straight.

My heart felt as if it were going to beat out of my chest. I allowed myself a brief moment to close my eyes, clearing my mind. We were pretty deep in the forest by then, no houses visible for a while, but a couple driveways had popped up here and there. I opened my eyes, a feeling of relief washing over me to find that I was alone on the road. One of those driveways must have belonged to him, I reasoned. Nothing to worry about – just getting myself worked up over someone who happened to share a scar with the person who’d turned my best friend into a toddler. A coincidence, nothing more.