Roadside Crosses

rationing it, as if the trunk of her Camry held only so much.
    A painful bang as the car hit a pothole. She gave a brief, muted scream.
    Other hints of light intruded occasionally: the dull red glow when he hit the brake, the turn signal. No other illumination from outside; the hour was close to 1:00 a.m.
    The luminescent ghost rocked back and forth. It was the emergency trunk release: a glow-in-the-dark hand pull emblazoned with a comical image of a man escaping from the car.
    But it remained just out of reach of her feet.
    Tammy Foster had forced the crying to stop. Thesobs had begun just after her attacker came up behind her in the shadowy parking lot of the club, slapped tape on her mouth, taped her hands behind her back and shoved her into the trunk. He’d bound her feet as well.
    Frozen in panic, the seventeen-year-old had thought: He doesn’t want me to see him. That’s good. He doesn’t want to kill me.
    He just wants to scare me.
    She’d surveyed the trunk, spotting the dangling ghost. She’d tried to grip it with her feet but it slipped out from between her shoes. Tammy was in good shape, soccer and cheerleading. But, because of the awkward angle, she could keep her feet raised for only a few seconds.
    The ghost eluded her.
    The car pressed on. With every passing yard, she felt more and more despair. Tammy Foster began to cry again.
    Don’t, don’t! Your nose’ll clog up, you’ll choke.
    She forced herself to stop.
    She was supposed to be home at midnight. She’d be missed by her mother—if she wasn’t drunk on the couch, pissed about some problem with her latest boyfriend.
    Missed by her sister, if the girl wasn’t online or on the phone. Which of course she was.
    Clank.
    The same sound as earlier: the bang of metal as he loaded something into the backseat.
    She thought of some scary movies she’d seen. Gross, disgusting ones. Torture, murder. Involving tools.
    Don’t think about that. Tammy focused on the dangling green ghost of the trunk release.
    And heard a new sound. The sea.
    Finally they stopped and he shut off the engine.
    The lights went out.
    The car rocked as he shifted in the driver’s seat. What was he doing? Now she heard the throaty croak of seals nearby. They were at a beach, which at this time of night, around here, would be completely deserted.
    One of the car doors opened and closed. And a second opened. The clank of metal from the backseat again.
    Torture . . . tools.
    The door slammed shut, hard.
    And Tammy Foster broke. She dissolved into sobs, struggling to suck in more lousy air. “No, please, please!” she cried, though the words were filtered through the tape and came out as a sort of moan.
    Tammy began running through every prayer she could remember as she waited for the click of the trunk.
    The sea crashed. The seals hooted.
    She was going to die.
    “Mommy.”
    But then . . . nothing.
    The trunk didn’t pop, the car door didn’t open again, she heard no footsteps approaching. After three minutes she controlled the crying. The panic diminished.
    Five minutes passed, and he hadn’t opened the trunk.
    Ten.
    Tammy gave a faint, mad laugh.
    It was just a scare. He wasn’t going to kill her or rape her. It was a practical joke.
    She was actually smiling beneath the tape, when the car rocked, ever so slightly. Her smile faded. The Camry rocked again, a gentle push-pull, though stronger than the first time. She heard a splash and felt a shudder. Tammy knew an ocean wave had struck the front end of the car.
    Oh, my God, no! He’d left the car on the beach, with high tide coming in!
    The car settled into the sand, as the ocean undermined the tires.
    No! One of her worst fears was drowning. And being stuck in a confined space like this . . . it was unthinkable. Tammy began to kick at the trunk lid.
    But there was, of course, no one to hear, except the seals.
    The water was now sloshing hard against the sides of the Toyota.
    The ghost . . .
    Somehow she had to pull the trunk release lever. She worked off her shoes and tried again, her head pressing hard against the carpet, agonizingly lifting her feet toward the glowing pull. She got them on either side of it, pressed hard, her stomach muscles quivering.
    Now!
    Her legs cramping, she eased the ghost downward.
    A tink.
    Yes! It worked!
    But then she moaned in horror. The pull had come away in her feet, without opening the trunk. Shestared at the green ghost lying near her. He must’ve cut the wire! After