Chapter 3

They hung up on me before I could finish talking.

I held the lady’s phone and just stood in a daze. Tears began to stream down my cheeks and drop onto the screen.

The lady looked at me before patting my shoulder to comfort me. She sighed, “Don’t be sad. How about you follow me home and call your parents to come fetch you at my place? I’ll get off the next exit, so I won’t be heading the same direction as you. But I’ll be able to take care of you for this short journey.”

I recalled my parents’ impatient voices and rejected the lady’s kindness.

“It’s alright, thank you. My parents said that my uncle will fetch me very soon. I’ll wait for him here.”

My parents did not want to turn around to pick me up due to the New Year’s traffic.

I was not close to Uncle Darren, so I bet he would not be happy to do a detour to pick me up. The lady wanted to say something else, but her phone started ringing. Her travel companions must be rushing her.

She looked at me in concern and took out a few pieces of chocolate from her bag and pressed them in my palm. Then, she took off her beige scarf and wrapped it around my shoulders.

“Have this scarf; you’ll feel warmer this way. Eat some chocolate so you won’t get hungry. If no one fetches you after a while, ask another stranger to lend their phones to you. Be safe.”

I forced myself to nod and sobbed, “Thank you.”

She rushed out of the washroom and left me alone at the empty rest stop.

The cold wind seeped through the cracks in the door, but the scarf provided me with some warmth. My stomach rumbled from hunger, so I took out a piece of chocolate and ate it.

I did not dare to eat them all at once. I carefully put the rest of the chocolate back into my pocket. If I needed to wait for a long time, I had to leave some for later. I wrapped the scarf tighter around my body and up against my neck.

I was wearing a hand-me-down sweater from Mandy. The collar of the sweater was loose. Some threads were falling out. Mandy did not want this sweater anymore after wearing it for a year. My mother said the sweater was still wearable, so she passed it to me.

Mandy was wearing a new pink puffer jacket this year. It came with a fur-rimmed hoodie, and she looked like a proud princess in it. Matthew was also wearing a new puffer jacket that was bright blue. When he ran in it, he looked like a waddling penguin.

As for me, I was stuck wearing Mandy’s hand-me-down, and I looked like Cinderella.

I was afraid that Uncle Darren would miss me when he drove, so I clenched my teeth and walked out of the washroom and stood against the cold wind.

The streetlight became dimmer, and the sky turned dark grey. Snow started falling on my hair and shoulders, and it immediately melted.

I stared at the cars and kept stomping my feet to prevent them from freezing. I warmed my hands with the scarf whenever I felt them going numb from the cold. I kept praying for Uncle Darren to arrive soon.

The cars kept passing by, blinding me with their lights. However, none of them stopped at the rest stop.

The snow was getting heavier, and it formed a layer of snow on my scarf, so I wrapped it a little tighter around me. The sweetness from the chocolate had faded, and I was left anxious and cold. I did not know how much longer I had to wait, and I was unsure if Uncle Darren would really remember to fetch me.

I felt as though the cold wind was going to freeze me to death in this empty rest stop.

Time felt extra long. I was left to freeze with this growing hunger. I stood under a streetlight and was constantly losing sensation in my limbs. The cold pierced through my bones.

I was not even shaking anymore; it was like my body had lost the ability to shiver. A strange, uncomfortable pain began to spread within me. I felt as though something was pressing against my head. It felt heavy and painful, and I could not even look up.

My heart started to speed up. It was thudding against my chest like thunder. I began to lose my breath.