Hurt Josh before he can hurt her.

Charlie looks down at the backpack at her feet. Inside are things that would normally be found in a purse. Her wallet, spare change, tissues, and chewing gum. Gone is the pepper spray Nana Norma had given her when she left for Olyphant. Charlie lost that more than a year ago and never thought to replace it. All that leaves for self-defense is her keys, which jingle at the bottom of the backpack as Charlie picks it up.

She unzips the bag and reaches inside, feeling for the keys. They aren’t much. Certainly not as good as pepper spray. But if she holds them with the keys poking out from between her fingers, Freddy Krueger–style, she might be able to fight off an attack from Josh.

Not that Josh looks remotely close to attacking. Calm behind the wheel, he points to the horizon, where the sky is lightened by a soft electric glow. Within seconds, a diner comes into view. One so traditional Charlie thinks it could be mistaken for part of a film set.

Chrome siding runs below the diner’s wide front windows, beyond which are red booths and blue tables. A sign hangs on the front door—red-on-black letters telling them that, yes, they’re open. There’s another sign on the roof. Neon. It spells out the name of the place. The Skyline Grille. The “e” on the end flickers slightly, like even it knows it’s unnecessary.

“Told you there was a place open,” Josh says as he steers the Grand Am into the parking lot. “You need to trust people more, Charlie.”

Charlie gives a wary nod, knowing the opposite is true. Trust is what got her into this situation. A heaping dose of suspicion would have helped her avoid it entirely.

As Josh pulls into a parking spot, Charlie sizes up the situation. It leaves her stumped. For reasons Charlie can’t begin to understand, Josh brought her to a place where help is within reach.

“Ready to eat?” he says. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”

They get out of the car, Josh a few feet ahead of her. As they cross the parking lot, Charlie cradles her backpack and ponders what to do next. It would make sense to end things immediately. Just burst into the diner and scream that Josh is trying to kill her, that he’s killed before, that he’ll keep doing it until someone stops him.

There are three other cars in the parking lot. A black Ford pickup, a boxy compact car, and a powder-blue Cadillac deVille with a dent in the driver’s-side door. She wonders if the driver of at least one of them is capable of restraining Josh. He’s a big guy. Strong. It’ll take someone equally as big and strong to subdue him, and Charlie doubts the drivers of the compact car and the Cadillac are up to the task. That leaves the pickup driver.

If he believes her.

Charlie knows full well that bursting into the diner shouting about serial killers will likely make people think she’s the troublesome one. They’ll assume she’s drunk or crazy or a combination of the two, just like the woman in the rest stop bathroom. Charlie remembers the way that woman looked at her. So skeptical, so unwilling to help. There’s nothing to suggest the staff and patrons of the Skyline Grille won’t be the same way. She’s sure she has the same desperate, deranged look she had at the rest stop. That might make it hard to convince someone to help. People don’t want to believe that a fellow human being is capable of such vicious cruelty. They want to think everyone they meet is just like them.

Nice.

That’s what Charlie thought about Josh when they met at the ride board. Hell, it’s what she thought at the rest stop, when he caught a snowflake on his tongue and she decided getting into the car with him—again—was the wisest course of action.

She was wrong.

Just like she could be wrong that someone in the diner won’t believe her.

But if no one does—if they look at her the same way the woman in the rest stop bathroom did—then all Charlie will have accomplished is tipping off Josh that she knows what kind of person he is.

Not nice. Even though he’s doing something nice right now by holding the diner’s front door open for her.

As she walks toward the door, she sees that a better option—a smarter, braver, more careful one—sits outside the diner, by the side of the building, a few feet from the front right corner.

A pay phone. Hopefully in working order.

Charlie can excuse herself, come outside, and call the police, who’ll have to believe her. That’s their job. Some cop will be dispatched to the diner, and Charlie will be outside waiting, ready to tell them everything she knows about Josh. If they still think she’s lying and Josh fools them just like he fooled her, she’ll make a scene. Let them think she’s drunk or crazy. A jail cell and a drunk and disorderly charge are far better than what Josh has planned.

She’s made up her mind.

Pay phone it is.

All she needs to do now is get away from Josh long enough to use it.

INT. DINER—NIGHT

The diner is mostly empty. Just a waitress, an unseen cook in the back, and a couple in a booth by the window. The couple—a man and woman in their late twenties—have a boozy weariness to them, which won’t be much help to her.

Neither will the waitress, who looks to be well past sixty. She’s got high hair, coral lipstick, and age-spotted arms that poke like sticks from the sleeves of her mint-green uniform.

“Sit anywhere you want,” she says as she rearranges the pies inside a glass dessert case near the door. “I’ll be there in a jiff.”

Charlie makes a move to the left side of the diner, where the couple sits, hoping to snag the booth next to theirs. Safety in numbers. But the woman chooses that moment to let out a drunken cackle, sending Josh to a corner booth on the opposite end of the diner, next to a jukebox pushed against the wall. Charlie has no choice but to join him.

She leaves her coat on after sliding into the booth across from Josh. Since she’ll be going right back outside to make a phone call, she sees no point in removing it. There’s the added bonus that, like a bullfighter’s cape, its bright red has attracted the attention of others in the diner. Normally, Charlie hates feeling conspicuous, but now she appreciates the attention. If all eyes are on her, then Josh will have to be on his best behavior.

That moment of something working in her favor lasts only a few seconds. Because as soon as she’s situated, Charlie looks out the window and her heart sinks into her stomach, which sinks to the diner floor.

The pay phone is right outside.

Just on the other side of the glass.

In full view of Josh.

Inches from him.

Charlie takes a breath, trying to stay calm. Maybe she should change her mind and make a scene anyway. She does another quick sizing up of the rest of the diner. The couple in the opposite corner is shrugging on coats and slipping on gloves, clearly preparing to leave. The woman—the drunker of the two—gets her hair caught in her scarf and barks out another laugh.

“You okay to drive, hon?” the waitress says as they pass her on their way out.

“We’re fine,” the man says.

“Suit yourself,” the waitress says. Under her breath, she adds, “But if you wrap your damn car around a tree, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Charlie watches the waitress watch the couple climb into the compact car parked outside and pull away. She respects the way the woman is looking out for others. That flinty concern might be needed if Charlie decides to abandon the phone call idea and straight-up ask for help.

The waitress closes the dessert case and flips a switch. It lights up like a window display at Christmas, the three levels of pies inside slowly rotating. Grabbing two menus, the waitress then makes her way to their table.

She looks familiar, but in a way Charlie can’t place. Like a character actress she sees on a TV show and then spends the rest of the night trying to think of what else she’s been in. Charlie assumes it’s because she’s a walking, talking stereotype of a movie waitress, right down to the pencil tucked behind her ear.

Still, she makes note of her name tag.

Marge.

“What can I get you kids to drink?” she says with a noticeable smoker’s rasp.

Josh orders a Coke and a coffee. Charlie orders a cup of hot tea.

“Scalding-hot, please,” she says, thinking ahead, picturing a scenario in which she has to throw it in Josh’s face in order to make a quick escape.

Marge, clearly a pro, doesn’t need to jot it down. “Hot as Hades,” she says. “Coming right up.”

She leaves them to peruse the menu, which is encased in a plastic sleeve that reminds Charlie of the license in Josh’s wallet. Although she suspects it’s really Jake’s wallet. Like their game of Twenty Questions, she no longer thinks it was a movie-in-her-mind situation. It’s more likely that Josh switched licenses at some point, probably at the toll plaza while talking to the toll collector. He’s smart. She’ll give him that.

She needs to be smarter.