Darkmoon(29)

“There’s just so…much of it.”

“I know.” He didn’t look as appalled as I felt, but I could tell he didn’t care for our surroundings all that much, either.

And it went on, and on, until at last we dropped down from Interstate 10 to I-15, and from there to another freeway whose number I didn’t catch, and then another, still with the overwhelming spread of suburbia on every side, rows of houses that looked the same, shopping centers that looked the same…cars and people that looked the same. I knew that wasn’t true, not really, but in that moment I was very glad that I’d grown up in wacky little Jerome, where everyone knew each other and every house was a little different, and there wasn’t a perfect right angle to be found.

All the while, though, we were heading steadily south and west — well, steadily until we came to an abrupt standstill on the 55 Freeway, in someplace called Orange. I glanced at the clock; it was a little past three-thirty, which seemed early for rush hour to me. Then again, “rush hour” in Jerome was waiting for a tourist to get the nerve to make a left onto 89A.

“How much farther?” I asked, attempting to stretch. The Cherokee’s seats were comfortable enough, but after more than seven hours cooped up in the SUV, I just wanted to get out. Thank the Goddess I wasn’t at that stage of pregnancy where you had to pee all the time.

“Miles or minutes?” Connor asked with a grin.

“Minutes.”

“Hard to say. I was kind of hoping we’d be getting in early enough that we’d miss some of the traffic, but….” After letting the words trail off, he gave an eloquent lift of his shoulders. “I think it’s still about twenty miles to Newport Beach, but if it stays this backed up, that could take us more than an hour.”

“Crap,” I said.

“Normally I’d say we could pull off, go get a snack somewhere and wait for it to die down, but from what I’ve heard, this probably isn’t going to clear up until at least seven.”

“Great.” I shook my head, wondering why people would put up with this sort of congestion when there were so many other places they could live. “No, let’s just keep going. I suppose we’ll get there eventually.”

“And we have a five-star timeshare waiting for us at the end of it instead of a Motel 6.”

“True.” That made me perk up a little, and so I tried to tell myself to be patient as we inched along. Things did get marginally better once we passed a minor fender-bender, and so we were able to rocket to a full twenty miles an hour instead of doing that horrible stop-and-go thing.

At last we were pulling off the freeway and onto a major road, which, while also congested, still moved a bit faster, and we came to the crest of a hill before dropping down toward Pacific Coast Highway.

“Wow,” I said, since I couldn’t think of anything remotely appropriate.

The Pacific Ocean sparkled ahead of us, deep blue, whitecaps catching the lowering sun and sparkling as if someone had tossed a bag of diamonds on the water’s surface. It seemed to stretch on forever, the horizon so much farther away than I had ever seen it, I in my world bounded by hills and mountains on every side.

“Yeah, that’s….” He let the words fade away, then shook his head as we coasted down the hill toward our destination.

Here everything was clean and perfect and manicured, from the carefully clipped trees to the smooth green lawns. I’d never seen so much grass in my life. We turned into the timeshare property, slowing down to accommodate the speed bumps, and eventually pulled up under a porte cóchère. I found myself wishing we’d borrowed Lucas’ Porsche, because even though my Cherokee was brand-new and shiny, it couldn’t really compete with the Mercedes and Beemers and other luxury cars I saw around us.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing at a low-slung convertible parked off to one side. I’d never seen anything like it.

“Tesla. It’s electric…and expensive.”

I’d never really been into cars, but that convertible was something else. And electric? Cool, I supposed, and maybe practical here in Southern California, but I wondered what its range was. We had a lot of wide-open spaces in northern Arizona.

We got out of the Cherokee, and a cool breeze touched my skin. It felt damp and heavy compared to the dry air I was used to. The breeze carried with it a strong, almost wild scent, one I’d never smelled before but knew had to be sea salt. In that moment, I didn’t just feel as if I was in another state…I felt as if I’d somehow landed on a different planet.