Something Wilder

“You could have just taken the photo out!”

“I got excited.” Leo looked at her and let loose that reckless grin again. “Besides, I overpaid for his shitty watered-down beer. If you think about it, I paid for this, too, just indirectly.” At her look, he relented. “I’ll send him a check, okay?”

“Why not just,” she said, flabbergasted and enunciating every next word for the apparent man-child in front of her, “take a picture of it?”

He barked out a laugh. “With what? A pint glass? You took our phones.”

“This is so awesome,” Walter said from behind them, his knees tucked to his chin. “I feel like we’re in The Goonies.”

Lily leaned her head back to collect her thoughts. If she was right, and the photo was taken in front of the little cabin, they might have the biggest clue yet about where they needed to go. Once her temper cooled, maybe she’d be able to thank Leo for simply grabbing it and bolting. After all, why waste time?

Nicole rolled down her window, and the hot air thrashed deliciously through the Jeep. Lily glanced down at the picture again, trying to build a plan in her mind. The entry points into the Maze tangled into a blur. She was too amped up by photo-stealing, key-grabbing, jukebox-possessive, bathroom-destroying Leo—the quiet man unraveling right in front of her eyes. He’d barely said ten words that first morning, but now he seemed alive—and the sight of him bursting out of his shell was bliss. Like time melting away.

Her blood streaked white with adrenaline as she remembered the way his hands had curled around her hips and pulled her against him. I didn’t want you alone at the jukebox.

She threw him a dirty look. Yes, they needed this clue, but there had been so many other ways to handle it—other than simply ripping the frame from the wall. If Leo couldn’t keep a level head, what hope was there for the rest of them?

“I didn’t want to leave it to chance!” Leo yelled over the wind, correctly reading Lily’s expression.

“But Axl is a nutjob!” she yelled back. “Maybe you noticed the pair of shotguns over the bar?”

Bradley smacked the steering wheel again. “Why does everyone have a gun?”

“His name is Axl?” Leo’s expression cleared. “That guy? The bartender?”

Lily paused, searching his eyes to understand. “Yeah, why?”

“I am just…” His face tightened again with an odd mix of amusement and violence. “I’m trying to wrap my head around the idea that you hooked up with a guy named Axl.”

Her mouth closed, eyes widening as shock rippled through her. “What did you just say?”

He passed a hand down his face. “Forget it.”

“How did you—?”

“What do you mean ‘how’?” he cut in, coughing out a laugh. “He looked at you like he had the right to.”

“That was—” she began, irate, before starting again. “It was nothing. It was forever ago—and forgettable.”

“Uh, guys,” Walter murmured from the back. “Not to interrupt, but—I think we’re about to die.”

In unison, every head in the Jeep except Bradley’s swiveled just in time to see a giant black truck barreling down the road behind them. It slowed, weaving and hovering, barely six inches off their back bumper, while the driver leaned heavily on the horn. Bradley let out a war cry, raising a fist to pound it on the tinny ceiling of the Jeep.

“I was born for this moment!” he shouted to the sky.

Raised on tires the size of a house, the truck had floodlights on the roof and a custom hood emblazoned with a hand-painted bald eagle, wings spread, talons carrying an American flag. Behind the wheel, to Lily’s complete lack of surprise, was Axl. One of his idiot friends leaned out the passenger-side window, shouting something.

Leo let out a delighted laugh. “You’ve got to be kidding me! Look at that truck!”

“We are absolutely going to die,” Walter groaned.

“You can’t make this shit up!” Leo crowed. “That is the exact truck I would have chosen for him!”

But Bradley wasn’t having it. He floored the Jeep, which responded with a chugging hiccup before hopping ahead, causing Axl to hit his own gas pedal with a vengeance. Both cars barreled down the bumpy, broken road; one wrong move, and the Jeep would be flattened by Axl’s vehicular tribute to small penises everywhere.

“He’s so mad!” Bradley yelled, delighted. “Jesus Christ, Lily, what did you do to him? Doesn’t he know you’re his hero’s kid?”

“Yeah, but they knew I never gave a shit about the treasure!” she shouted over the roaring wind.

Bradley extended an arm out of the driver’s-side window and raised his middle finger, yelling, “Want your picture back? How about you suck my dick?”

Axl and Idiot Friend’s faces went red and they screeched ahead, cutting in front of Bradley and slamming on their brakes. The Jeep skipped across the road, stuttering as Bradley reacted, veering to the left to avoid hitting the truck’s rear bumper. A horn blared and Bradley screamed, steering harder to the left to avoid an oncoming car and swerving down a side road that was even more riddled with potholes than the one they’d been on.