She wasn’t one to pay attention to billboards, let alone one that was fading and partially obscured by a sad roadside grove of scraggly pine trees. But she and the smiling woman on the billboard both had cropped black hair with a streak of bleach and a small gap between their two front teeth. ESCAPE THE PRISON OF YOUR TRAUMA, the billboard read. It was a sign from the universe. She memorized the phone number. The last three digits were easy—her favorite angel number, 888.

A week later, she found herself sitting in a rather dimly lit office on a stiff leather chair, reviewing a vague liability release form. The office was nestled into one of those fancy strip malls with storefronts for organic smoothies, sushi, and laser hair removal. There wasn’t a sign for the facility, only a door with a keypad onto which she’d been instructed by the woman on the phone to enter a code. A green light flashed. She pulled open the heavy metal door and headed down the bleach-scented hallway.

There was no one inside when she entered the waiting room, just a small open sliding window on the other side of the uncomfortably large space, revealing shelves with binders and a taped-up banner that said ‘Happy Birthday’ in glittery letters. She walked toward the window. “Hello?”

A faint swirl of smoke crept into her line of sight. It smelled like salted caramel. A head popped up from somewhere below. The receptionist had dramatic eyelashes and old acne or possibly meth scars. A desk drawer slammed shut.

She smiled at the receptionist. “What flavor is that? I vape too.”

“You didn’t see that.” The receptionist scratched her neck with a long acrylic nail. A thick band of tattoos peaked out from the sleeve of her pink scrubs.

“See what?”

The receptionist smiled in a defiant but polite way that revealed she was relieved, but also ready to defend herself against any judgments thrown her way. “Name?”

“Am—” She cleared her throat. “My name is Amy.”

The receptionist handed Amy a clipboard and a pen. “Take a seat anywhere.”

Amy sat in the leather chair and scanned the room. There were posters of surrealist art on the walls—a naked woman in front of giant metal gears, a mannequin with her head in a bird cage, the naked back of a woman with holes like a musical instrument. Amy recognized the photos from a coffee table book her friend used to have. She turned back to the paperwork and began reading through the warnings—psychosis, depression, temporary loss of libido, tinnitus. She thought for a moment, sighed, and signed the form with a few practiced swoops.

Amy walked up to the window. “Loss of libido?” she said, handing the receptionist the form.

“It’s rare. Don’t worry.” The receptionist got up and headed to the door that opened to the waiting room. Amy stood there awkwardly while the receptionist stabbed the buttons of the keypad next to the door repeatedly with her nail and it repeatedly blinked red. She tried again. Red again. “I can never get this damn thing to open.”

Amy wondered if she should leave.

“Ah shit, I had it reversed.” The door swung open, and the receptionist guided Amy to a room at the end of a narrow hallway with a sagging ceiling. The treatment room, which was a fraction of the size of the waiting room, was painted a light violet and decorated with photos of wild seascapes. Amy didn’t like the ocean. She often joked that she died at sea in a past life. The receptionist instructed her to take a seat and wait for the doctor. Amy obediently sat down on a midnight blue velvety soft recliner. The door closed. She was alone again.

The chair was so plush and cozy that she dozed off for a moment, jerking awake when a female voice addressed her through a metal speaker in the wall. “Hi Amy. So glad you’re here. Alisha will be in shortly to administer the medicine.”

“Don’t I get to meet you?” said Amy.

“That won’t be necessary,” said the voice, smooth and uncanny like AI. “The simulator takes you to a peaceful setting where you can work out what you need to work out. You may experience dissociation symptoms as you adjust to your surroundings. We cannot predict what will go on in the virtual reality world your brain creates. The medication we provide makes you forget about this office visit, tricking your brain into thinking that what you’re experiencing is real. One drawback, or for some, a fun benefit of the medication, is that it gives you the ability to taste sounds.”

“Does this treatment erase real memories too?”

“No, I’m sorry if you thought that.”

Amy nestled her body into the folds of the chair again. A mist of lavender hung in the air, the source of which she didn’t bother to investigate. The receptionist entered a few minutes later, pushing a cart holding a large metal device with knobs and plastic tubes attached.

“I see you’re a woman of many talents,” Amy said to the receptionist.

The receptionist smiled and rolled the machine next to the chair. “You won’t feel a thing. It’s like laughing gas at the dentist.” She uncoiled one of the plastic tubes and attached it to a plastic mask. “Ready?”

The mask moved closer and closer toward her face but was interrupted by a strange noise coming from the hood of her car. Where was she? Road trip. She was headed somewhere important. She studied her surroundings—a flat, brown expanse with charred telephone pole crosses snaking through the land and a fire-slumped barn, its only strip of uncharred wood sloppily graffitied with a cartoon skull. Her attention shifted back inside the car. There was a water bottle, cherry lip balm, a Starbucks receipt, and an ant crawling across the top of her steering wheel. She guided the ant onto the receipt, opened the door of her car, and gently lowered the ant onto the road. The ant was safe, she was safe, everything was going to be fine. They would be able to fix her car in the next town. She pulled back onto the highway.

Exit eleven. Her lucky number. An American flag danced in the breeze outside a sagging house that hugged the road beside a sign for Red Pine, population 888. Closer to the exit she counted three charred cars, one fire-slumped house, an old tractor conspicuously untouched by past flames, and a single clothesline slung with work overalls and a white dress.

An auto parts store was immediately on her right after driving only a few more minutes. “Free Fix Finder Service” a big red sign on the window said. Fix finder, she thought. That sounds promising. She parked and checked her phone. Nothing but a notification from her astrology app: It’s time to be open to the universe.  A man with leathery skin looked over at her briefly from his red truck, then looked away. The smell of rubber greeted her like an old friend, reminding her of going to the abandoned racetrack with an older boy, driving around and around in circles faster and faster until she was screaming and crying. Even though she’d been afraid, at least she was alive. The boy’s fat teeth and sloppy smile came for her like a phantom. She shook herself back to the parking lot and got out of the car.

Inside the auto parts store, a stand of black and blue American flags dripped black oil onto the concrete floor. The tires lining the walls were also soaked and dripping oil. The men at the counter were staring at her. She expected them to look her body up and down or to stare at her breasts, but instead the men stared straight ahead, frozen, their faces blanched with fear. She walked up to them, smiled sweetly, and waved. One of the men seemed to respond favorably to her smile. His shoulders shifted down and he ran his blackened fingers through his shaggy beard. “Do you need help, miss?” His voice tasted like licorice.

“Yes, could you look at my car?”

The other men continued to stare at her blankly. The oil continued to drip.

 “We don’t see your kind much around here,” said one of the men suddenly. His voice tasted like chalk. The man with the beard shot him a threatening look. 

“My kind?”

“City folk, he means,” said the bearded man.

“I grew up in a town like this.”

“Bet you did, hon.” His voice was salty, sweet, like iron. “Meet ya out there.”

She went back to the parking lot and stood there, refreshing her astrology app over and over again. It’s time to be open to the universe. The bearded man came out with a device and stood at the hood of her car. He looked at her with raised eyebrows. He was waiting for her to do something. “Pop the hood?” he said.

“Oh right, of course.” She popped the hood, and he plugged his device into something near the engine. The wind sent the pine branches into a frenzy. An electric current shot through the air and she felt a small shock. She jumped. She was back in high school, running through a field, trying to find her mom’s car that she’d “borrowed.” She was trying to climb the fence but fell back because it shocked her. No one had her back at the party. No one cared that she was falling over, then taken to a back room.

“You get shocked?” asked the bearded man at the hood of her car. His voice was peach vodka. She made a face. Someone coughed. Gummy worms. She looked around. A slim figure emerged from behind a pine tree that was bleeding from its bark. All the pine trees were bleeding. Were pine trees always bleeding? The afternoon glare prevented her from seeing the face of the emerging figure clearly. He walked toward her with that delicate swagger she knew so well. Kyle.

 She couldn’t believe he was standing in front of her. She laughed. He waved. She looked behind her. It was just like how they’d met at that party—a house show with punk kids shooting up on the front porch, tripping hippies making snow angels in the blood on the lawn, the art girls catching frogs and throwing them against the windows. No, that didn’t seem right. A friend of a friend who wasn’t even there had invited her to the party. She’d needed some fun. She’d been working all the time—eighty hours a week at the non-profit, a lawyer for women charged with murder for getting abortions, a growing trend that had crept up on everyone like smoke.

“There’s no one behind you, silly,” said the new Kyle, now standing in front of her, smiling that slanted, dangerous grin of his.

It’s time to be open to the universe. The sky was a crisp blue. Her eyes scanned the technicolor strip mall lining the single road that raggedly cut through the landscape like a serrated knife. Were colors always this bright? She thought of the Wizard of Oz and how Judy Garland was on all those drugs, and they barely let her eat, how the Tin Man got so sick from the body paint they had to find a new actor.

“I heard you asking for help,” said Kyle.

“You did? Do you know anything about cars?”

“Uh, ma’am?” said the bearded man she’d forgotten was there. “I can’t find anything wrong. You should probably go to a repair shop. There’s one a few streets down.” The man disappeared back into the store.

“Cigarette?” said Kyle, presenting his opened pack of American Spirits to her. His nail beds were a little dirty. She tasted rubber, smoke, and gasoline. She took a cigarette. He handed her a silver Zippo lighter decorated with a tiny dart board. Her heart was beating like Dorothy’s must have been when she landed in Oz. The breeze made her shiver. She was very hungry. She lit the cigarette.

BAM. Two vehicles collided on the road. The sound of breaking glass tasted like cotton candy. They were both pulled toward the accident, slowly crossing the hot pavement littered with cigarette butts, a couple Mountain Dew bottles, a smashed lollipop. Why did anyone drink Mountain Dew? The breeze pushed her skirt against her legs, the air brushed its hand against her underwear. She looked down. She had legs and a body, and her heart was pumping blood through it all, and it was obeying her brain. In the road, the cars were old, primitive versions, the kind she’d only seen in movies, completely naked with gears exposed, more like giant bicycles. Their metal was entangled in a way that didn’t make sense. An old man was bleeding from his head, a frail woman was screaming at the bleeding man who was staring at Amy. “Stop staring at that slut! You just hit me!” The woman screamed.

“Let’s get out of here,” said Kyle, grabbing her arm and directing her back to the parking lot.

“Stop staring at that slut.” That’s what Amy heard a woman say at a bar when the news displayed an image of her client on the screen—a twenty-year-old tattoo artist with short bangs and very little skin devoid of ink.

“Thank you for helping me,” the tattoo artist had said to Amy at their first meeting. Amy grabbed her hand, and an ancient energy pulsed between them; tears blurred both their eyes. She wanted to tell the young woman that this wasn’t how things were supposed to be, that both of them should be sitting in a beautiful rose garden, bonding about other things, more complex and interesting things, things other than a perfectly safe and routine medical procedure.

Amy ran the tips of her fingers across the trunks of the bleeding pine trees marking the path back to her car. The blood was warm. She licked her finger. It tasted sweet. “I miss you,” she said to Kyle.

“I’m right here.” 

They got in her car with Kyle in the driver’s seat and drove down the now-deserted road. A Starbucks sign gleamed ahead. All the other stores had disappeared. Amy took a long drag of her cigarette. “Caffeine!”

Kyle laughed like a little kid. They pulled up to the black building with impenetrably tinted windows. A handwritten sign on a piece of cardboard like the ones travelers hold on the side of the freeway was taped to one window, pointing them toward the drive-thru. They pulled up and stopped next to the glowing menu. The drinks were all wrong—skinny slut latte, berry bitch smoothie, tonic water. A woman was shouting at them through the intercom. Her voice tasted like ketchup. “Do you need help!?” The voice sounded alarmed.

“We’re okay, we just want a drink. Do you have an iced oat milk latte?” Amy said to the metal box.

“Sure, but our coffee is made from placenta. Is that okay?” the woman said back, calmer this time.

“Placenta?” Amy looked at Kyle.

He returned the look, confused. “There’s still caffeine, right?” he said into the box.

“Of course!”

“Okay, make that two,” said Kyle, and he pulled forward.

The barista at the window was not what Amy expected. She wore a tie-dyed tank top and had pink hair with a lip piercing and a full chest piece of interlocking roses. She was already holding their drinks. “Let me know what you think!”

They thanked her and drove off without paying. In the parking lot, they drank their iced lattes that tasted like sweet mud. “Not sure I’d order this again,” he said. It suddenly hit her that it was planned for her to run into Kyle, that they were supposed to have an important discussion, that he was supposed to give her the key to her freedom. But the feeling passed, she said nothing, and they continued on their mission to the repair shop. The blue of the day had been covered by a purple and orange wool blanket. The strip mall had appeared again on the left, but it was gray and ugly, covered in ash. Kyle seemed to know where he was going.

The run-down repair shop was marked only by a sun-bleached American flag. She thrust open her car door and headed inside, suddenly filled with a deep sense of urgency. Hung on the walls of the repair shop were photos of eagles with fish hanging from their mouths and gangs of motorcycle guys with waist-length beards and round bellies like pregnant women. A woman sat in front of them behind a worn desk. She was plump and rosy cheeked, her eyes glued to a TV on the wall. She chuckled like she and the people on the screen were in on a secret.

Amy stepped closer to the desk, wincing from the shame of her helplessness. “Can you help me?” The words emerged from deep in her throat.

The woman didn’t acknowledge them. Her eyes stayed fixed on the screen.

“Her car is having problems,” said Kyle.

The woman looked at them and squinted her eyes. “Dave’s out for the day.”

“Who’s Dave?” said Amy.

“The mechanic.”

Amy was feeling dizzy and nauseous amidst the lack of air circulation inside. She steadied herself against the desk. “Is there another one?” she asked.

“Another Dave?”

“Another mechanic.”

“No.” 

“Okay, I guess we should try somewhere else,” said Kyle.

“Randy’s is also closed. He and Dave went hunting.” The woman directed her attention back to the TV. It was Judy Garland in her blue dress and ruby slippers. But it wasn’t the movie. She was on some kind of reality show. A man was handing her a rose.

Nausea had fully taken over. Amy needed to lie down. “I need to rest.”

The woman’s gaze traced the length of Amy’s body, her eyes lingering on the blood smears on Amy’s shirt where Amy had wiped her fingers after touching the pine trees. “Oh, honey. You look frightful. There’s a motel right next door.”

Kyle led her back outside. The sun was a bleeding phantom on the horizon. She could barely see. “Kyle, I have to tell you.”

“Tell me what?”

But she didn’t want to talk about it because she didn’t want to be that kind of woman. Kyle had been nice, offering her a ride to the clinic immediately. She’d declined. He tried to facetime her outside the clinic. She texted him that she was already inside. But she never went in. She’d never judged a woman for having an abortion, in fact, she sometimes judged them for not having one. And she knew how lucky she was to be able to live in a sanctuary city where it was allowed. No one close to her was anything but supportive of her dealing with the problem in a responsible manner. And now she was being that woman, the one she saw both times she’d gotten abortions before, the one who changes her mind at the clinic and suddenly rushes out the door. She felt like she was betraying some part of herself by thinking about actually having the child. What about helping her clients who lived in areas where abortions were illegal? What about the pandemic and climate change? What about turning into an insufferable mother who her child would come to hate? She started the engine and drove away from the clinic. For the next couple months, she wouldn’t take Kyle’s calls. She eventually answered, lying to him about going through with the abortion, telling him not to contact her anymore. He didn’t put up much of a fight. Then one morning she woke up to a thorny rose bush whipping its tendrils against the inside of her uterus. Her sheets were wet. She dipped her fingers in the blood. She smelled her fingers. Iron and spoiled milk. She threw away her sheets in the dumpster, took a shower, cleaned her fridge, and ate three bags of gummy worms.

The smell of something cooking hit her nostrils. She looked down at the worm sizzling on the pavement. She looked at Kyle. He was pointing at the sizzling worm. There was a scar on his cheek. Had he always had that?

“Bleh bleh blooh.” It was like he was speaking underwater.

“Who are you? Do I even know you?”

He tried to pull her toward him. His skin felt like rubber. His face was familiar but not Kyle. It was uglier and dumber. It was the older boy who’d led her into that back room when she was a teenager. She screamed. Her brain was bleeding or there was a leak in her heart. All she could see was the thick red fluid pouring out over and over in her mind. She ran to the inn and started jiggling each door handle until one of them opened. She stumbled inside, slammed the door shut, and locked the dead bolt and the chain. She collapsed on the bed. She was safe. The room smelled starchy and artificially clean. She was in that alternate reality of motel rooms that are always the same. She lay there in the dark for what felt like minutes or possibly centuries.

 There was a knock at the door. Her heart thrummed against her chest and adrenaline pulsed with a distant hum from the depths of the universe. Fuck it, she thought. She remembered her horoscope message: It’s time to be open to the universe. She centered her eye over the peep hole. The girl from Starbucks was standing there with her pink hair and perky smile.

“Do you need help?” the girl said through the door.

 Amy opened the door. “I’ll be fine,” she said, locking eyes with the annoying little girl, limbs filled with a sudden urge to push her to the ground and start kicking her.

 The girl kept smiling and rubbing her amethyst necklace. It was just like the one Amy’s mom had given her. The girl’s hair was pink just like Amy’s had been back in high school. “I’m a healer,” the girl said. “I help women like you.”

 “Women like me?” Amy wanted to flick her in the space between her eyes. 

 “Women who missed out on how it was supposed to be.”

 “That’s not me, I’m a woman who helps people. I am not—” Amy felt like she was going to pass out. She went back inside, collapsed onto the bed, and immediately fell asleep.

 She woke up in a purple room where a woman in pink scrubs was heading toward her with a steaming towel. 

“Can you help me? That wasn’t how it was supposed to be.”

The woman bent over, put her mouth next to Amy’s ear, and put her hand on Amy’s. She was whispering. “You’re better off vaping through the pain. Trust me. There’s no real solution.”

Amy started to cry. It was the first time she had let herself cry about it. She lingered in the subtle kindness of acrylic nails running up and down her trembling arm.