Page 118 of Grown-Up Second Chance

“Idiot!” I yelled and raised my fist for good measure.

He gave me the middle finger and zipped into the fast lane, causing the driver of a passenger car going the eighty mile an hour speed limit to stomp on his brakes and land on his horn.

People had gone insane and dropped all pretense of manners.

I took a couple of deep breaths. Road rage was a thing. And these people had guns.

Time to go back to pretending I was a harmless little old lady.

~ ~ ~

Hotel rooms can be depressing in the best of circumstances, but the chain hotel in Casper didn’t reach that threshold. Once I let my sisters know I’d made the first stop, I ate my dinner in the hotel dining room before returning to my space. Surfing through the dozen channels gave me few options for entertainment, so I settled on a rerun of a movie I vaguely remembered.

I should let Joe know I stopped at a hotel for the night.

My fingers were poised above my phone, but I had no idea what tone to use.

Serious?

Fun-loving?

Flirty?

No, strike the last one. Ironically, sex was going to be the most serious discussion of all.

In the end, I decided on neutral.

I’ll be there tomorrow, I texted.

I can’t wait to see you, he replied quickly. Where are you?

Casper.

Long drive.

Yes.

The three little dots indicating typing appeared, disappeared, and re-appeared again.

Drive safe, he wrote.

Then nothing.

What was I expecting? A declaration of undying love over a text message? We weren’t teens anymore.

I tried watching the movie I’d found, but I couldn’t get into it. Flipping through the channels, I came upon some viewing options, so I scrolled through those.

Adult movies.

I sat up.

I’d never watched one, always too afraid someone would find out.

If I watched one now, someone could find out I’d done it, but why would they? It was relatively anonymous. And what harm could it do? I might learn some things. Old dogs and new tricks.

My heart pounding, I charged a movie called Guilty Pleasure.

After a few moments, I almost turned it off, the acting was so bad and the script only a vehicle to get to nudity.

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