Turn it Off

The pinks and oranges of a sunset were visible from my rear-view mirror. I sped down one of the many back roads of North Carolina, in my family’s mini van filled with the sleeping members of my family.
“Alex?” My dad asked groggily from the passenger seat, “Why didn’t you wake me at six like we planned?”
“Er, I um tried, but you wouldn’t wake up…” I lied. The truth was that had lost track of time. I did most of my thinking while driving, and when there really isn’t much to do but go straight, your mind can go anywhere.
“Oh, well at the next gas station pull over, so we can switch and your brother and sister can get some candy or something,” he said ending with a yawn.
“Alright,” 2 hours later I was pulling into a random gas station that nobody’s ever heard of.
“Mackenzie, Shelby, Zach!” wake up, go potty, and pick out 2 candy’s and a drink each!” I told my younger siblings.
“Okie dokie, artichokie!” Shelby said racing towards the door to the convenient store.
“Alright,” Zach grunted, shuffling his feet slowly in the direction our younger sister had gone.
“Ali!” Mackenzie called out for me in her four year old voice.
“Yeah Kenzie?” I asked preoccupied with filling up the tank.
“Can you help me outta my supper seat?” she asked referring to her new booster seat.
“Sure thing,” I said putting the gas nozzle back on the wrack. I helped her out, and walked with her inside the store. While I was pulling open the glass door, I felt a tug on the hand that Mackenzie was holding onto.
“Ali, look!” she giggled, pointing at a grungy looking man strumming a guitar on the curb.
“That man only has four fingers!” she said incredulously.
“Shh Kenzie! Don’t point!” I scolded batting at her hand still hovering in the air.
“What kind of candy do you want?” I asked changing the subject. She pulled a number of candy bars off the shelf. I could already hear the wailing and screaming she would be doing when I told her ‘no you can’t have that many’.
“Uh Mackenzie,” I started, trying to think of what to do, when my eye caught a shiny array of stickers. Perfect.
“If you get that much candy, you won’t be able to get any stickers!” I told her, watching her face fall as she registered my words.
“Oh, alwight,” she said carelessly tossing the discarded candy back, and running over to the sticker display.
“Well that was easy…” I muttered to myself.
When we reached the car I found my father rubbing his sleep filled eyes, getting ready for his portion of the journey.
“Here you go daddy!” I said cheerfully, handing him an extra large coffee, two sugars, one cream, just like me. With the coffee, I regretfully handed over the keys.
“Ali? Will you sit wit me?” Mackenzie asked as I strapped her back into her ‘super’ seat.
“Sure. Zach, man the forts, and sit up front with dad, but don’t touch any of my CD’s, got it twerp?” I told my fourteen year old brother.
“Sir, yes sir!” he mocked me, adding in a solute for affect. I just responded with one of the only things we have in common, the classic Taylor eye-roll. Some of our cousins on the Taylor side of the family wish they could master the eye-roll that Zach, Shelby, their mothers, ours, and I have perfected over time.
“Soo… Beauty, and the Beast, or-“
“BEAUTY AND THE BEAST!” all three of my siblings yelled out.
Once Zach noticed what he had done, he slouched down in his seat, grunted, deepened his voice and stiffly said, “Not that it matters, I uh, just don’t want to listen to any other Disney crap right now”
“Sure Zachey, sure” I said with a wink, “your secrets safe with me,” I added before putting in the DVD.
Halfway through the movie I felt the car come to a stop. I raised my head from where it was resting on the window and looked towards the front of the car.
“What’s up dad?”
“It seems as though we’ve run out of gas,” He answered looking at me with bewilderment.
“But that’s impossible! I just filled the tank!” I stated.
“Well whether or not that’s true, were stuck, no gas.”
“What are we gonna do?” I asked, wondering how far away the gas station was.
“It’s got to be a good hour and a half by car, maybe two!” my father said reading my mind.
“I guess I’ll have to go and get more gas to hold us tight to drive back to the gas station,”
“Alright, I’ll go with you,”
“Don’t be silly, Zach can go with me, and you can stay here with the girls,”
“Fine, just be safe” I said crossly as he woke up Zach and got out of the car. I got up and turned the heater up, and pressed the automatic lock button, hearing the click from all sides of me. I settled back down into my puffy blanket and started to watch the abandoned movie.
“Alex? Do you hear that?” Shelby asked from the back row of the van.
“No honey, it’s just a dream, now go back to sleep,” I dismissed her.
“But I’m not asleep; I haven’t been asleep since the gas station,”
“Are you sure? You looked pretty asleep to me a minuet ago…” I said doubtfully.
“Well! Maybe I’m just that good of an act- there it is again! I swear I’m not deaming!” And she wasn’t, I heard it too, A dull tapping, getting louder, and louder, then suddenly stopping. I checked on Mackenzie to see if she was still asleep. I was in luck, she was. I leaned forward, turning off everything, the lights, the movie screen, and even the car. The tapping noises had started up again, this time closer to where the door handle on the door that was closest to me. Then I heard the pulling and release of a locked car door.
I was trying my best not to freak out in front of Shelby, if she saw my freaking out, then she would start to freak out, and I would never get control of her.
“Maybe it’s dad or Zach?” Shelby said cupping her hands on the glass of the window and trying to look outside.
“Get away from there!” I snarled pulling her down to the floor where I had started to set up camp with my blankets and some pillows. I got up on my knees and started to un strap Mackenzie telling her, “Were at grandmas, we’re going straight to bed okay?” I’m not sure if she heard any of that, because she was basically asleep for the whole time.
“Why’d you tell her that?” Shelby asked.
“Because, she doesn’t need to think anythings wrong,” I snapped.
“And is it?” she looked me in the eyes and asked.
“No, nothing’s wrong, now get down!” I hissed. The car started to rock back and forth. Starting and stopping just as abruptly as the tapping. Fifteen minuets passed, and nothing had happened. I was beginning to think that it was all in my head, and that I needed help. I poked my head up and looked around, not that this could do anything to save our lives, if it needed to be done. As soon as I did this, the van rocked back and forth once more.
“Ah!” I yelped hitting the floor once again. Five more minuets had gone by, and I started to see flashing lights, fallowed by that familiar sound of sirens outside of the car.
“Thank god!” I practically yelled.
“Alex? Shelby? Guys?” I heard my dad’s panicked voice shout.
“DADDY!” Shelby and I cried in unison as we dog piled my father. The sirens had belonged to a police cruiser that was still running.
“What’s with the police?” I asked.
“Uh, I’ll tell you when we get to grandmas, this kind man is going to take us, and there’s a tow truck that’s going to pick up the van in the morning,” he informed me.
“Oh, alright,” I said grabbing Mackenzie and holding her on my waist.
We reached my grandmothers an hour later. My father thanked the police man while I herded my siblings up the stairs to bed, with the help of my grandma.
As we had finished tucking everyone in, we heard the door slam downstairs. We found my father in the kitchen making coffee, and rubbing the bridge of his nose.
“So what was that all about?” I asked my dad.
“When Zach and I reached the gas station, it was swarmed with police. I was told that I wasn’t allowed to get gas, because there was a murder investigation going on, so we got a ride back to the car, because the police didn’t want us walking around with a murderer on the lose.”
“Oh, wow, daddy, when you left, there was some one trying to get into the car, and rocking it back and forth.” I said, close to tears.
“Honey, everything’s alright, you’re here and safe now” my grandma said pulling me into a hug, “now go get some rest, and we’ll see you in the morning,” she ordered.
“Okay, night, I love you,” I said sniffling, as I made my way upstairs.
When I woke up in the morning I heard my dad on the phone, it sounded like he was talking to a mechanic. I walked into the kitchen and sat down at the table, waiting for him to get off the phone. When he finally did, he sat down across from me, and put his head in his hands.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, not sure if I wanted to know the answer or not.
“That was the mechanic, he said there’s a hole in the gas tank, that had to have been intentional, and that there was… blood all over the car, and hand prints, I forgot to tell you, that the murder last night, had been done by a serial killer that the police have been trying to catch, he takes off a finger of his victims, the mechanic also said that the hand prints only had four fingers…”