F*ck me. I’m totally screwed.

I listened with composure on the line, because that was what my dad taught me to do. I remained quiet, instead of saying all the things that came to mind, like ‘what the hell?’ or ‘are you sh*tting me right now?’.

Dad always said manners were important, even with people who were screwing you over. I sat in my car in the dark parking lot, listening to the caller. Driving at night on an unfamiliar road wasn’t a problem, but I didn’t live dangerously enough to talk on the phone while I was looking for the next place to turn. So there I was, in the dark lot of a shuttered Mexican restaurant, holding back all the curse words in the book as I listened to my plan dissolve into thin air.

“I guess I didn’t get your message,” she said, her tone the equivalent of a shrug, “so I rented the room to someone else. She’s really great—she’s a drummer.”

“I see,” I said, rubbing my forehead. There was clear tension in my voice.

“I’m sure you can find another place in the city. There’s always people looking for roommates.”

“Thanks,” I said, and hung up.

Shit. Shit. SHIT.

There went my destination, the address I’d programmed into my phone when I started the GPS guidance. My new home. The apartment where I would be renting a room during my internship.

And, no, there were not loads of people looking to rent a room to a stranger who was so broke she was probably going to have to steal toilet paper from the magazine office where she’d won the unpaid internship. I rolled my eyes at myself. It would be fine. I’d have to get a motel room, which wasn’t in the budget I planned, but I could find someplace cheap until I found a rental.

I’d always prided myself for taking the lemons that life threw at me and making a damn good serving of lemonade out of them. Growing up, I’d been through my fair share of trials. I was the independent type. The kind of girl who didn’t let a few roadblock get in her way. That was another trait I’d credited my dad for passing down to me.

I swung back out onto the highway and drove on. I blasted the A/C even though it was chilly out, to make sure I didn’t get sleepy. I cranked up my workout playlist, some classic Britney Spears tunes to keep me from balling my eyes out. I made three turns in quick succession, squinted at an oncoming truck with its brights blinding me, and was glad when it passed by. I turned off the music when I was within a half hour of the city. With no one on the road, I switched on voice search and said ‘motels near me’ in hopes of finding someplace affordable to crash. The phone didn’t respond. I cut my eyes to it and tapped the screen experimentally. It didn’t light up. I’d never bothered to buy a car charger, so I’d have to wait until I checked in at a motel to plug the phone in and let my dad know I’d arrived safely.

Oh well, people had stayed in roadside motels for decades before cell phones were invented and found them just fine by following the signs right?

I could do the same.

I kept driving, fighting the yawns that started coming, and rubbed my eyes even though I knew it smeared my mascara. The lights on my dashboard flared and went out. I flicked the interior lights, which didn’t come on, and a slow grinding sound filled my car. I managed to steer it onto the shoulder of the road before it died.

“Well, crap,” I said to myself.

My phone was dead. My car was dead. I wasn’t about to try and walk ten miles of highway into the city alone in the dark. So it looked like one problem solved, I thought wryly, I knew where I was sleeping for the night—in my car.

Perfect.

I locked the doors, fished a bottle of water out of my purse and took a drink. In the morning I’d walk a little ways and flag down a car, get someone to call a tow truck for me. It was annoying, but I’d make it work. I didn’t have much other choice.

I got out my notebook and started to write down a list of observations, some funny, some bitchy, about my road trip to the big city, about starting life after college on my own—things that excited me and things that scared me. This was all raw material I could use for the magazine if I ever got a chance to do a feature article or even a sidebar. It was too dark to see, and my handwriting was never the best. Yawning, I put the notebook aside and started to take off my shoes when I saw the flare of red and blue lights track across the dashboard from behind me.

“Things will turn for the better soon”, I thought out load.

I wasn’t quite sure if I believed my own words.