Previously:

The backseat occupants nodded in agreement.

"Fasten your seatbelts, ladies, we have a bumpy ride ahead of us."

Shrugging their shoulders, the two cohorts exchanged smirking glances. They figured they'd find out what that meant, sooner or later.

As they drove slowly up toward the exit, Liz turned her squinted gaze away from the car that looked so much like hers.

**********
As Tommy explained the basic plan for their route to get to the car, Liz and Linda were distracted by the sight of the closed shops.

"When we get back, we'll have to ask Wolf why everything is closed." Liz was delegating that task to Tommy. "Will you remember to ask Wolf about that?"

"Definitely, I want to know why this is such a ghost town. There's got to be a reason. A serious reason." Tommy's countenance darkened.

As the car rolled down the hill and out onto the highway, with which they were altogether too familiar, Liz said to Tommy," Sorry...you were saying?"

"I was explaining the plan of action to fetch your car. I suspect the only progress in the fire fighting process, is they've moved farther north, closer to your car. Because of that, we're going to go a back way.

"In fact, it will be the same route you'll be taking to head back home from here. Admittedly, a lot of it's dirt road."

Liz and Linda laughed simultaneously. Liz noticed Tommy quizzically glanced up at them. Liz said, "Much of Vermont has dirt roads and we both live on one. In fact, one of our favorite pastimes is to pick a road and just keep driving to see where it will take us.

"There's one, that for some reason we inevitably take the fork that ends up, not just being a dead end, but the road morphs into field. It's just done. No more road. Not even a cow path."

Liz checked to see if Linda had buckled up yet. She had. Liz decided she'd better, when they hit the first bump as the car pulled off the highway.

"I guess we can't use the funny saying here, that we have when giving direction to travelers who lose their way. 'Should be hardtop all the way.'"

Tommy chuckled, indicating to Liz that he was enjoying the Vermont yarns and humor. She thought of going on with more, but decided against it. It was becoming clear, their driver needed to focus on the road, if that's what it could be called.

Their expert chauffeur reassured them."It'll soon get less bouncy along here, not so many ruts or bumps."

Linda and Liz noticed they were not being thrown and tossed around as much, in the backseat. The ride leveled out and Tommy was able to make better time. He spun smoothly around switchbacks, turning this way and that, this fork here and there.

"This is amazing." Liz was in awe at his knowledgeable skill at maneuvering along this barren land. How do you know these roads so well?"

"Remember, you said you like riding on unknown dirt roads? Well, that's how I've learned the way back out to the highway, where we'll look for your car."

"We're coming up on a fork where you will spin off to go toward the best route for your exit onto a hardtop highway. I will give you the directions later."

Liz and Linda looked each other. Liz wondered, is she thinking of the same thing as I am? We're going to have to break it to Tommy that we could never find our way. I guess we will work that out later.

Linda loves driving Liz's car; it is a lot like hers, but more spaceship-like. Her Toyota, 'Yota' as she affectionately calls it, doesn't have the slanted windshield with a long dashboard reaching forward and outward. They agree Liz's looks like a spaceship.

Linda was thinking about how she guessed she wouldn't be driving Liz's car 'til they reached hardtop. She would designate herself to be the navigator, quite certain, her cohort would need one. Both were directionally challenged. It was going to be a task, to try to follow a map, handwritten on a dinner napkin.

"Here we are, out to the road, ladies. Do you think your car is to the left or the right?"

"I don't know, Linda, what do you think?" Liz remembered, Linda was right the last time they had to choose, after hiking up a steep hill from the chainsaw tree massacre.

"Let's go right, then we can work our way back toward where we found that house." She shuddered as she said that.

"Right and north, it is. Here's hoping," Tommy said. The car lept from the soft surface onto the blacktop.

"We can finally make good time. There's no traffic. They've either all moved northward or are still backed up down there because of the fires."

They were speeding along nicely until Liz yelled. "Stop!"

Both Linda and Tommy looked at her. Tommy slammed on the brakes with a lurch. "What's going on? Why'd you have me stop?"

"I wondered why it wasn't as foggy here. The back of the sign we passed said 'Billings: 400 miles'. We never passed that sign, walking, we would have been sure to see it."

Tommy did a fancy 'u-ie' and they were headed south, traveling even faster.

"Oh no, there's that house 'Gruff' let 'Big Nose' off at." Linda was shaking as she ducked down.

"We've gone too far. We'll soon be going by the...the van is still parked there at the house we rescued the girls from. Quick, Tommy, get us out of here. Hurry, turn around. Don't let them see us." Liz was shivering, now.

Tommy hurriedly backed them up quite a distance, before turning the car around. Both ladies expelled sighs of relief. Their rapid breathing and heartbeats were slowing.

Tommy was quiet while the two processed the situation. He was becoming aware of two things. His new friends had PTSD from their rescuing experience and because of that, it had not dawned on them, that their car was nowhere to be found. He braced himself for the moment of their realization of this very scary fact.