Ohio

It was Sunday, and in a panicked fugue, I drove from California to Ohio. It took me two hours. I got on the Interstate 80 East, and before I knew it, I had passed through Chicago on a very high-rise freeway and entered Ohio. Later, I looked at a map, and many of the intervening states, including Indiana, had become one state, labeled “Western Territories.”

I pulled off the highway into a small roadside town, entered a café, and climbed a staircase to the roof. Somehow, my car got there too. A waitress found me and told me I had to stay put for a while, as great rains were approaching (and indeed, the sky was darkening). I tried to find the best place to hunker down, but multiple dark puddles and soft grassy areas made finding a safe area of the roof difficult. My car was magically moved into a parking lot (at J and 1st street) below. The waitress abandoned me there, saying she’d come get me after the storms.