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Turn | Mar 08 2003

A young couple are hitch-hiking cross-country and are picked up by a man in blue car. The man doesn’t realize this, but the couple are in a fight. In fact they’ve been in a fight for nearly two days and have barely spoken in that time.

The woman takes the passenger seat, the one next to the driver, while her boyfriend sits behind her. This is an arrangement they have: she always sits in the passenger seat because she’s better at talking with people.

In a short time it becomes clear that the driver is insane. He keeps mentioning a letter he’s received from President Carter. This letter, he says, is a thank-you for certain work he recently performed for the president. He explains that unfortunately he cannot reveal the exact nature of this work, for reasons that he cannot be reveal.

I would have to kill you if I told you, he says.

In that case I’d prefer you didn’t tell me, says the woman.

This is meant as a joke of course, but the driver fails to get it. Instead he’s offended.

You don’t believe me, he says. You don’t believe that the president wrote to me.

No, of course I believe you, says the woman. Why would I doubt you?

I have the letter in the glove compartment, says the driver. If you don’t believe me, I can stop the car and show it to you.

No, that won’t be necessary, says the woman. Honesty, I believe you, I really do.

The driver says nothing, and nothing gets said for a long time, and then, abruptly, he turns off the highway.

The man in the back is the first to speak. Where are we going? he says. Why are we turning here?

The driver doesn’t answer and just keeps driving, his eyes locked on the road before him. A few minutes pass before he makes a second turn, this time down a dirt road.

I don’t think we want to go this way, says the man in the back.

No, says the woman, this doesn’t look right to me.

Well, it is right, says the driver, so you two just shut up.

At this the man in the back reaches around the right side of his girlfriend’s seat and touches her flank. She brings her hand to his, and they hold hands like this, in secret. It’s the first time they’ve touched in two days.