I drove more than 100 miles that day in the rain and the last five were the most soul-sucking as I was stuck in a long line of cars like a vehicular centipede and couldn’t pass any of them and the speed limit was 35 and I wanted to drive 65 because it had been a shit day and I just wanted to get home and relax in my recliner with my dog but everyone was going at a speed that would make a snail applaud and the tension tightened my neck muscles and sure the Slayer song probably wasn’t helping but finally my turn came up so I wheeled my Mustang around that corner like a molten blade through a block of cheese and the road I lived on came up and I roared to the left down that road and the G-forces pressed me into my leather seat and I screeched to the right into my driveway and parked at the top so I could get my mail and I exited my metal equine and suddenly behind me was an unmarked cop car with lights going and I was like fuuuuck and the cop got out and asked why I was going so fast on the road I lived on and I gave him my best defeatist look which didn’t afford much effort and I told him Because I Live Here and I’m Tired and he was like Yeah I Get It and verbalized a warning as he slinked away.
Laura Shell quit her day job in August of 2023 to become a full-time writer. She has been published in numerous online journals, and her first anthology of paranormal stories, titled The Canine Collection, was just released. She’s currently working on her second anthology. If she isn’t writing or reading or submitting short fiction, she’s slinging snarky jabs at her husband of 35 years.