mandapie

This place is godawful. This is probably one of the best stories you will ever read, and it’s not even the whole thing, just the part involving Mt. Vernon. Which is, incidentally, the biggest part.
One day over the summer of 2006, my friend wanted to drive from our homes in Wheeling, Illinois (suburb of Chicago) all the way through the state of Illinois to Sikeston, Missouri. On the way there, we stopped at Mount Vernon for some gas. It was really sourthern. There was fried chicken next to the register. So, my friend and I left the car and when I was on the toilet I realized something horrible: the keys are locked in the car. So. I come back and she says “okay let’s go!” I say…”we can’t.” “What do you mean?” “Keys are in the car.” There they were, in the cupholder. I’m hyperventillating because we are over 300 miles away from home in a foreign city we’ve never heard of. As I am sipping my frozen coffee and struggling for air, I at least remark “hey this will be a good story later on, right? Otherwise it would have been a smooth trip!”

So we got a gas station attendant to help…with a coat wire (Pronounced “cohht-wahhhr). He noticed my locks are “the easy locks” and that he was a car thief when he was younger. AWESOME. He spent 45 minutes sweating on my car and still no luck. Then my buddy remembered she has Triple A and is a Gold Member. Wait, it gets better. So we’re standing outside waiting for the tow truck or whatever, and we’re talking and it starts to get darker. And darker. I remark, “oh damn the sky is getting pretty dark. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if it started to downpour?!” “Oh haha that would be so funny!!!” So we keep talking and I say again…”you know. It’s getting darker as we’re talking. Oh wow. Those clouds look like tornado clouds. NAHH!”
Well.
It starts to POUR. I’ve never seen rain this hard in my LIFE. You know those natural disaster videos on TV from Hawaii? IT WAS EXACTLY LIKE THAT. I was actually starting to blow away and I’m not exactly 90 pounds. Then we hear on the PA…”girls at pump 11, you’re gonna have to come on inside. There’s a tornado in the area.”
Yep.
We look at each other and run inside. There’s a TV on showing the weather. The tow truck pulls up and we go back outside. The guy, a 17-year old who runs the tow truck business with his mom. He tries to open the door but the rain is too hard and FINALLY, after my friend and I are SOAKED, tells us to get in his truck. We jump in and notice that the streets are DEAD. There was a county order for everyone to clear the roads. The rain is so hard we could barely see the other gas station sign that was like 50 feet away.

Things are blowing everywhere and the tow truck is swaying and we’re talking to our 17-year old southern stud muffin. Apparently, it happens all the time there. Sweet. His mom called and said the house basically blew down and he asked if his “race car was alright.”
The rain died down and we begged him to go out and he ran back in and out about seven times. I was ready to flash him just so we could get the fuck out of there. Finally it opened and I go in my car. A line had built up behind us and some lady tells me I’m “holding up the line.” After this episode, I pretty much went off on her.

Then we got on the highway, I ripped out a cigarette and called my boyfriend and told all. As we drive, we find that we are driving through more of the storm. Same hard rain, but I’m driving 90 miles an hour. With a cig, texting and changing the music. My friend yells at me stop texting…and a tire flies in front of our car. Alright, I’ll stop texting.
More to this story, of course, but that’s about all that happened in Mount Vernon.

I go to college at William Rainey Harper College in Palatine!