Do You See Her Face? (A Jess Mariano Fanfiction)

All Norman Bates

Watching the darkness of the road ahead, Jess tried to keep his anxiety at bay. He had to remind himself that Ella was with him, they were older, and even more stable than they had been the last time they visited. He didn't need to feel nervous about the trip, but the memories of his lonely months in Venice were itching at the back of his mind. Sometimes, he would give in and scratch, even if it only made things worse. He bit at his bottom lip, eyes occasionally wandering to the sky. There were stars, lots out in the heartland of America with no light pollution. And there were hardly any other cars, as the night went from evening to late. There were no concrete plans about where to stay the night, just the next decent motel they happened upon. Each time Ella suggested stopping, Jess insisted he was fine to keep driving. He wanted to get as much done as he could manage. Truthfully, he was not looking forward to the silence of the nighttime, when Ella went to sleep and he had to be alone with thoughts of his father turning over and over in his head.

"Do you hear that?" she asked after a moment, brows furrowing. With her attention away from her work, she had begun to pick up on a faint clicking sound.

"Hear what?" Jess said, broken from his anxious reverie.

"Listen," she said, then gave a hesitant pause. Then added: "It's getting louder."

Jess did as she told him, turning the quiet music on the radio all the way down. Sure enough, beneath the rushing of the tires and the occasional screech they had come to tune out after years of riding in the death trap, there was a clicking. And it was getting louder, faster and faster. Then, Jess began to feel a drag in his speed and a resistance in his brakes.

. . .

Too tired even to work, Ella laid with her hands behind her head and stared up at the ceiling. They were somewhere in Kansas, with shitty cell reception and even shittier motels. No auto repair shop would be open until the morning, the man with the tow truck had said, but he suspected it was the engine, based on the sound they had described to him. Luckily, the man had been kind enough to drive them to the nearest 24-hour lodging. The Ambassador would sit solitary in the tow yard until the morning, when they came to bring it to whatever repair shop had the lowest prices. In all honesty, Ella was just glad they hadn't been forced to spend the night on the side of the highway. It had taken them almost a half an hour before finally getting Ella's cell in the right position to handle a call to information, to get the name of a towing company. The whole ordeal had been nerve-wracking, but she was feeling marginally better behind the safety of their closed motel room door. At the front desk there sat a disinterested woman with thick glasses which magnified her light eyes and a magazine open on the desk in front of her. She had told them a lost key was a $50 fee before sending them on their way with little more than a glance.

It wasn't a shock. Jess's car had been living on borrowed time for quite a while, anyway. Rusty and creaky and dying. Ella almost felt vindicated. Finally, her predictions had come true. She had expressed doubt when Jess had said he would be the one driving, to give her time to work and relax. He'd been encouraging her to relax more often recently, and she appreciated it. But riding passenger in the Ambassador was anything but relaxing. Ella still couldn't believe how flabbergasted Jess had looked when he had to pull over on the side of the road, unable to drive safely with the way the gas pedal wasn't cooperating. Ella felt a bit of foolish nostalgia at the thought of the vehicle. Another site of their youth bites the dust.

"I don't know," Jess sighed into his phone, running a hand down his tired face.

He'd been talking to Sasha for the last twenty minutes. It was past ten, but not the middle of the night. Jimmy, however, wasn't available to talk apparently. Sasha had been suggesting alternative plans for them to get to California, though both Jess and Ella knew there was no way they were getting down there anytime soon if the car was as broken as they suspected. Even if it wasn't completely dead (which it was), they'd have to wait for parts to come in. Who knew how long that would take for such an old make and model.