Time Traveller Girl

I took it upon myself to help my friend Rachel, who required a travel buddy to visit her family in Ohio. The morning after we drove into their driveway from the airport, I was roused by the smell of powdered sugar, French toast and maple syrup.
We were preparing for a 3 hour car journey to Columbus. My grandparents used to live there in the ‘60’s and I had contacted their old neighbours who would be letting Rachel and I stay for a few days: her cousin, Natalie, had a job interview in Kentucky and she agreed to drop us off on the way.

‘Hey, my grandma is visiting Columbus anyway! So why not?’ She grinned.
Natalie’s fiancé, Evan, was driving and soon Rachel and I piled into the backseat, pushing our bags into the trunk.

‘Wait up,’ Grandma Judy appeared from the porch, carrying a laundry basket overfilling with towels. Too busy staring at her strange cargo, I hadn’t noticed her little dog, wearing a stars and stripes bandana, jump onto my lap and I screeched with surprise. Judy threw her head back, laughing. ‘Don’t you worry about Tucker,’ she cooed, sliding into the car, squeezing me into the middle seat. Natalie grabbed the laundry basket and placed it between her feet in the front.

Was it me or was the basket…chirping? I craned my head and noticed the colourful washing line clips holding the top towel over the basket. Through the small holes I spied a tiny emerald green parakeet peering out from his stronghold.
‘I couldn’t leave my precious Sophie behind!’ Judy said, whipping out her overly large sunglasses.
Two hours down Route 71 with the Superman soundtrack blasting out of Evan’s stereo, the bird squawked like a maniac but at least the dog stayed mostly still on Judy’s lap (though he tended to flex his nails into my bare legs once in a while).
We were reaching the outskirts of Columbus when Evan slowed the car, hitting traffic into the city. Judy yawned and instructed Natalie to release Sophie from the confines of the laundry basket. Natalie folded back the towel and the little bird flew up onto Judy’s outstretched finger.
Evan didn’t seem at all phased by this and continued to hum happily to the Spiderman soundtrack that had just started to play.
The car moved on slowly and gathered speed – passing an upturned truck and two police cars on the side of the road.
We turned into a car park just off the interstate where we agreed to meet my hosts but I had never met them before, and this was an unfamiliar city. I wonder how this is going to turn out…