28. Wait... you just said WHAT to me (it was so shocking what they said)?

I was shocked when I heard the words that they said....

I had the worst nightmare of my life but I don't remember what it was. It was something like I accidentally got involved with some sort of cover up of a death or something and there was like this plumber guy but yeah I don't remember. I got jostled awake by a speed bump and realized that we didn't even leave the neighborhood yet. In one way I was like super greatful for this, because it meant that we had like the whole road trip left, and I didn't sleep through it. In another way though, I was really starting to worry about what would happen if I didn't get some sleep. This was the most tired I have been since I had to write a 5 page essay in one night in high school, and after I did that, I totalled my best friend's car when I was driving her to get cigarettes from her older cool friend because she was too drunk to drive. I had to tell the police that a deer ran out in front of the car. What would happen this time?

Dharmit had already put on the sickest pod cast I ever heard. It was by this podcast company called NPR and they started it out by basically confronting their very own recording company by saying that they were recording on top of a native land. I know that is the most up to date right thing to say when you got the chance to like, acknowledge it to a room, so I knew that Dharmit also liked to know about how to keep up to date with saying the right thing and having the opinions that will age well and also are morally correct.

"Wow, it's so amazing that they just said that," I said, yawning.

Ashley was sitting in the other back seat and looked over at me from her phone. She said "Someone's sleepy!"

I said, "Yeah haha, I guess we actually didn't make it that far out, I totally just fell asleep so hardcore."

Dharmit said, "You guys are so lucky I'm you're friend right now. Tesla is the number one car in the world and you are driving in one right now because of me."

I thought that was a little conceited but also so true, like you go Dharmit, it is so sick you have this Telsa, even though I would never want one, because actually electric cars is worse for the environment because of lithium.

"I am just joking come on guys," said Dharmit, but he didn't sound like he was joking.

Phillip said, "It's gonna be a pain to get parking now. We're like two hours late, and I really wanted to try this hotpot place in Eugene before the debate. This kinda sucks." He laughed a little afterwars and rolled his window all the way down. It was so loud outside!

Dharmit screamed, "Don't worry. I will get the good parking because of the electric charger." Then he used his little control system to roll up Phillip's window without saying anything. Phillip looked at him kind of annoyed but didn't say anything.

Dharmit was driving SO fast. "Dharmit, you are so good at driving, we're going to get there so fast!"

We were cruising through all the city streets and hitting the highway. I started googling things about the law on my new phone, because I am actually just super interested in it, like maybe I will actually pursue becoming a lawyer interested. One of the things I was googling was about if I or I guess really any person could go to jail for working in a coffee shop that your friends vandalize and destroy with a bunch of homeless guys, but there was not a lot of hits for that on my google search. I did hear that google was like surpressing controversial search results though so maybe that's why I couldn't find anything.

I went to reddit news and saw that the LaQuan Don Darius news article was EVERYWHERE. They had this super grainy picture of him in the fat suit trying to break into the library that was in like every article. On one site I saw that there was this little bit of pink hair in the bottom right of the image and I realized that it was probably taken with Gum drops selfie stick. I was clicking on like every possible article and every link and there was all of these comments arguing about how if he should get prosecuted for doing whiteface or just maybe not allowed to be the president, however, I also agree that whiteface is not a thing like Don Lemon said at this time.

One article on this super jenky site that basically looked fake it looked so crappy made my heart basically stop. It was this site called the daily wires and I could tell right away that it was not only dangerous, but dangerous and racist. It had this article titled "New activism and why Whiteface actually IS a thing". Instead of that picture of LaQuan Don Darius trying to bust into the library, they had a selfie Gumdrop took while she was in blackface and she was crying and her african american wig was falling off. But why my heart stopped was not because they were DEFINITELY going to mischaracterize her scheme, and that they did a race switch, her and LaQuan, basically to save his life from police violence, I saw that I was in the back of that selfie!!! It was a little tiny picture of me, but I could make out those fancy jeans I got from the thrift store that were actually like 300 dollar jeans and also my hair looked very good that day, and besides all that, yeah, I was 100% sure it was me. I quickly turned off my new phone because I also know that google tracks your emotion reaction to reading the news article and I didn't want it to keep redirecting me to false misinformation websites like the Daily Wire.

I was starting to think I was actually going to get arrested now. I was going to need to get one of my friends to read the article for me and tell me what it said, someone who I wasn't afraid of getting their phone potentially infected with a republican virus.

"I'm just going to stop here for coffee," said Dharmit super suddenly, basically SLAMMING on the breaks of his Tesla car. Didn't he know that there were other people in the car? The thought that maybe he could be one of those people who didn't have a brain's mind was terrifying to me all of the sudden.

"Easy there Dharmit!" said Phillip laughing, and he actually sounded like he thought it was funny too. There was a homeless guy on the highway exit who was laying down on a big bed comforter and smoking a bong rip, and he had a sign leaned up against him that said "please give me weed" and a silly smily face next to it.

We went off the high way and took like three turns and we pulled up at a little espresso stand called Ladybug Espresso. It was weirdly like the only thing on this road and the rest of it was just super tall trees. The road was just so straight and it disappeared into mist.

Dharmit said, "My friend he just recommended me to this coffee shop, he said they make like the best coffee."

"Wow that's so cool, what are they known for?" I asked, because I know so much about coffee now I can actually have a super deep conversation about that.

"Well you know they have like the regular kinds, but just really good." The person in front of us pulled out super fast and like super sketchy, kicking rocks up everywhere. It was some kind of jeep but it sounded like way louder than any jeep I ever heard. I don't know why but I was getting a bad feeling about this place.

"Dharmit, are you serious? You know this is like a nudie coffee shop right?" Ashley asked and she sounded confused.

We pulled up to the window and there was this girl in a wig who was wearing basically nothing and a backwards hat and so much make up that she did so well. It was like so empowering for her to be able to sell coffee when she was naked and also a sign that actually yeah, society IS moving in the right direction, so I was so psyched to see that.

I asked Ashley to roll down her window so I could say that to her, because Ashley was on the seat on the drive through side. I started yelling out the window: "It is so awesome that you are doing this like SOO yas queen!!!" but before I could keep going I noticed that the girl looked like she just saw a ghoul or some type of scary ghost of her own. Phillip looked SO concerned, like a typically over protective male.

"That guy tried to rob me can you please call the police? He tried to kidnap me!!" The girl screamed and was kind of crying.

Then I noticed that Dharmit was kind of just frozen awkwardly staring between her and the menu, and then he just suddenly accelerated and drove out of there like as fast as the jeep guy did!

"What the fuck Dharmit??" asked Phillip, "I'm calling the cops." and Phillip made a call in that the girl almost got kidnapped or whatever, but I personally think she was fine because she was clearly a Gumdrop tier bad bitch for selling coffee while she was naked.

Dharmit just muttered something about "should not be dressed like that" and resumed the directions to Eugene on the map.

Ashley looked at me like with huge eyes doing a sort of "what the heck just happened" face. This was not my usual friend group. If I was with my real friends, with my real ones, we would HUNT down that jeep that harassed this naked coffee girl and tie them up to a tree. You NEVER be mean to girls, and you also never be mean to children or trans (or trans children).

We drove in silence for a while, Ashley started texting me though. Dharmit and Phillip were talking about some computer programming thing which was like not that interesting to me, and he had this whole list of NPR podcasts that seemed to just be about BIPOC. This was pretty chill but even I sort of felt like they were kind of fake because they sounded like they were obsessed with LGBTQBIPOCA+ people in like some weird almost gross way, like they were obsessed with gay people, not interested in them, if that makes sense. Where was chinese in LGBTQBIPOCA+? Where will I make my cake and eat it too in this NPR world?

Ashley was asking me cool questions like where am I from, what do I do, blah blah blah. It was fun and it was like a big secret that we were texting in the back. She asked me if I ever did rock climbing and I was like yeah, I did almost every hike, and she said wow that's so cool, so I knew I was in. Then she asked me about if I had a tent, and she said don't worry, Phillip and I have a three person tent, which is also so chill and cool, so I can just stay in that with them obviously.

We had already driven so much further than I ever had in my life and it was starting to look so crazy outside. I could not even see the city any more and I couldn't see the ocean. I did grow up kind of in the country though so it wasn't that scary, but wow I don't even know if there was a house out here. I was looking out over the fields and it was so open and wide that I couldn't even think of anything to imagine.

A podcast just came on that was about two Sri Lankan LGBTQIABIPOC+ that was also NPR. They were going on and on about how it was so amazing that they were trans and LGBTQIABIPOC+ and also that they work at NPR.

I was trying to be a good sport so I said, "Wow, this is so interesting."

Dharmit said, "You know, Sri Lankans are so anti trans that it is so amazing for them to come to the US and basically making more trans people!"

I said, "Well you know that in the US, um, that also we have trans, and um it's actually all races haha." I was feeling like arguing for some reason, suddenly, but I didn't even know what about.

"That is easy for you to say! You are white," said Dharmit.

"Wow haha, actually I'm like, half Chinese, but okay," I said, and I just started googling more about if I was going to get arrested.

I'm not sure if this was a very fun road trip, after all.

"Okay we are very close to Eugene but I need to charge otherwise we will not make it."

"What like your phone?" I said.

"I need to charge the car we are driving in to drive us further to the Eugene."

"Oh, wow! That's so cool that your car is like a cell phone!" I said, and in my mind, I rolled my eyes.

We were in the middle of no where. I have never seen such a desolate place that just looked racist like this. It was something about the way the fields were so big and the houses were so far apart. I saw a house with 3 giant trucks. Why do you need 3 trucks?

This is a place where people like me get killed.

We pulled into this little 3 charger charging station next to an empty gas station with all the lights off. Dharmit got out and started smoking a cigar while he plugged the charger into the car.