Before my best friend drove us from her house to a homecoming party one night when we were in high school, her dad handed us a flashlight.
“You might need it,” he said.
We didn’t believe him.
But flashlight in hand, we hit the road.
We knew we were close to the home of the classmate whose family hosted the annual party when we turned onto a road that had no street lights. We arrived at a fork.
“Left or right?”
“Which one’s the driveway?”
“I have no idea.”
We picked left.
Through trees, we saw a bonfire sparkle from afar and the lights on the house. But the road we chose changed directions. My best friend stopped the car, in the middle of a pitch black patch of downhill property.
“How the heck do we get to the house?” she asked. We cracked up. “Do you have the flashlight?”
“I do,” I said, and handed it to her.
She flipped it on and shined it out the window. The beam of light traveled across trees, until it hit a sign right next to the car:
We in fact were not in our classmate’s driveway.
We were on her boat ramp.
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This post is part of a series of true stories, called “True Story.” Click here to read all the posts in the series.