A Deadly Wandering

Reggie coaches his old high school’s sophomore basketball team. He enjoys it and it helps him deal with grief. He’s also dating a girl named Trisha, a friend of his ex-girlfriend. His overriding goal is still to go on a Mormon mission.

In the highway patrol office, Rindlisbacher meets with officers Tony Hudson and Scott Singleton, new on the force. Rindlisbacher tells Singleton Reggie’s story and gives him the phone records. Singleton finds a series of texts sent from Reggie’s phone at the moment of the accident.

In March 2007, a young man runs a red light because he is texting and driving and kills 17-year-old Lauren Mulkey.

In 2012, Dr. Atchley is working in the field of neuroeconomics, which determines the value of behavior based on monetary measures. He discovers that the value of a text drops sharply after a very short period of time—texts rely on immediate reception and response. However, Atchley also discovers marked differences between a young person’s relationship with texting and an alcoholic’s relationship with booze: Unlike addicts, texters are willing to wait to receive a text. Texting appears to be a compulsion rather than an addiction.

In one of Dr. Atchley experiments, a young woman named Maggie sits at a driving simulator at the University of Kansas lab.