Wiley unpeeled the covers and gazed at her bare arms and legs, the sharpness of her hips outlined beneath the cotton nightgown. Sorely tempted but no fool, he lifted her by the shoulders to sitting position and gave her a moment to understand the situation. They had been planning this escape for months, and she was supposed to be awake, ready and waiting, not caught between dreams and reality.
“The time has come,” he said, hoping she would respond fully. He cocked his elbow to capture the moonlight on his wristwatch. Ten minutes after three. In one motion, she crossed her arms, grabbed the hem of her nightgown, and with a twist pulled it over her head. Naked to the waist, she flashed a wicked grin and licked her lips. “Aren't you going to wake me with a kiss?”
He leaned into her, cupped his left hand beneath her breast and stroked her hair with his right. In the pale light, her skin glowed blue, and he nearly missed her mouth when he bent to kiss her. “Time to go, Sleeping Beauty.”
“Avert thine eyes, Prince Charming.”
By the time she finished dressing, the spell had vanished, their giddiness turned to fear, not only of being caught by her father sleeping just down the hall, but a general dread of the first steps of their long-distance runaway. The rake of her nails on his back startled him, and a gasp leapt from his throat as he wheeled to face her.
“Let's go,” she whispered, and over her shoulder, she slung a macramé bag crammed with necessities. A week before, they had snuck out a suitcase of her autumn clothes, which now nestled in the trunk of the stolen car. She led the way, pushing open her bedroom door into the darkened hallway, the sound of the old man's snores penetrating the walls, and Wiley had to cover his mouth to still nervous laughter. At the top of the staircase, she stopped and tugged on Wiley's shirtsleeve. “I have to pee.” When she saw the panic in his eyes, she reassured him. “I always go just before a long trip. You don't want to have to stop before we get going. Besides, he won't wake up. Sleeps like a dead man.”
Waiting for her in the vestibule at the bottom of the staircase, he thought he heard someone knocking at the front door, the soft rapping of a child, uncertain perhaps at waking the household at that deep hour. He hooked the lace curtain with one finger and peeked through the side windows. No one. The wind. The sound of his own heart jumping against his ribs. He did not hear Erica sneak behind him, and when she touched him, he let out a short whoop. Overhead the bedsprings creaked as the body rolled over. The faint glow from the bathroom illuminated a thin patch of the hallway at the top of the stairs, and the drone from the fan underscored the silence.
“I left the light on in case you gotta go. Long trip, baby.”
He rolled his eyes.
“Seriously, if he wakes up in the middle of the night, he'll think I'm in there. And he'll just tie it in a knot and wait. Never knocks, never disturbs the queen on the throne. Then he'll get tired, and just go back to sleep. I wouldn't be surprised if he's still in bed when my mother gets back tomorrow night.” She danced a four-step jig. “Let's go already.” He stumbled over the bottom step and sprawled, nearly knocking her over.
The moon and stars lit the way around to the backyard. They climbed over both fences, and just once she looked back at the bathroom window shimmering like a lighthouse beam. She felt like an emigrant pulling away from the shore with the certain knowledge that she would not be sailing home again. Not now, not ever. For a moment, she let go of his hand, and he raced on ahead across the dewy lawn, stopping only to look back for her. Erica glanced over her shoulder, pulled by the sharp tug of all she had known, by the memories of happier days with her parents. By the pain she was about to inflict. A deep sadness nearly stopped her, and had the house shown any sign of life, she would have turned back. Wiley called softly, and her soul jumped and raced to his side. Cutting through the new bicycle path, the trail ended at Friendship Avenue where he had parked the stolen Pinto. Wiley opened the hatch to stow her knapsack, and in the back, obscured by their suitcases, sat a shotgun, a .22 rifle, and a box of shells atop an old Pittsburgh Steelers stadium blanket. Swaddling the guns, she tucked them in for the night. They were well down the road before Wiley reached under the steering wheel and eased out a Colt revolver he had secured in his waistband. He handed the gun to Erica, asking her to stow it in the glove compartment.
“What was that for?”
“In case the old man woke up.”
“What would you have done?”
“Waved it in his face. Scare him.”
“What if he refused to let me go?”
“Shoot him.”
She wondered if he was serious or impressing her through false bravado. It was already beginning to feel too late to go back, so she breathed deeply to settle any second thought. As they passed the Friendship School, she rolled down the window and shouted into the night: “Angels of Destruction!” Tipping his head through the driver's-side window, he echoed her with a curdled yowl. The headlights reflected off the lenses of a pair of round glasses, but they never saw the figure along the road. Against the school's wrought-iron fence, a lone young woman heard their cries and laughed to herself in the darkness.
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