Maxwell started to whine, growing restless in the parked car, and Cap joined in, at a higher pitch, his annoyance even greater than his brother’s. Izzy felt something hazy grow in her brain; her tongue felt fat in her mouth. Suddenly, she felt so far away from her past life, as if it had all happened to someone else, as if she had arrived at the complex with Cap in her arms and no history to speak of.
But, strangely enough, she also felt disconnected from the Infinite Family. Here in her car, back in Coalfield, the complex felt like it was a million miles away and there was nothing that connected her to it. In this moment, who knew how long it would last, she was entirely free of her past, present, and future. It was just her, Izzy, in space, entirely at peace. And then she looked in the rearview mirror and saw Cap and Maxwell. She had the two of them, her two sons. She could go anywhere, do anything, and no one would ever know. No one would ever look for them, not her father, not Dr. Grind, no one.
She started the car, backed out of the parking lot, and got back on the highway. She was driving south, away from Coalfield, but also away from the complex. She would head south, as far down the coast as she could go, until she hit Key West. She would rent an apartment and get a job waitressing or tending a barbecue pit. She accelerated, the car now going eighty miles per hour in a fifty-five-mile zone. She was putting miles between her and the entirety of her life up to that point. The boys had fallen asleep in the back. Kenny and Carmen would not begrudge her having taken Maxwell with her. They still had eight other children to love. Dr. Grind would not begrudge her disappearance. He still had so many people to take care of. It would not matter. The project had to anticipate some measure of loss during the duration of the study. They would let her go.
She was breathing so rapidly, it felt like she was sprinting, as if she was moving the car forward by her own sheer force of will. Forty minutes later, she was in Georgia. No one had called her. No one knew where she was. She could not believe she was doing this. She reached across to her purse in the passenger seat and took out her wallet. She had eighty dollars. If she stopped at an ATM soon enough, she could probably take out a few hundred more without anyone knowing. She would be the best mother. She would love Maxwell and Cap as much as everyone else in the project combined. It could work, she kept reassuring herself. It would work.
And then Cap started to cry, fussing and fidgety in the car seat. He kept grunting, trying to get Izzy’s attention. “It’s okay, honey,” she said. “It’s okay.”
Then Maxwell awoke from his nap and began to fuss. “Izzy,” they both said. “Izzy!”
Izzy put her foot on the brake, slowed the car down, and pulled onto the shoulder of the road. A truck passed by, shaking the car. She took off her seat belt and turned toward the two boys. They held out their hands for her. She climbed into the backseat, barely enough space for her to fit between the two car seats. She unbuckled them, pulled them into her lap. She hugged them, whispering to them sounds that were not words, just musical notes to calm them. They held tightly to her.
She could not do it. If they had slept the entire way, maybe she could have managed it. The faster she ran from her past and present toward a new future, the present was always right there, always on top of her. There was no way she could separate the three of them from the larger family; the lack would be too intense. She did not know where she was, on a road in Georgia, her two boys in her arms. She slowly placed them back in their car seats. She climbed into the driver’s seat and started the car. Temporary insanity. That’s all it was. She would never mention it. No one would ever know.
She turned the car around and started back for home, for the complex. She sang “The Wheels on the Bus” to Cap and Maxwell and by the time the doors on the bus went open and shut, they were quiet and happy once again and she felt sure of her decision.
Back at the complex, the family getting the children ready for bed, Izzy kissed Maxwell and Cap and signed herself back in before she started to walk back to her own house. Dr. Grind appeared and held out a Tupperware container.
“We had Nicole’s peanut butter and dark chocolate pie for dessert tonight,” he said. “I know that’s your favorite, so I saved a piece for you.”
Izzy smiled and took the offering with great pleasure. She hugged him quickly and then walked back toward her house.
“Everything went okay on your trip?” he called after her.
“Great,” she said. “As great as I could have asked for.”
“Glad to hear it,” Dr. Grind replied.
In her house, Izzy sat on the floor of the kitchen and ate the pie in three huge, quick bites. It was so delicious it left her momentarily dizzy. She sat on the floor and replayed the events of the day in her head. She thought of Mr. Tannehill. She thought of her father standing behind the counter of the market. She thought of that race to the ocean, nothing around to stop her but her own heart. And she thought of Dr. Grind, holding that piece of pie, offering it to her like a bouquet of flowers. She thought of Cap and Maxwell, now probably lying in their own beds. She finally stood up, washed the Tupperware container and the fork, and went into her bedroom.