Red bands of light were stretching across the horizon while, at their back, the sky had darkened to a starry black. He had thought Ellie was sleeping all this time, but when he looked at her, he could see that her eyes were halfway open as she reclined in the passenger seat. She watched the scenery without really seeing anything, blinking languidly every once in a while like someone under the influence of a strong sedative.
She had the shoe box in her lap, and it struck him as peculiar that she had insisted on taking it into the sandwich shop with her and refusing to leave it behind. As if she had known they’d never return to the Olds. The thought caused a chill to ripple through him.
Perhaps sensing his eyes on her, Ellie rolled her head so that she faced him. Her skin looked mottled and fluid in the dusky light. For an instant, she looked so adult—so much like Kathy—that David felt a sudden ache in the center of his chest.
“What would those cops have done if they’d caught us back there?” she asked. Her voice was just barely above a whisper.
“They would have taken us into custody.”
“They would have taken me away from you,” she said.
“They would have tried.”
“They would have hurt you to get to me,” she said. It was Kathy talking now: Ellie’s face looked so different in the dark.
“I’m not sure the local police know exactly how important you are,” he said.
Ellie turned her head away from him.
Western Kansas had given way to the lush switchbacks of Colorado. The trees that flanked the highway were enormous black pikes driven into the earth. At the horizon, the sky continued to darken as the sun settled beyond the western hills. They were roughly two hours from Funluck Park, according to the road map he’d found in the glove compartment and the calculations he’d worked out in his head.
“How exactly did those doctors kill Mom?” she asked, still not looking at him.
“It’s complicated,” he said.
“Explain it to me.”
“I’m not sure if it’s the best thing for you to know, honey. You don’t need to think of your mom that way.”
“I want to know.”
He considered this. Finally, he said, “Mom was okay at first. The doctors were just drawing blood. But then Mom started to get worried that she might get sick. She stopped eating and grew weaker. And the doctors, they just kept taking more blood.”
“Why did you let them?”
It was like an arrow thwacking into the center of his chest. When he opened his mouth, he found it difficult to speak at first. He cleared his throat and said, “Your mother didn’t want to leave at first. She was afraid of getting sick if she left the hospital.”
This was close enough to the truth that he didn’t feel like he was telling a lie, although it wasn’t the complete truth. Ellie didn’t need to hear the complete truth.
“In the end, she’d just grown too weak. Her body just gave out.”
Enough silence passed between them that he thought he’d answered all Ellie’s questions. But then she said, “Would I die like Mom if we gave up and went back home? If they took me to some hospital to study me and take my blood?”
“You don’t have to worry about that.”
“I’m just asking a question. Would I die, too?”
He slammed a palm down on the steering wheel. “I don’t know, El! I can’t predict the goddamn future. I’m just trying my best to keep them away from you.”
“It makes me feel sick,” she said. “It makes me feel like what we’re doing is wrong. It makes us no different from those people back in Kentucky. Those people with the skull . . .”
“I told you already, it’s not the same thing.”
“Yes, it is. You can’t even tell me why it’s not.”
“Because we’re not actively hurting anyone. Those people, they were going to shoot us, kill us. Don’t you see?”
“You’ve got a gun right now. You’d shoot somebody, too, if they tried to get me. How is that different?”
“I’m trying to protect you.”
“But if I could help all those people who are sick—”
“Enough!” he shouted at her. “Okay? Enough. I’m your goddamn father and you’ll do what I tell you.”