Mary gathered up the rest of Hannah’s things and put them in her backpack. Then, resting her hand on Hannah’s back, she guided her toward the door. Mary pushed it open and a burst of cold rushed in. Hannah paused and turned to look behind her. “Bye, Tammy!” she called to the woman, who was now zipping her coat.
The woman smiled and offered her own farewell. “Bye, Hannah!” Then she looked at Mary. Neither Hannah’s teacher nor the women who cared for her after school knew quite what to make of Mary. “Merry Christmas,” she said, with a polite nod.
Mary found a smile. “Merry Christmas.”
Walking back down the concrete path to the parking lot, Mary took Hannah’s hand. “Did you have fun at work today?” Hannah asked.
Mary chuckled. “Sure, Bunny,” she said. “I had fun.” Without a high school diploma, Mary’s job prospects were limited, but she had been able to secure a position working at the front desk of a very nice hotel in town, the sort populated by wealthy older couples and soon-to-be-divorced businessmen. “Lots of people checked in. Everyone’s visiting family for Christmas.”
It would be the Chase girls’ first holiday in their new apartment, which was on the bottom floor of an old white house that had been converted into a handful of small dwellings. It was on the outskirts of town on a street called Boosk Avenue, which was inhabited mostly by immigrants from Mexico. Mary soon found out that the residents of the town called the people who lived there Booskers, and she would occasionally hear the name shouted out of the window of a passing car at one of the dark-skinned men with grass-stained sneakers or their wives who worked as nannies. Mary looked at Hannah’s too-small purple coat and wondered if she could have made more of their stay with the Dackards. If she could have been smarter.
At the hotel, Mary was able to make extra money the way she had become accustomed to making extra money. By being observant. By being fearless and fast, by relieving gentlemen of their wallets, by slipping into cars, hotel rooms, and homes to see what she could find. And so she and Hannah had gotten by, living frugally and nimbly, as they had during those months on the road. But what had seemed like a choice on the road now felt like a necessity. And throughout their first fall, Mary felt tense and caged by the confines of a place. She would often lie in bed at night with Hannah by her side and imagine waking her sister up and getting her in the car and driving until they no longer knew where they were or where they had come from. But she knew that Hannah needed a different sort of life. They weren’t the same, the Chase girls. They shared Diane’s blood, but there was more to their making. And on those nights when Mary felt like an animal gnawing at its tether, she would close her eyes and wait for the feeling to come, that feeling of falling. That feeling of no longer belonging to the earth. Only then could she sleep.
Putting the shifter into reverse, Mary backed the Blazer up, cutting the wheel sharply. “Hey, Bunny,” she said, nodding toward the glove compartment. “Look in there. I got something for you.”
Hannah pressed a button and the glove compartment fell open. With a gasp, she said, “Oh, my gosh.” She reached in and pulled out a pair of furry white earmuffs, then brought them to her chest and stroked them as she looked at Mary. “They’re so soft,” she said, her voice high and light.
Mary shifted into drive, then straightened the wheel out, her smile full and pure. “Try them on,” she urged. Hannah pulled them apart and placed them on her head, mussing her hair as she did so.
Mary chuckled. “You look so pretty, Bunny,” she said, as Hannah pulled down her visor and tried to make out her reflection in the dim light.
As they came to a stop sign, Mary said, “What do you say we go for a little drive before going home?” Mary flipped on the turn signal and made a left out of the parking lot, away from their own home toward Northton Avenue.
The girls were both quiet as they drove, tired from their days and content to look at the lovely homes around them, with their garland-wrapped columns and shiny black doors. Then, without a word, Mary turned onto a side street and quickly looped around, putting the truck in park. They were only two blocks away from the stone house that they had driven by on their very first day in town.
Mary looked at Hannah. “I’m just going to check on something, Bunny.” Then she pulled the handle of her door, pushed it open, and stepped out.
Walking around the front of the truck, Mary crouched next to the Blazer’s rear right wheel, then twisted the gold cap on the tire’s valve until it came off. Placing it between her teeth, she pulled a screwdriver from her pocket and stuck it into the open shaft, letting the air from the tire rush out. As she listened to the hiss of the release, she looked up to see Hannah staring out the window, the tip of her nose against the glass, fog from her breath forming a cloud beneath her nose.
“How’re you doing, Bunny?” she asked.
“Good,” answered Hannah.
“I’m almost done, okay?”
“Okay.”
When the tire started to compress under the weight of the car, Mary put the screwdriver back into her pocket, took the cap from her mouth, and screwed it back into place. Then going around the front of the truck, she opened the driver’s-side door and got back in.
“So you like your earmuffs?” she asked.
Hannah nodded, bringing her hands up to stroke them.
“Good,” said Mary, remembering the little girl who had left them behind when her grandparents had brought her for tea at the hotel. They had come back looking for them, but by then, they were already tucked deep inside Mary’s bag. I’m so sorry; we haven’t seen them, she had said. But if you’d like to leave your number, we can certainly call you if they turn up.
Mary put her foot on the gas and the Blazer lurched forward, bucking unevenly due to the deflated tire.
“The truck feels weird,” said Hannah.
“I know,” said Mary, her gaze focused forward. “It’s going to.”
They drove a block in silence as Hannah’s small brow tensed, feeling the bumps and jerks from the ride. When Mary came to a stop sign, she turned onto the wide and lovely Northton Avenue, and almost immediately, the stone house came into view, glowing and warm and looking like it had been waiting for them. Mary took her foot off of the gas and let the Blazer coast into the driveway, then she flipped on the truck’s hazard lights and looked at the house. In the front window, she could see a tall tree strung with white lights and the movement of figures inside. Ahead of her in the driveway were cars that hadn’t been there during her many previous drives past the house. And Mary felt her heart begin to thump wildly, as if operating independently from her mind, as if answering to a different master.