“No.”
“Bunny . . . ,” Mary started. Then she got down on her belly and lay on the floor next to Hannah. With her hand in between her cheek and the worn industrial carpet, Mary looked at her sister. Hannah was facedown, resting her forehead against the back of her hand. Mary looked at the chipped and faded pink nail polish on Hannah’s fingers. Hannah had picked out the color earlier in the summer, and Mary had painted them for her. “Why are you hiding?”
“I’m not leaving tomorrow. I don’t want to go.”
“Summer’s done,” said Mary, her voice gentle. “Everyone’s leaving here soon. Your friends are already gone. Kim and Shawn are gone. There’s no reason to stay, Bunny.”
Mary watched the side of Hannah’s face redden, watched her eyes tighten, listened to a high, steady whine come from the back of her throat. “Kim and Shawn had to go,” she said, her words an accusation. “They had to go to school.”
“Bunny, what are you saying? You want to stay here and go to school with the eight farm kids who live here all year long? You want to live in an unheated trailer this winter?”
Hannah sniffed and rubbed her eyes hard against her hand. “No,” she said, her face still down. “I want to go to a school like the one I used to go to.”
Northton, on the few occasions it came up, was never mentioned by name. “We can’t go back there,” Mary said.
Hannah finally turned to face her, the whites of her eyes shot with red, her lashes slick and moist. “Why?” she asked.
“We just can’t.”
And Hannah turned back to the floor. “I knew you’d say that.”
For a long time, the Chase sisters lay next to each other in silence, Hannah under the bed, Mary on the floor beside it. They lay there as the sun began to sink, until the light through the window was yellow gold, until their hair was wet with sweat. They lay there as all the towns and all the time and all the boys since they left Northton took their turn in Mary’s mind. They lay there until Hannah spoke, her voice weak. “I don’t want to drive anymore, Mary.”
Mary reached under the bed and put her hand on the back of Hannah’s head, feeling her damp curls, feeling the dip at the base of her skull. “I know, Bunny,” she said. “We don’t have to anymore. This’ll be the last time. I’m gonna find some place better for us. Some place where we can stay.”
The next morning, they drove for hours before they reached the interstate, through endless stretches of corn that covered the Midwest like a landlocked sea. The only signs of humanity came by way of the occasional silo or farmhouse, silhouettes against the early-morning sky. They didn’t talk during the first stretch of that drive. And as Mary let her head rest against the seatback, she thought of the infinity of miles she had traveled in that truck. The Blazer that was still running due to minor miracles and boys who knew how to rebuild engines and change timing belts. Its passenger’s-side door didn’t open anymore, rust had eaten away a small hole in the floor of the truck bed, and the exterior was spray-painted a matte black, but the Blazer still ran.
Next to Mary sat Hannah, slowly eating a donut from a box, picking off one piece at a time.
“What kind is that?” asked Mary, though she could see it was chocolate glazed. She just wanted Hannah to talk.
“Chocolate,” answered Hannah, as she stared out the window, her forehead against the glass.
“Pass me one.”
Hannah’s limbs suddenly seemed leaden, and the effort of retrieving the box of donuts from her feet, taking one out, and extending it toward Mary seemed calculated to look tremendous.
“Thanks,” replied Mary. She took a bite, a large green sign for the interstate coming into view. “The highway’s coming up soon,” she said, her mouth half-full.
“So?” grumbled Hannah.
“I just thought maybe you’d want to know where we were going.”
Arms over her chest, Hannah looked out through the passenger’s-side window. And not for the first time, Mary tried to divine her sister’s features. To determine which parts of her came from whom. She listened to the car’s tires thud against the road, waiting to see if Hannah would take the bait. Waiting to see if Hannah would ask. But Hannah remained silent. And when the on-ramp for the highway came and the Blazer curved smoothly to the right, Hannah immediately looked at Mary.
“West?” she asked.
Mary smiled and nodded. “We’re going to Utah,” said Mary. “We’re converting to Mormonism. We’ll learn how to make Jell-O molds.”
Hannah shook her head and gave an artful roll of her eyes. “Seriously, Mary.”
Mary chuckled, her hands on the wheel. “Alright, Bunny,” she said, her voice quiet. “We’re going to California.”
“California?” asked Hannah, a smile forming at the corners of her mouth. “Where in California?”
“A town up north. Right on the ocean. There’s a famous hotel there.”
“And we’re going to stay there?” Hannah asked, her words a test.
Mary nodded. “Yeah, Bunny. We are.”
“And I’m going to go to school.”
“You’re going to go to school.” Mary felt the rhythmic bumps of the road underneath her tires. “But you know, since you haven’t been in a while, you have to start over again in kindergarten.”
“Shut up, Mare,” said Hannah, with her arms crossed over her chest, but the smile was still on her face. Throughout all of their travels, the Chase girls had never been to California. Mary extended her arm out to her sister who knew nothing so well as the curve of Mary’s side. And after a reluctant moment, Hannah folded into it, resting her head on Mary’s shoulder.
THE GIRLS DROVE ALL DAY UNTIL the land started to hint at the massive mountains that broke out of the earth in the distance, hiding behind the cloak of cloud and sky. They ate donuts and unwrapped American cheese singles, sandwiching them between slices of white bread. When they had to go to the bathroom, they’d pull off to the side and squat next to the Blazer with the door open.
“Shit,” Mary said, as she peered down at the slick red-brown oval staining the lavender cotton of her panties. She hung on to the door handle with one hand for balance.
“What’s wrong?” Hannah asked.
“Pass me down my purse.”
Hannah reached for the beat-up bronzed leather bag that Mary had carried forever. Since Miami. Since before. “What’s wrong?”
“I got my period.”