She stayed up all night tallying what she’d spent on me that year alone. Food, clothes, school supplies, gas. It was only April, but already my debt was unimaginable. She stuck it to the bathroom door so I’d see it every day, so I’d watch that number grow. I’d face it in the mornings and imagine what I’d owe by the time I turned eighteen. By the time I died. An unceasing mounting of cost, a quantitative measure of the thing I already knew could never be paid off. I tried to use the bathroom at school when I could, to avoid seeing it. I tried to eat less, to need less, to be less. I didn’t like that school. The kids made fun of me for my clothes and for my silence.
When the bullying got real bad, they called my mom in for a meeting with some of the other parents. I sat in the hall outside, alone. All the other kids had after-school activities, sports or drama club or friends’ houses to go to. So when my mom tore into those other parents like she was tempted to let go of the chain soldered to her heart, I was the only one who heard it.
“My daughter,” she spat, and it must have been a shout because her words were fierce and clear while the others’ responses were unintelligible, “is worth more than every other child in this school combined. I’ve sacrificed everything for her. Do you even know what sacrifice is? Do you really want to bring this fight to me? Do you really want to find out how hard I will come for you?”
Alone in the hall, I realized something. The same debt that loomed over me, that threatened to topple over and crush me, was also proof that my mom loved me. That she would give so much for me, that was something precious. That was a gift other children lived without and would never understand.
The next morning, there was no tally sheet on the bathroom door. We never talked about it again, but I remembered. Both things: the debt and its secret meaning.
I stay perched behind the truck stop, cinder blocks digging into my tailbone, and wait. Hunger rattles my soft palate. The 18-wheelers never seem to park outside the safety of the gas pumps and their CCTV.
Twenty minutes. Thirty. My phone’s dying. Time’s ticking.
Headlights cut through the early-morning emptiness. It’s a truck, the same model as Uncle Bill’s but silver instead of black. Maybe that’s a sign. The driver’s a younger guy, shaved head under a baseball cap and a T-shirt with angel wings on the shoulders. He’s close enough to call out to. My throat feels like it’s filled with gravel. Come on, say something. Get him over here. Say my engine’s dead, that’ll get him to move his car out of the way of the security cameras. And then—
All my joints shudder. My mind’s suddenly plastered with an image of Veer, jacket stripped off to reveal her folded-in shoulders, bending over my car. Red in one hand, black in the other.
I can’t force words through the rockslide in my throat, but I jerk my hand up in an impression of a wave. His attention twitches toward me at the same moment that my phone buzzes. A long, insistent purr, like it’s got something special to tell me.
I glance down. It’s a Reddit notification.
I forget the guy and snatch up my phone. Deep breath. Maybe they don’t know anything. Maybe they’ve only written back to tell me to fuck off.
Hey, it reads.I can’t find the documentation anymore but I think it was a couple miles up Alamo Road or maybe Mormon Well, past the Corn Creek visitor center but before you fully get into the mountains. If you’re not local, I can drive out and take some pics?
Relief soaks through the rocks in my mouth. That’s only a few miles away.
A second message blinks.Are you okay? Why is it urgent?
It’s urgent because the sky is already threatening to fade from blue black to watery yellow. It’s urgent because my veins are howling and I can either feed myself or find my mom before the sun comes up and the flayed man disappears into the crevices of the desert. There isn’t time for both.
Unless.
The convenience store doors cough out the guy in the angel wings T-shirt, Monster energy can in hand.
“Hey,” he calls, and for a second I don’t realize he’s speaking to me. He’s got dark-brown eyes and a friendly smile, like no one’s ever hurt him. “You good?”
I could do it right now. Bite down on his neck and make myself whole again. The sharp-toothed beast in my heart licks its lips. The bones of my face cry out for bloodshed.
Come on, Ellis. Do it.
His eyes aren’t even the same color as hers. He’s got thick, dark lashes, but the irises are muted and muddy and near black. Not the same, not brown like well-watered soil, like tea steeped so long it’s perfectly bitter. His teeth are overly straight, the front four bright white and the rest ivory yellow. He smells like Irish Spring and eye drops. He’s nothing like her.
And still. I can’t.
A long second passes. The air smells like gas fumes and saliva. Every breath roils my stomach. All I can move is my eyes, and he must see something in them that looks like an answer because he shrugs and gets back in his car and drives away, and I only regain control over my limbs once they’re crawling with the acidic sting of shame. My curse growls its contempt against my rib cage.
It doesn’t matter. I don’t matter. Every failure, every weakness, is meaningless, as long as I reach my mom in time. I’m strong enough to keep control of my hunger. I’ll force myself to be strong enough.
I pull my car around and fill up the gas tank. Last thing we need is to run out of gas halfway to Arizona. The little screen on the gas pump flares to life, and a perky woman in a blazer blurts out a warning about hiking safety.Don’t forget to bring plenty of water!The gas fumes make my eyes sting. They taste like olive pits and hopelessness.Always tell a trusted friend or loved one where you’re going!
The nozzle clicks, and the screen fades to grainy news reruns.Beloved Italian restaurant closing its doors after two decades. Golden Knights beat the Kings in their first preseason match. Chaney’s ex-boyfriend loved hockey. Preseason’s in the fall, isn’t it? How old are these headlines?
Doesn’t matter. The pump spits out a flimsy receipt, and I ball it up and look for the trash.Woman found dead in her apartment, shot by boyfriend. Search continues for San Diego man whose car was found off-road near Sheep Peak.
My hand shudders, and the balled-up receipt bounces off the plastic lip of the trash can.
Sheep Peak. That’s near Corn Creek, right? I double-check on the map. If you drove past the visitor’s center and headed north, off-road, you’d end up somewhere near the base of Sheep Peak.
