It didn’t take them long to find the road they’d been on when they’d stumbled across Amelia. From start to finish, they’d only been with her under an hour, but Don was sore, tense, as if he’d just been in the trenches. When Amelia had revealed the gun—still talking, talking, talking in that flat voice of hers—he’d panicked. There were knives in the drawer just across from him. An electric teakettle in one of the cabinets. He’d thought about grabbing it and bringing it down on her head. He hadn’t, but it’d been a close thing.
A half hour later, Rodney pulled the RV off the road, using the emergency lights even though they hadn’t seen anyone else sinceAmelia. He closed his eyes and laid his head against the steering wheel.
Eventually, he said, “That was…”
“I know.”
“I believed her.”
“So did I.”
“She…”
“Yes.”
Rodney’s eyes were wet when he lifted his head. A rare occurrence for the stoic man. Don could count on both hands the number of times he’d seen Rodney cry. He wasn’t quite there yet, but close enough. “Could we have helped her?”
“I don’t think so,” Don said quietly. He’d climbed into the passenger seat shortly after they’d escaped. Now, he reached over and took Rodney’s hand in his. Rodney’s wedding ring glinted in the low light. “She was already gone.”
“I thought…” His throat worked. “I saw her doing it. Walking us into the barn, telling us that it was all going to feel better soon. I can’t— Can you imagine what that must have felt like for the others? Not knowing what they were walking into.”
“It wouldn’t have felt like anything at all,” Don said. “Something they always did, probably.”
Rodney slammed his hand against the steering wheel. “Her parents. Akid.”
“I know.”
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered, blinking rapidly.
Don rubbed his hands together to try and stop them from shaking. “What do we do? We can’t go back, but we can’t just leave her out there on her own.”
Rodney’s eyes were dry now. A little red, but dry. “Yes, we can. And we’re going to. I’m not going back out there. She’s armed. We’re lucky enough as it is.”
“But—”
“Donald.”
He sighed. “I know. I know.” His thoughts were jumbled, Amelia’s voice whispering in his head. He wondered if he’d ever sleep again. Not that it would matter for long, but still. “Why is this happening?”
“Would it make you feel better if there was an answer to that? An explanation for everything bad that happens?”
He knew what Rodney was saying, what he was talking about. Not just Amelia. Not just the end of the world. It was more than that. They were getting ever closer tohim.
“Yes,” Don said. “I think it would. I know that’s not how the world works. We can know when and how and where, but thewhy? That’s what haunts me. You can be surrounded by people who love you, who want what’s best for you, and it’s still not enough. Because there’s something inside some people that eats up everything good. All the light.” He paused, stomach slick and oily. “Some people have black holes in them. They try and escape, they try and break free, but it’s too strong. Burns up everything until there’s nothing left but ash. And what does that mean for the rest of us? If we get too close, we run the risk of getting caught in the pull. But if we do nothing, what does that make us?”
“It’s not the same.”
“Bullshit it’s not,” Don snapped. “You saw the look in her eyes. Don’t tell me it didn’t remind you of—”
“Itdidn’t,” Rodney retorted, cheeks splotchy. “He was nothing like her.”
“I’m not saying he was. I’m saying that they couldn’t ignore what’s in them. It took them, it changed them, made them mean and cold and nonsensical. Makes them paranoid, distrusting. And when you pile onthis?” He jabbed a finger toward the sky. “It’s awonder we’re all not more broken than we already are. How the hell do we go on every day knowing this is reality?”
Rodney said, “We do it regardless.”
“What?”
“We do it regardless,” Rodney repeated. “We go on because we know what we’re supposed to do. We go on because we have to. I can’t just stop. I can’t just let it go. Not now. Not when it’s the most important thing we’ve ever done. Should we have done it sooner? Yes. We should have. But we couldn’t because we know what seeing him again means. We know what this last part is. We made a promise and we still have time.”