They drove down the driveway. In the side mirror, Don saw Jerri waving, Naks sitting beside her. He thrust his arm out the window and waved back.
Rodney pointed the truck west.
CHAPTER 7
Sixty miles to go. The sky looked like it was on fire. Two in the morning, and it was an odd sort of bright: almost like a full moon, but more powerful. Shadows danced along the roadway, the trees black shapes rising on either side of them, along with pebbles and pinecones, all hovering a few inches above the ground.
Slow going. Not only was it early (late?), but the ever-winding road continued to rise in elevation. Sometimes there were guardrails. Other times, none, with a sheer drop off that would certainly mean their deaths if the Nissan slipped over.
Rodney’s hands gripped the steering wheel as he leaned forward, squinting at the road ahead. Don was on map duty once more, guiding him through as best he could using the screenshots he’d taken. So far, so good.
Ball lightning chased after them through the trees, bouncing up and down, leaving scorch marks against tree trunks and grass. Other lights, too, lights Don couldn’t place. Little flashes of light bursting out of the ground in the tree line, then disappearing. Don wondered if it was the Earth crying out.
He said, “We’re going to make it.”
Rodney didn’t say anything.
Don said, “We have time. We’re on the right road. It’s only a couple of hours more.”
Rodney squeezed the steering wheel.
Don said, “Hopefully, the watchtower isn’t—”
“I loved him,” Rodney said. “With everything I had. More than I’ve loved anything. But, toward the end, I think I hated him too.”
Don froze. He waited.
It did not take long. “I hated him,” Rodney repeated, rigid in his seat. “For what he did. I didn’t want to, but I did. It came out of nowhere. It was like a switch had flipped. I was sad and then it was like my insides had been replaced by molten steel. Like I was burning from the inside out. I felt it in my stomach. My heart. My lungs. I could barely breathe around it. I hated him, Don. For not trying. For not listening to us, even though it was so hard for him. Didn’t he see that we wanted what was best for him? Didn’t he see that we gave him every part of ourselves?” He slapped the steering wheel. “And for what? Where did it get us? What am I that I can eventhinksomething like that?”
Don looked away, throat bobbing up and down. He thought about the people they’d met on their journey west: the beauty, the ugliness. For every Becca and Amy and Jerri, there was an Amelia. There was a family wearing masks. He said, “You’re human. Painfully, wonderfully human. I can’t, and won’t, blame you for feeling that way.” He rubbed his sweat-slick palms against his thighs. “Especially when I felt the same way.”
Rodney looked relieved. “I… I didn’t want to. I tried everything I could to stop it. But it just kept growing and growing until I couldn’t control it anymore. It’d been festering, I think. Festering for a long time. And then it just broke open, and all the poison spilled out into me. I couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t do anything but let it wash over me. And I remember thinking, no, no, this isn’t how it should be. This isn’t fair. Why do other people get to be happy but I don’t?Why do others get to live normal lives but I don’t? Why didthishappen to me? Selfish. So selfish. I didn’t think about him. I didn’t think about you. I was thinking aboutme. How it made me feel. How sad. How furious.”
“You never said anything like this before.”
“How could I?” Rodney asked. “How could I look you in the eyes and tell you that as much as I loved and hated him in equal measure, I hated myself even more? I couldn’t stand to see the hurt on you, especially knowing I’d been the cause.”
“So you chose to protect me from yourself.”
“I suppose I did. I guess that—”
“As if you had the right.”
Rodney’s jaw tensed.
But Don didn’t care. “As if you had the goddamnright,” he snapped, anger bubbling in his chest. “As if I wasn’t feeling the same way. As if I wasn’t capable of handling whatever you had to throw at me. You weren’t alone, Rodney. You weren’t then, you aren’t now. I love you. God knows I do. But sometimes, ohsometimes, you act like you’re the only person in the world capable of dealing with pain. You act like if you take it all in on yourself, no one else will have to deal with it. Guess what? We do.Ido. It leaked from you, your poison. I could smell it. Taste it, bitter and cold. How do you think that made me feel? But you weren’t thinking of me. You said so yourself.”
“It wasn’t about you.”
Wrong thing to say. “Bullshit. It was aboutbothof us. Not just you. Not just me. Together. We were still here. We were and are still alive.”
“For now,” Rodney muttered as they rounded a corner. Ahead, the road stretched out before them. No other cars, just the headlights on the blacktop. Above, the cracked moon in a kaleidoscope sky.
“Don’t give me that,” Don retorted. “Who the hell do you think you are?”
“I’m your husband.”
“Then maybe it’s time you start acting like a partner.”