Our Finest Hour (The Time #1)(80)

There’s a future for me and Isaac. A family. I want to move forward. Which means first I have to go back.

On quick feet I walk away, and I don’t pause until I’m far away, until I’m certain he hasn’t followed me.

A brick wall catches me, and I sag against it. I suck in deep breaths of air until I think I’m more or less coherent.

When I’m certain I can speak, I get out my phone and press a button.

“Hi. I need a ride.”





“Thanks,” I say to the driver, sliding out of the backseat. He’s old and he looks unhappy. I feel bad that he’s out driving people around on a Saturday night. He looks like he should be in a recliner reading a newspaper.

He drives away, leaving me on the street in front of Isaac’s place. The light in Claire’s bedroom is out, but the living room light is on. What would Lucia say if I went in there right now and told her what I’m planning?

She’d tell me to wait on it, probably. Give it a little thought.

But the time for waiting is over.

I kiss my hand three times and send it out to the lit window. Two for the people inside, one more for the person who’s been calling me incessantly. The people I love.

I get in my car, and take my phone from my purse.

“I’m sorry, Isaac,” I whisper, and then I turn off my phone. He means well, but he doesn’t understand what a lifetime of questions will do to a person. Perfect Isaac from a perfect home. I’m happy he was given a shiny, golden life. I really am. But we don’t all get that. Nor do we all get the chance to ask the person who abandoned us why they did it.

I’m driving now, almost to the interstate I will stay on for hours. The car is too quiet. I glance at the black face of my phone and put it back in my purse. I turn on the radio, and country music fills my car.

It makes me smile.

I’m doing this for us, Doctor Cowboy.



It’s almost one in the morning when I pull into the dirt parking lot of a motel. It’s in the next town over from Sugar Creek. Briefly I wonder if it’s the town my dad worked in, the one with the power line issue.

The desk clerk eyes me suspiciously. I would too, given my attire and the time of night.

“Thanks,” I say, taking the key off the cracked counter.

The room is exactly what I expected. A bed I would never want to run a black light over, because sometimes it’s best not to know. Everything is in desperate need of an update, or at least a good scrub, but none of that matters.

I take a mylar blanket from the backpack I keep in my trunk. Never have I been so happy to have a hunter for a father. He gave me everything in this backpack. Inside I find freeze-dried foods, matches in a waterproof case, and various other survival supplies. All I really need tonight is the blanket.

I spread it on the bed, lie down, and roll up like a burrito. It takes two hours to fall asleep, despite my exhaustion.



My mouth tastes like cotton. I run my tongue all over, trying to moisten it. I shimmy from my blanket, and walk on stiff legs to the bathroom. Mascara is streaked under my eyes, and my face has long red dents from the blanket.

I can’t chase her down like this. I turn on my phone to search for a nearby store. While I’m looking, floods of notifications come in. Text messages, missed calls, voicemails. I ignore them all, but I see the very last text, sent at three a.m.

Good luck.

Thank you, I write. I pause, my fingers hovering above the keys. I’m sorry I left like that. This is something I need to do. Alone.

I send the message and grab my purse. Before I walk out, I type and send one more message before I turn off my phone again.

I love you.

It’s time he knew that.



I’m ready to go now. At least, I think I am.

Physically, I’m presentable. I’m still in last night’s dress and shoes. There was no way around that. But I've cleaned up and brushed my hair and my teeth. I tried to eat breakfast, but the energy bar I bought tasted like chalk in my mouth. Maybe everything tastes like that when you're about to confront your runaway parent. I checked out of the motel under no less scrutiny than I’d checked in with. Different employee, same suspicious, squinty stare.

Sugar Creek is quiet this morning. Nobody out and about. I’ve passed the bakery twice. The second time I pulled up close enough to see the hours. Closed on Sundays.

Is the entire town closed? Are people locked in their homes? Where is everybody?

I drive around, which doesn’t take very long, until I see a parking lot with cars.

Church.

Yeah, right.

There’s no way she’s there.

I drive around the town one more time, even slower, before pulling my car into a spot in the church parking lot. Well, I suppose church is supposed to be a place for saints and sinners.

I have no idea how long it will be until the service is over, but it’s not like I have anywhere else I could try. This is the most promising lead. So I sit. And I think. Which is something I managed to avoid doing during my drive.

I have so much to say to her. I want to tell her about all the years in grade school when I sat and watched my classmates make Mother’s Day gifts. All the colorful, plastic beaded bracelets, the picture frames made from Popsicle sticks, the woven keychains. The training bras I bought with my babysitting money so I didn’t have to suffer the embarrassment of telling my dad I needed one.