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Still, her phone was still her greatest asset for being found.

Maybe now that it had cooled down a bit, it would have detected a lone bar of service and she could send a text.

She wriggled around until she could reach the cooler, pulling out her phone and turning it on.

It was fully charged at least—for all its sins, Arizona was a great place to get maximum benefit from a solar charger.

Still no bars. She sighed, staring at the screen. Still, she could at least type a just-in-case text message, have it trying to send so if service miraculously appeared it would go whether she was paying attention or not.

She started a new message for her mom, shoving down her concerns and imaginings to keep it simple and to the point. Short, so it took as little data as possible to send. And positive, since her mom was almost certainly melting down by now.

Mom. I went to paint at Dad’s favorite place. Car won’t start. Directions below. Love you!

She added a heart, typed in a quick summary of the route she’d taken, and hit send, tapping yes when the system advised her that there was no network— no shit —and asked if she would like it to automatically send when the system became available. There. That was…

God. What if that ended up being the last message she ever sent her mom?

She wasn’t thinking the d-word. She would not think the d-word. But she couldn’t stop herself from thinking about what it would be like if she d-worded. Not so much for her but for her mom. The what-if pounded at her, lurking behind her eyes, tight and headachey, until she started another message.

I’m sorry, Mom. Not that I came out here to paint, but I should have left you a better note.

I love you and I wish I had been a better daughter and taken better care of you.

Thank you for being the best mom, for loving me no matter what, and for never feeling bad about playing punk music when the other moms were all playing kid stuff.

You’ve always been badass. I wish I’d told you that more.

She hesitated. She didn’t want to type goodbye . Goodbye felt like giving up. And she hadn’t given up yet. This was a just-in-case message, not an epitaph. Finally, she just ended it with a final I love you, Poppy.

Sent. Yes , send when network available.

Well, that was done. Fuck fuck fuckety fuck. She thunked her head against the side of the car, wincing when she hit one of her bruises.

She should probably send another, all the financial information her mom would need, but that would really feel like an epitaph.

And she wasn’t d-wording yet. She wasn’t done trying to rescue herself.

But if she got to the point, she promised herself she’d write it.

Where all the bills were, due dates and amounts.

The status of the disability appeal. Which of her possessions might be worth selling.

Where to find the paperwork for the art she’d left with Heather, the remaining cash from Rai…

Rai.

A stab of grief hit her without warning, making her gasp.

She’d been doing a great job at staying stoic, composed in the face of danger even as she considered how much her d-word would break her mother’s heart, but apparently typing a not-goodbye message to her mother had used the last of her stalwartitude.

A word she was not going to apologize for making up, because saying it in her head had brought to mind the way Rai would frown when she strained the boundaries of the English language, and god , she loved him.

And her last message to him had been go .

She didn’t bother resisting when her fingers tapped and scrolled to their text messages.

Almost their entire relationship, laid out in emojis and glorious Poppy s and walls of text.

She still hadn’t read—couldn’t bear to read even now—his last message, though she had gone through the process of unblocking him the night before, while she’d been huddled in the back seat of the car listening to the coyotes.

It had been largely symbolic, of course—she couldn’t send him messages and he almost certainly wouldn’t send any to her, even if he knew she’d unblocked him—but it had still felt sweet.

Like she was blowing him a kiss across the miles. Like maybe someday he would catch it.

She wondered where he had actually gone.

She set her jaw, started a new message. She’d taken care of the main business for her mom—not the depressing part of it, but the most important part—and she should take care of business with Rai, too.

Hey Rai. Long time no message, huh? Ofelia said you’re doing well.

I’m glad. You don’t have to reply to this, but I wanted to tell you I don’t mind if you do contact me.

I’m sorry I blocked you. It seemed like the right thing to do, but I know it must have hurt you.

I finished the painting. I think you’ll like it now.

I can give it to Ofelia for you, or mail it if you want, either to you or to your mom.

I can’t take a picture right now. If you can’t reach me, check with my mom and she’ll take care of things. Thanks, Poppy.

God, how dull. And dry. And utterly missing everything she wanted to say to him.

Not to mention how it assumed she was going to be around for future contact.

She owed Rai more than that. Owed him everything, actually.

And if she didn’t make it home, if this truly was the last message she sent to him, maybe even sent posthumously when her solar-charged phone was hauled back into Tucson with her sun-bleached d-worded bones, then it needed to be… Rai-worthy. Magical. Legendary.

She deleted it and started over.

Glorious Rai. I’m sorry. Sorry I hurt you, sorry I made you leave, sorry beyond sorry that I blocked you and wouldn’t let you explain.

I haven’t read your last message yet, but I will.

I promise. I’m saving it for when I think all hope is lost, because I know that whatever you said, it’s full of love.

And I need your love now more than ever.

Thank you for seeing me from a distance and deciding I would be fun to torment, for feeding me peaches and buying me coffee.

Thank you for taking me flying. For showing me magic.

For worshiping my body and savoring my pleasure and giving me strength.

For making me laugh so hard I cried. For helping me even though I refused to be helped.

For seeing my art better than I saw it myself.

Thank you for teaching me how not to be safe, how to leap and fall and get up again.

Thank you for loving me. And if there is anything you still feel sorry for, I forgive you.

I forgave you long ago. I have thought of you every moment since you left, yearned for you, needed you like water and food and air, and if I ever get to see you again, if you ever want to see me again, I promise I will show you.

I love you, Rai. I will always love you.

And I will always be grateful that you loved me, even for just a few weeks.

Sure, it was hyperbolic. Dramatic. Over the top. But so was Rai, and she’d be a shitty lover if she didn’t rise to meet him where he lived. Who cared if she felt like a caricature of a rom-com heroine? He was pure elemental magic, her himbo orange-cat prince. He’d earned a little hyperbole.

She read it over again, then added at the end, Wherever you are, wherever I am, I send you many kisses. She added kissing emojis after that, as many as she could, until they filled the entire screen.

Send.

Send when network available? Yes.

She heaved a brittle breath, filled her lungs with hot dry air and blew it out. Well, that was something. She hoped he smiled when he read it. She hoped he read it. She hoped he didn’t have to cry for her afterward.

I would not have you weep.

“Ditto,” she mumbled, allowing herself a few seconds more of wallowing. Because if she didn’t make it, then Rai deserved that last bit of her energy, even if he didn’t know she’d spent it.

But she was going to make it. She was. She was going to get up. Maybe she couldn’t run, maybe she couldn’t even walk, but when you can’t…

Ah, there. That was the inspiration she’d been looking for. Not from Buffy , but from Firefly , of course. It would be the fucking space western that held the wisdom she needed to get out of this fucking wild-west hellscape, hiding in among the stuff that had aged less well.

When you can’t run, you crawl. And when you can’t crawl…you find someone to carry you.

Well, she could fucking crawl. She could use the tarp to protect her hands and her knees, bring the umbrella along for shade. She just had to get back to the main road, just a few miles. It would take forever, but she would do it. She would rescue herself.

She just needed to rest a little more before she did.

There was a hawk in the distant sky to the north, or maybe an eagle.

She rested her head against the car and watched it.

The swooping made her dizzy. Maybe it was a vulture, coming to circle her like in a cartoon.

Or hell, maybe it was a pigeon. Or a hummingbird.

She couldn’t tell, really. It was a bird, and it was flying.

She wished she could fly again with Rai. She wished… She wished…

She wished that Rai could be there to carry her.

Poppy closed her eyes against the relentless desert, breathing deep and marshaling her strength for the long crawl ahead.