Page 38 of Peak Cruelty

Vance

S he doesn’t ask why we’re leaving. Doesn’t ask what’s next. There’s comfort in that.

I pack in silence. The kind that folds. That zips. That erases. Everything goes back in the duffel as though it never happened. Which is the point.

She folds her shirt like it matters. Like it won’t end up forgotten in a motel drawer six towns from here. Her movements are precise—the way you handle something fragile you don’t want, but can’t bring yourself to ruin.

We don’t talk. Not really. A few words here and there about gas, distance, snacks we won’t eat. She rides with her feet on the dash, head turned toward the window like she’s watched her yearly vacation come and go and she’s sad about it.

The storm is gone but the sky’s still bruised. Purple leaking into black. Rain tries to catch up but never quite does. The kind of drive that feels like running, even if you’re sitting still.

“You take the scenic route on purpose?” she asks somewhere past midnight.

I glance at the GPS. “It’s faster.”

She sighs. Low. Noncommittal, as though she knows that’s not the question she asked.

We hit a 24-hour gas station around two. She stays in the car. I go in. Pay cash. No receipt. Just caffeine, protein bars, something sweet I think she might want. The clerk doesn’t look up. I like him for that.

Back in the car, she cracks open a soda, takes a sip, and then wipes the lip before offering it to me.

I take it. Finish it off. Hope it and the adrenaline will keep me awake.

By three, the road goes flat; dark. Motel signs start cropping up like regrets—cheap, lit, and unavoidable. I pick one that looks like it hasn’t been robbed in the last week. Neon blinking just enough to say we’re open, when it should say keep going.

Room key’s tied to a board too large to lose. Door’s aluminum. Interior’s beige with a vengeance.

I drop the bag. She kicks off her shoes.

Neither of us says what we’re thinking. We don’t have to. And, besides, what would be the point?

She heads to the bathroom. I sit on the edge of the bed like I’m still deciding whether to sleep or disappear.

The faucet runs. I hear her brushing her teeth. Decide to stay.

When she comes out, she’s wearing a shirt that used to be mine. Still fits her better.

She doesn’t crawl into bed. Just stands there, arms crossed.

“You ever get tired of pretending you’re not scared?”

I look up. “No. I get tired of being right.”

She nods. Once. Like that’s fair.

“But sometimes you’re wrong.”

“Sometimes I am,” I say and for a second, looking at her, I think maybe we could make a run for it. Try out woodworking or some other mundane hobby for people with too much time on their hands. I think, maybe we could make a go of this. “But it’s rare.”

“You know I could just say I went with you willingly. That we went off grid. Just got back.”

I smile, even though I know it’ll never work. That much attention, and I’m done. I’d have to live an entirely different life. Hard to live in the shadows, hard to do what I do, when your face is plastered all over the evening news. And I’m not ready to change who I am. I may never be. “We’ll see.”

“I guess we will.”

She turns off the light. Climbs in. Back to me. Close, but not touching.

And I lay there in the dark, counting ceiling tiles I can’t see, trying not to think about the photo she doesn’t know I saved.

Trying not to think about what it means that I did.