Chapter 14 - Life

Michelle drove the little blue sports car until the fuel gauge flashed to refill. It had taken almost 100 miles before she finally started to breathe again without that awful pain in her chest. Looking around, she had no idea where she was; she had just taken off. It was like she was on autopilot: her body just moved by itself until she was outside of the house. She didn’t even remember picking up her purse, or taking her keys from it, but she had, and she was driving, miles and miles passing by until finally she could breathe again.

She pulled into the next gas station and pumped a full tank. The guy behind the counter eyed her suspiciously as she pulled the baseball cap she always kept in the car down lower over her eyes, which were red-rimmed and sore. The last thing she wanted was to strike up a conversation, or worse, be recognized.

“Anything else I can get ya?” he drawled as she came up to the counter.

She shook her head and handed over some bills.

“We got a special on—”

“Where am I?” she interrupted before he could go on with his sales pitch.

“Buttonwillow, ma’am.”

She looked confused, but took her change and turned to leave. She had no idea where Buttonwillow was.

He’d seen that look too many times and added, “It’s 30 mins west of Bakersfield.”

She stopped and turned back to him briefly. “Okay, thank you.”

“No problem. Have a good day.”

Outside, she ran back across the forecourt to her car and climbed in, her little sports car offering safety and a comfortability that she had not felt for months. She had always assumed that pregnancy would be nothing but blissful happiness. She and Cam had everything they wanted, and this would just be the cherry on the cake. And it was for a while. But then something changed. One morning she woke up feeling not quite so happy. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but over time it got steadily worse.

The road was deserted as she continued on, no destination in her mind, just a need to get as far away as possible. She couldn’t stand it any longer: Darcy screaming at her, her face red and blotchy.

She had tried, really tried, but the dark cloud descended again, and she couldn’t shift it, or the feeling that something bad was going to happen if she stayed.

It took a moment for her to realize that the blurred windscreen wasn’t because it was raining; it was because she was crying, again. She was so sick of crying.

It had been easy to hide it at first. Before they were born and Cam would be out of the house, she would cry constantly, terrified that she wouldn’t be a good mother. She worried constantly that something would happen to them, that she would do something wrong and hurt them. And then they were here, and everything felt better for a while. The cloud lifted and she was happy, until Darcy made it clear that she didn’t want anything to do with her. Awful thoughts to do something dreadful kept invading her thoughts, something she never thought herself capable of, but what if she did? She couldn’t risk it. Sometimes she just wanted the noise to stop, just so she could think straight for a moment, just a moment. She’d just been trying to get a nap, cuddling a pillow. The next thing she remembered was standing over the cot, sobbing and pleading, the pillow still in her hands. For the barest second, her mind took her somewhere she didn’t want to go. Her children needed to be away from her; they weren’t safe.

She stopped the car at the side of the road. Wiping her eyes, she caught sight of a sign up ahead: Fresno 40 miles. She knew this route, had driven it before with Cam. Popping the glovebox, she rummaged around until she found what she was looking for: keys.