I'm SOO sorry this update has been so long in appearing. My life for the past 2 1/2 weeks has been like some crazy sitcom, with weirder and weirder things happening each day to keep me from writing. I keep expecting somebody to jump out from behind a tree with a hidden camera. But anyway.. I finally managed to get it finished today! It's been so long since I read the reviews for the last chapter that I can't remember if there were any questions or not, but if there were, remind me again and I'll make sure to address them next update.
Thanks for sticking with me! (And try not to give up on this fic when it gets too dark... I SWEAR the sun will return. ;) )
Chapter 25
The bark of the tree dug into Sawyer's back even through the thick layer of his coat as he leaned against its trunk, waiting. He could have gone inside, but the sharp, frosty air was refreshing to him. After a night without any sleep at all, it helped clear his head. They'd been making good time all day, and they'd crossed the border into Yukon Territory even earlier than expected. It wasn't yet 2:00 in the afternoon. This was the last stop before the real wilderness began, and he and Kate had been determined to stay awake for it. Now he stood gazing down the nearly deserted main street of the sleepy little town, halfheartedly wishing for a cigarette. It occurred to him that if he didn't buy a pack - or better yet, a case - while they were here, then he might not have another chance for months. But still he didn't move. His body felt heavy and lethargic.
After a few minutes the door of a small building across the street swung out, and Meg stepped through it, bracing it with her back to hold it open. Kate followed, with a steaming styrofoam cup in each hand. She was laughing, turning her head over her shoulder to say something to Meg. Sawyer couldn't make out her words, but even from a distance, her smile was like a light in a dark room. He could see the way it made her eyes crinkle above her glowing cheeks. Meg glanced at her watch and answered her, at which Kate nodded and then stepped down off the curb. Meg started up the sidewalk on the other side, while Kate checked for cars and then quickly crossed the street, coming toward Sawyer. He watched her approach, her hair whipping around her face in the wind.
"Here," she said when she reached him, holding out one of the cups.
He took it, thinking it was probably coffee. But the smell was wrong. "What the hell is it?" he asked suspiciously.
"Apple cider," she answered, taking a sip of hers. Wincing, she said, "Careful. It's really hot."
He looked down into the liquid with distaste, but before he could even say anything, Kate told him, "It was all they had in there. So just try it before you start complaining, okay?"
Giving it another whiff, he considered, but then leaned back and looked at her. "Got a better idea."
Mystified, Kate watched him dig into the inner regions of his coat. A few seconds later he came up with a small, flat pocket flask. "Sawyer," she said, closing her eyes with a wry grimace. Then she glanced around to make sure nobody was watching. "Since when did you start carrying a flask?"
"Since Meg showed up," he said, flashing his dimples. Uncapping the bottle, he tipped it over the cup of cider and added some whiskey. "Thought it might come in handy. And what do you know?" he added, raising his eyebrows at her. "I was right."
She sighed, watching him screw the cap back on.
"Wish I could offer you some, sweet pea," he said almost regretfully.
"You know what, maybe I'll just bend the rules and have some anyway," Kate said, swiftly grabbing the flask before he could protest. She took the cap off and tilted it toward her cider. Just before the liquid started to come out, she froze and looked up at Sawyer. The expression on his face was a mixture of dread and horrified confusion. She smiled in triumph and lowered the flask again. "You make it too easy," she told him, trying not to laugh.
Realizing she'd been messing with him, he gave an annoyed scoff and yanked the bottle from her hand, capping it and replacing it in his pocket. He narrowed his eyes. "You're just a one-woman comedy show, aren't you?"
"Come on, let's go for a walk," she said, still smiling a little. "Meg's having the motor home completely serviced, so it won't be done for another hour. She went to the salon to kill time."
He allowed her to drag him away from the tree, knowing that if all went well, this was probably the last time she'd be seeing streets and sidewalks and buildings for God knew how long. Might as well indulge her, since he'd put her through hell last night. They started down a residential side street, where the houses were two and three-story clapboard, mostly dilapidated and on the verge of caving in. They looked to have been boarding houses once, but now seemed uninhabited. The whole atmosphere was depressing. Sawyer wished they'd picked another street.
In a musing voice, Kate said, "The lady in the store said this place sprang up overnight during the Gold Rush. I guess not everybody stuck around."
Sawyer stopped for a second and stared at a rambling Victorian with boarded-up windows. "Bet you that one was the whorehouse," he said, tilting his chin toward it.
Kate looked at it, then back up at him. "Why would you think that?"
"Because," he said. "It's got about twice as many doors as it needs, in places where it don't need doors."
Kate seemed confused, but shook her head, turning to walk on. "I don't even want to know what that means."
Sawyer followed, smiling. "Wish I'd lived back in the Gold Rush days. Get you a horse and a couple pistols, you could make your whole damn fortune by the time you're thirty... Then just settle back and get old on it."
"Most miners weren't that lucky," Kate said.
"I ain't talkin' about mining," he said with scorn. "Talkin' about doing it the easy way. Hell, people back then were even more gullible than they are now. They didn't know any more than a hole in the wall... coulda sold 'em an invisible cow, and they'd pay for it. If I had me that kinda raw material to work with, I'd be a millionaire, Freckles," he said, emphasizing the last syllable. "I'd build us our own goddamn town and put myself in charge." He took another long swig from his cider.
Kate bit her lip, amused by the quick effect of the alcohol. "You might want to go easy on that moonshine there, sheriff."
"Too late," he said with satisfaction, smacking his lips over the last few drops. "That stuff ain't bad, doctored up." He crushed the styrofoam cup in his fist and tossed it into the gutter. Kate leaned over and picked it up without saying anything.
They continued on to the end of the street and turned into the next one. Kate paused at a trash barrel to toss the cup away, then glanced up. "Do you hear that?"
Sawyer listened. Besides faint traffic, all he could hear were the energetic shrieks of kids and what was probably a basketball bouncing on pavement. "Sounds like recess," he muttered.
Kate looked around, trying to locate the noise, and then walked past a delivery truck blocking the view. Sawyer followed, and they found themselves outside a high chain-link fence. Inside it, a square playground branched off the back of a red-brick school building. About fifty children were climbing over the equipment, playing basketball, or standing in huddled groups, talking.
"Let's sit down for a minute," Kate said, noticing a bench under an aspen tree.
Sawyer stared down at her, skeptically. "You know, you can get arrested for watchin' little kids like this."
She rolled her eyes. "We're not doing anything wrong. It's a public bench. Besides, I'm feeling dizzy."
He immediately lowered himself next to her, dropping the sarcasm. "Why didn't you say anything?"
"It's no big deal. I just need to rest for a few seconds."
He didn't seem completely convinced. "What do you think is causin' it? You've been gettin' lightheaded like this a lot here lately. Is it the elevation?"
She shrugged, unworried. "The book said it was normal. In the first few months, so much of the blood flow is redirected to the uterus..."
"Whoa, now," Sawyer interrupted her, holding up his hand, looking sick. "I'm gonna stop you right there, sweetheart. Let's just forget I asked, if it's all the same to you." He sincerely wished that she would stop springing words like blood flow and uterus on him with no warning. What the hell had he gotten himself into?
Kate suppressed a smile as if this reaction didn't surprise her, turning her head away to watch the kids in the school yard. She looked with wistfulness at three girls pumping their legs frantically on the swing set, trying to outdo each other. Their laughing voices caught in the wind, soaring up louder and then fainter as the breeze shifted.
"When I was a kid, I used to make a beeline for the swings as soon as I got out the door," she said in a quiet voice. "I'd pick one and stay on it till the bell rang. It was like time just... stopped, when I was up there. I could forget everything that was wrong... everything that was going on at home. I used to have this crazy idea that if I could just get up high enough, I could somehow keep going... leave everything behind down here." She smiled ironically, looking at her hands. "Wishful thinking, huh?"
He watched her, not answering. The undercurrent of anger that ran through her memories of childhood was something he recognized all too familiarly. He knew perfectly well what to do with anger. But it was that unrelieved sadness on her face that he could never bear to see. He just didn't know how to respond to it. These were always the moments when he felt the most useless.
"What about you?" she asked now, turning toward him.
"What about me?" he repeated, having lost the train of meaning in the act of staring at her so closely.
"What did you do during recess when you were a kid? Wander around pickpocketing?"
He gave her an offended look. "You think that's all I ever did? Steal from people?"
Kate smiled a little, conceding. "Okay, what, then? I can't really picture you as a see-saw or merry-go-round kind of guy."
Sawyer sighed, realizing she wasn't going to let him out of this ridiculous conversation. He hadn't fully taken into account that getting her to open up and be more communicative would have to be a two-way street. It didn't seem entirely fair.
"I went to a different school damn near every year." He tried to think, running back through his memory to the earliest ones he could recall, during the time of his first series of foster homes. "The grade school back in Knoxville... it had these railroad ties laid around the border of the whole playground... Guess the bastards were too cheap to invest in a fence," he added with cynicism. "So I'd walk on the things, see how many times I could make it around the whole border before it was time to go back in. If I stepped off, then that time didn't count... Had to start all over. Got to where I could do it without ever fallin' off, if I was careful." He finished up grudgingly and then looked at Kate, wondering if this would be satisfactory.
"Sounds like fun," she said in a soft voice.
"It wasn't," he replied.
She waited a few seconds before she ventured her next question. "When you did that, you were... all by yourself?"
Irritated now, and feeling somehow cornered, Sawyer threw in a warning glare with his answer. "Yeah. Wasn't really a group activity."
Now she was watching him, probably with the same expression with which he'd just been watching her, and he hated it. He knew that if he was allowed to sympathize with her troubled childhood, then she should be able to return the favor. But it was different, somehow. It made him feel so weak when she looked at him that way, like he was still the lonely, isolated little boy she was picturing him as being. Maybe it would be better for both of them if they would just stop dredging up the past, once and for all. But he supposed if that were possible, they would have already done it. After spending so many years of their lives with people who couldn't be confided in, it was too easy now that they had each other to let things rise up out of the darkness into the light of day. From the very beginning, he'd known this would happen if he got involved with her. He'd known that she would be able to drag memories out of him that he'd worked hard at burying in unmarked graves. But there was no turning back from it now.
In order to distract her, he gestured toward the monkey bars, where a boy, probably about seven or so, was perched dangerously on the very top rung. None of the teachers seemed to be paying any attention. "Look at that little daredevil," he said.
Kate looked, and then paled slightly. "He shouldn't be up that high," she said, sounding worried.
"This comin' from the professional tree-climber?" Sawyer asked with a smirk.
"Yeah, well, I know what I'm doing at least. He doesn't look old enough for that."
They both continued to watch the boy as he wobbled, balancing on one bar near the center of the structure. It looked like he was trying to stand up.
"Fifty bucks says he falls," Sawyer muttered, staring intently as if this was a sporting event.
Kate glanced at him with indignation. "Sawyer! How can you place bets on the safety of a child?"
She looked back at the boy, who had now risen to a squatting position on the bar. He seemed to have remarkably good balance. Kate reconsidered. "Make it seventy-five," she said under her breath.
"You're on," Sawyer said, grinning.
They shook on it, distractedly.
After a few more seconds of tense waiting while the kid painstakingly rose higher and higher towards a standing position, a loud clanging ring signaled that recess was over. All the kids moved in a herd toward one set of double doors, pushing and shoving each other to squeeze through. The boy on the monkey bars swung down easily, dropping to his feet with a small thud and taking off running.
"I win," Kate said.
"The bell rang! Doesn't count," Sawyer argued.
"You never said anything about the bell," she said, laughing. "He didn't fall, did he? So cough it up!"
With an exaggerated show of reluctance, Sawyer dragged a wad of bills from his coat and counted out seventy-five bucks. Damn, he hated losing. And she knew that. Which was why she enjoyed it so much.
"Thank you," she said as she took the money, clearly pleased with herself. Then as she looked at what she was holding, a shadow of comic disbelief flickered across her face, as though she'd just realized what she'd done. She looked at Sawyer. "You don't think we'll be like this when it's our own, do you?"
Just the thought of his own son or daughter standing on top of a ten-foot high jungle of metal bars made Sawyer's palms sweaty, and the kid didn't even technically exist yet. "Doubt there's much chance of that," he admitted. Jokingly, he added, "Besides, don't you think our kid'll be worth more than seventy-five bucks?"
Kate didn't seem to hear him. Her gaze followed the last of the children as they straggled into the school, their exhilarated voices not quieting down until the absolute last minute, hushed by the stern looks of teachers. Her expression was one of longing mixed with regret. She continued to stare at the door even when it closed behind the little girl who brought up the rear. "It's gonna be lonely up there," she said in a faraway tone, as if the thought was occurring to her for the first time. "Really lonely. For all of us."
She looked over at Sawyer. Hardly above a whisper, she spoke. "What if we're making a mistake?"
He rose to his feet, slowly, straightening out his legs. Taking a few steps forward, he peered through the chain-link fence and then turned back around to face her, leaning on it. "Little late for that, ain't it? We're practically there."
She nodded, a tiny, mournful smile touching her lips. "Yeah. I guess so."
"You done resting? Because I'm about to freeze my ass off stayin' in one place like this. Whiskey don't last long out here."
"I feel better," she said with a sigh, pulling herself to her feet. "Meg's probably done with her manicure by now, anyway. We should go find her."
Sawyer shook his head in weary amusement at the idea of Meg getting a manicure, but he didn't say anything about it. He'd save it till he could make fun of her in person. Kate cast one more glance toward the playground, and Sawyer started to turn away, assuming they were good to go.
"Hey," she said. He felt her hand on his arm, so he stopped, waiting.
"Do you think..." she began, and then stopped, in a manner that was almost shy. She touched her stomach without seeming to notice it. "Do you think once we get settled up there, we could have a swing set?" Apparently embarrassed by these words, she rolled her eyes, as if to counteract their sincerity. "I mean, not right away, obviously... But someday?"
He swallowed hard, not sure why such a trivial request would make him want to lift her up against this fence and kiss her till she couldn't breathe. "Now how'm I supposed to say no to that?" he drawled.
"You're not," she said, wrinkling her nose at him.
Out of all her facial expressions, it was one of his favorites, but as he smiled down at her, he was overcome by a vague sense of uneasiness that seemed to come out of nowhere, unattached to anything at all. He looked up, scanning the area, as if with the sensation of being watched. But that was crazy. The whole damn place was deserted, and there wasn't anybody up here who would recognize them anyway. The feeling still lingered, though, despite there being no reason for it.
He glanced back down at her, and there was a hint of concern in her eyes as she stared at him, transmitted there from his own worried features, he knew. Whichever emotion one of them was experiencing seemed to infect the other like a virus. She waited for him to explain what was bothering him, but it was too indefinable to put into words. Instead, he slung his arm over her shoulders and pulled her close to him. The simple action made him feel a little better, though he couldn't completely shake his sense of disquiet.
"Guess we better go hunt down the beauty queen, huh?" he said in an overly casual voice as they started back up the street.
Within an hour after getting back on the road, Kate had given up the fight to stay awake. Sawyer lay beside her, trying to rest, but he couldn't seem to drift off. His earlier uneasy sensation had died down, but hadn't gone away entirely, and it was just enough of a nagging presence to keep him alert. In the back of his mind, he wondered whether it was simply a reaction to the fact that they were getting so close to their goal, and that the reality of his future life was beginning to sink in. It wasn't a reassuring thought.
He finally decided to get up and sit with Meg. At least that would focus his mind on something more specific and tangible. He left Kate with a light kiss on the shoulder and headed toward the front, glancing out the side windows as he moved. The wide sweep of the scenic wilderness they were traveling through would have been breathtaking for anyone in the mood to enjoy it. The highway they were now on was deserted except for the RV, and it would have been easy to spot wild animals near the ice-blue lakes and rivers surrounded by white-capped mountains, if only they'd taken the time to look. But even Meg seemed to feel that the vacation was over, and that the sooner they reached safety, the better. She glanced up as Sawyer dropped himself heavily into the passenger seat, but she didn't seem surprised.
"She asleep?"
"Yeah," Sawyer said.
"Good. I imagine waiting up all night for your selfish ass to get home is quite a drain on the energy."
He sighed in irritation. How could he have thought this would be a good idea? Instead of responding, he took up his own line of attack. Glancing at Meg's hands on the steering wheel, he said, "So, what's with the fingernails, Tammy Fay? You planning on shackin' up with this guy when we get to the North Pole? What is he... some old high school flame? You still keep his promise ring in your sock drawer?"
Meg glanced at him, annoyed, and he gave her his slightly malicious grin.
"You think I never had a manicure before, smart-ass?"
"I ain't ever seen you with one."
"Well, you don't see me that often, do you?" she insisted. "If you did, you'd know that I've always believed it's a good idea to have built-in weapons on your body." She held up her hand, palm inward. "See those? I could cut somebody's throat with my pinky."
He rolled his eyes, but tried to force himself to be more serious. "So what's he like? This guy you claim to know?"
"Clifford?" Meg considered. "Clifford marches to the beat of his own drummer, that's for damn sure. He's an old hippie... Anti-government, anti-establishment, anti-capitalism... Anti-everything, just about. And you'd think with him being against the world like that, he'd be bitter. But, oh no. Not Cliff. I've never seen the bastard mad at anything in my life. He's like some trippy school guidance counselor who wants you to think that life is juuuust swell.. Even wears one of those shirts with the yellow smiley faces on it. God, I hate those," she added, but with a certain fondness that somewhat belied the statement. "Though I'm guessin' some of that peace and harmony might come from a blacklight in the basement, if you catch my drift."
"Great," Sawyer said without enthusiasm. "Just what I need, another pothead neighbor."
"Well." Meg sighed. "It could be worse. At least he won't try to get Kate to star in an S&M porn flick."
Sawyer stared at her like she was crazy. "What?"
"You're not the only one who's had bad experiences with neighbors," Meg said. "And don't ask me to go into details, because I won't," she added warningly.
"Thank God for that," Sawyer muttered, still disturbed.
Suddenly, the RV jolted into a large pothole that stretched across the center of the deserted highway, where it appeared part of the road had been washed away in a flood. "Damn," Meg said.
"Could you be a little more careful? Sawyer asked with gritted teeth. "I don't recall signin' up for the monster truck rally!" He instinctively glanced toward the back, even though the partition prevented him from seeing anything.
"Oh, sure thing... Next one I'll turn the hover function on, and we'll just glide over it. That work for you?" she asked. When Sawyer didn't answer, Meg chuckled quietly. "She's fine. That baby isn't just gonna fall out, you know. When the time comes, you'll wish it would, believe me."
"I wasn't even thinking about that," he said with hostility. Then, a few seconds later, he unconsciously contradicted himself by saying, "I know she's fine. I mean, it ain't like she's getting dizzy all the time, or anything." He made his voice casual, then glanced surreptitiously at Meg.
"Well, good. Glad to hear it."
"Why's that good? So, what... are you sayin' that it'd be bad if she was getting dizzy?" he asked, sounding worried. "Because she is, if you want to know the damn truth! I just made that up, when I said she wasn't."
Meg laughed, unable to help herself. "Good God, you sound just like your father."
Sawyer stared at her, his attention immediately diverted. With mild dread, he asked, "What the hell's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that I've never seen anybody so paranoid about a pregnancy as your dad was when Laura was carrying you. Up until then, he'd always treated her like one of the guys... She was such a tomboy. But as soon as he found out you were on the way, it was like she was made of glass. Only time I ever really liked him, during those nine months," she said, her voice lost in memory. "He waited on her hand and foot, too. And if you'd known how lazy he was before that, you'd know how strange it was to see it. I remember this one time when she was having chocolate cravings late at night. Any normal person would have just told her she'd have to wait till morning. But what does he do? He breaks into a convenience store and steals three hundred candy bars for her." Meg shook her head. "Still can't believe they never caught him for that. And those things lasted for years, too. By the time they were gone, your mom was so sick of chocolate, she said she never wanted to taste it again for the rest of her life."
This anecdote, for some reason, struck a chord in Sawyer's memory. He thought hard, trying to grasp what was eluding him. "These candy bars... Did they keep 'em in a box? Under the kitchen sink?"
Meg glanced sideways at him, surprised. "Yeah. They did. You remember that?"
"Sort of," he muttered. His memories of life with his parents were so spotty and full of holes that they mostly consisted of isolated images detached from any real meaning, like this one of a mysterious box under the sink filled with candy bars, going stale by the time he was old enough to swipe a few when his mom wasn't looking. Now at least the image had a story to go with it. He mentally repeated the details to himself so that he wouldn't forget them.
"How 'bout that," Meg mused. "Well, anyway. The point is, you're crazy. Bat-shit crazy, just like he was. There's nothing wrong with your girl, so stop worrying about it. You and her have got enough real problems without adding imaginary ones. Once you get up there and get settled, maybe it'll be easier to stay calm." With one hand, she pulled a map from the dash and ran her eyes over it. "There aren't any roads to the place, so the closest we can get is a ranger's station, about fifty miles ahead. Once we're there, we can radio Clifford and he'll pick the two of you up in a helicopter. You ever been in a helicopter?" she asked.
"Yeah," Sawyer said, distracted by something else she'd said. "What do you mean, he'll pick the two of us up? Aren't you comin' too?"
"Now why would I do that? Haven't you had about enough of my company?"
"You even gotta ask?" he said. "Had enough before the first hour was up, if you want to know the truth. But..." he paused, sounding almost hesitant. "Pretty sure Kate thinks you're gonna be stickin' around for awhile."
"What would have given her that idea?"
"Hell if I know. But for some lunatic reason that I can't even begin to fathom, I get the feeling she actually likes you. It was her damn idea to ask you if..." Here he stopped, realizing he'd said too much.
"To ask me what?"
Sawyer stared straight ahead, wanting to kick himself. "Forget it."
"Don't make me use these fingernails, boy. You know I hate mysteries. Now spit it out!"
He sighed. "Fine. But you better not mention it to her, because she wanted to ask you herself. And I'm not in the mood to get into hot water over somethin' this ridiculous." As Meg waited, Sawyer tried to force out the words that he hadn't planned on being the one to say. This was supposed to be Kate's job, damn it. "She wanted to know if... If you'd be the kid's godmother." He nearly choked on the word, his misery at saying it readily evident to anyone with ears.
There was no immediate response to his statement, which surprised him. He waited and waited. Finally, he couldn't stand the suspense any longer, and he cast a glance at his aunt.
She was watching the road, concentrating on her driving, but with an expression on her face that he'd never seen there before, an expression that startled him just a little. She looked like a completely different woman than the one he knew. Like a woman who got scared or upset or overwhelmed or occasionally vulnerable. Like a woman who had emotions. But... There had to be some mistake, didn't there? Those tendencies didn't apply to Meg. They never had, for as far back as he could remember. Even when his uncle had died, she'd reported the fact to him like she was talking about a pie she'd burned.When he'd tried to gain her sympathy once by telling her that if he didn't pay some guy ten thousand bucks, he'd be dead in a week, she'd said placidly, "Well... I'd go with cremation, then. It's cheaper." It was the last time he'd ever appealed to her for money.
Because of these and a thousand other instances, he'd always believed she was somehow impervious to normal human emotions. He'd envied it, in fact, and had done his best to perfect the same technique in himself over the years, without much luck. But Meg was an expert. So that, now, to realize that maybe he'd been wrong about her this entire time was a profoundly disorienting experience. With her barriers down, her face appeared almost young, and Sawyer had a flash of what she must have looked like back when his uncle had fought with her in the middle of the road and then proposed to her on the spur of the moment, years before he was even born. Christ almighty, she must have been pretty once. He could have gone a lifetime without ever needing or wanting to know this particular fact.
"Godmother," she repeated now, blankly.
"It's the person who takes care of the kid if we fall down a mineshaft or something," he explained.
"I know what it is," she snapped, making him feel a small measure of relief. At least she still sounded like herself.
Apparently trying to collect her thoughts, Meg waited a few seconds and then said in a quiet voice, "I don't know anything about children."
Sawyer made a sarcastic noise. "Like we do?"
She seemed amused at this, but her expression was still touched. "Good point." She paused for a second, and then sighed, with a hint of weariness. "So, I imagine this is the kind of question you're not really supposed to say no to, isn't it?"
Shrugging a little, Sawyer admitted, "How should I know? Ain't exactly like I've ever asked it before."
Taking a deep breath, Meg seemed to pull herself together. She was starting to look normal again, tough and composed, like usual. "I guess maybe I could handle the little brat if I had to. If you're sure that's what you really want."
He almost reiterated that it was Kate's idea, not his, and that Meg would have to take it up with her, but something stopped him. Under the circumstances, it just didn't feel like the right thing to say. Instead, he settled for a grudging, "Don't pull a muscle gettin' all excited about it, now."
She smiled softly, but didn't say anything. Sawyer decided that this exchange had been more than he'd bargained for. He felt worn out. Since it would start to get dark soon anyway, he decided to get back into bed with Kate. Maybe he would start undressing her to see how far he could get before she woke up and noticed. That was always fun.
Standing up, he prepared to head toward the back again, but Meg's voice stopped him. "James."
He glanced down at her. She seemed serious, as if she were going to say something she didn't know how to express.
"I can't remember if I ever told you this before," she began, which clearly wasn't true. "But I just figure maybe you should hear it." She swallowed hard, trying her best to stay stoic and no-nonsense. "You know I wanted to keep you, right? After they died, I mean. Your uncle and I... We tried to keep you with us. But they wouldn't let us." She glanced up at him, then back at the road, her stare furious and haunted at the same time. "Did you know that?"
He hadn't, in fact. And he'd always wondered. It was a major reason for the veiled resentment that he'd felt toward Meg for most of his life. But he couldn't admit to that now. "Yeah, I knew that," he lied.
Meg nodded, not as if she truly believed him, but as if she was relieved that at least he knew now. "Well, I just thought I'd make sure."
Sawyer stood where he was a moment longer, trying to digest the information without making it obvious that he was hearing it for the first time. The meaning flickered over his face, especially affecting his eyes, making his features seem open and somehow vulnerable. In a voice that was unusually gentle for him, he teased her. "What makes you think I'd have wanted to live with you anyway?"
She laughed, pleased with the smart-ass perfection of this remark. "Get some sleep," she said, dismissing him.
As he turned, he brought his hand down on her shoulder for just a brief second, awkwardly, before moving toward the back. Meg drew a deep breath into her lungs and then released it, her expression strangely peaceful.
He hadn't even drifted beyond a light doze yet, having decided after he lay down that Kate was sleeping too soundly to be bothered, when an unfamiliar noise dragged him back to consciousness. He listened for a second, and there it was again. A short, tapping honk. Somebody's car horn. He raised his head up, trying to figure out if it was the RV or not. He didn't think it was. And why the hell would Meg be honking, anyway? It felt like they were still traveling at a solid pace, so she wasn't waiting for bears or moose to cross the road. He glanced down at Kate, who was lying on her side up against the wall. The sound apparently wasn't loud enough to penetrate her sleep.
Sawyer got out of bed and yanked his jeans and shoes on again, then went back up front to investigate.
"What the hell's that noise?" he asked Meg.
She glanced in the sideview mirror. "I don't know where this son of a bitch came from, but he just appeared out of nowhere. I think he wants me to pull over."
Confused, Sawyer leaned over and checked the mirror on the passenger side. There was a car following close behind, something sleek and black and built to be inconspicuous. But the front windows weren't tinted, and he could see a man inside. A large man with blonde hair.
Sawyer leaned back away from the mirror, slowly. And now, the anxiety he'd been vaguely sensing all day centered itself and found its object. Only he had no time to focus on it, or even consider what this meant for them.
With the continued honking, Meg had started to nudge the RV over onto the shoulder, as though she were preparing to stop. "You think he needs help?" she asked.
"Get back on the road!" Sawyer said, harshly.
Meg gave him a surprised look, but turned the wheel away from the shoulder and resumed her former pace. "Who is it?"
"Don't slow down," he said, turning toward the back again. "All right? Just, whatever you do, keep this damn thing on the road."
Although concerned, she seemed to agree by her silence.
Sawyer moved quickly back to the shelf-bed in the narrow hallway again. He knew what he had to do. He knew he had to wake her up. But as he stared down at her sleeping form, it was as if time slowed to a crawl and then stopped. The very rise and fall of her chest seemed to be in slow motion. Her dark brown hair was messy and the shorter strands near the top tapered across her cheeks. She was wearing a light green sweater. The blanket was twisted around her and her socks poked out from the end of it. He thought if he stared at her intensely enough, he could burn this image onto his retinas, give it some kind of lasting permanence. Maybe later, it would be only a random flash of memory, like the box of candy bars under the sink. Or maybe, if he just stood here and refused to move, refused to wake her up, they could both cheat time and slip under the radar, and this single moment would stretch and swell until it contained everything, and they could stay in it forever, never changing and never needing to escape from it.
Sawyer was startled out of his reverie by another series of taps on the horn. The noise was impatient and also somehow malevolent, like the person honking was enjoying this game.
He leaned over her, resting one hand lightly on her back. "Wake up, Freckles." He shook her a little until she stretched and rolled toward him, smiling.
"Sawyer..." she muttered. "Can't you go to sleep without it, just once?" Her eyes remained closed in a relaxed, lazy manner as she waited for his kisses to begin.
"Kate."
At the unusual serious tone in his voice, she opened her eyes fully and stared at him. Seeing the look on his face, she sat up, the expectation of pleasure dying out of her eyes. "What's wrong?"
He couldn't seem to find the words to tell her what would have to be said. He remembered feeling the same thing after the FBI had first visited the house back in Tennessee, and he'd had to let her know that their time there was over. Why was he always the one who had to break this kind of news? It didn't seem fair.
"Sawyer, what is it?" she repeated, growing more alarmed. Then she heard the honking as well. She glanced toward the back, then at him again, confused. "Is somebody following us?"
"It's that guy," he finally said. "The one from the lake. Almost positive it's him."
Kate looked away, and he could see the thoughts racing through her mind, reflected on her features. She pushed past him out of the bed and located her shoes, pulling them on fast. "That's impossible," she muttered.
"Look and see for yourself," he said. "Your eyes are better than mine, anyway."
She gave him a quick glance of dread, but then turned and went into the master bedroom that Meg slept in, the room at the very back of the motor home. There was a small window near the corner, shuttered with mini-blinds. Approaching it hesitantly, Kate parted two of the slats just enough to peek through. Sawyer watched a wedge of evening sun fall on the top part of her face like a mask, then disappear as she dropped her fingers and snapped the opening shut again.
"It's him," she confirmed, her voice flat.
Now they stared at each other. Sawyer could see that Kate had already transitioned into her tough, shrewd, common-sense persona - the part of her that did what had to be done while pushing emotions into a special compartment to be dealt with later. She didn't look scared at all. The only weakness he could detect was a sad hopelessness far back in her eyes, but she did a good job of suppressing it. "I don't understand," she said quietly. "He couldn't have been following us this whole time."
"He hasn't been followin' us the whole time. Bastard must've known where we were headed to begin with. He's probably been up here a week waitin' for us to show."
Kate looked at the floor, nodding slightly as if this interpretation was probably the right one. It didn't seem to make her feel any better. She looked back up at Sawyer, and they shared another few seconds of wordless communication. Both seemed to be trying to apologize for the loss of everything they'd planned to have together - everything that had the potential to slip out of their grasp, right now. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Sawyer remembered Kate asking him about the swing set earlier in the day, a memory that jarred painfully with this moment. It was such a simple thing, but it was all she wanted. It was all they both wanted. A place to live. A place to be with each other everyday, a place to have their baby, and maybe even, someday, another one. No, they weren't perfect, and yes, they'd done some pretty godawful things in the past. But those people who had died at their hands would never be brought back. Time didn't allow for reparations, even if the heart was willing. And whether they were in a prison cell or not, they suffered for their crimes unceasingly, during every waking hour as well as in their dreams at night. Was it too much to ask that they be left alone to suffer in their own way, together? Why were they forced to fight so hard for a desire so simple?
"Get the gun," he told her, barely above a whisper. She closed her eyes briefly and then took a deep, fortifying breath before disappearing into the hallway where her backpack was.
"James, what's the plan, here?" Meg hollered from the front. "Still the same?"
"Yeah!" he shouted. "Just keep her straight ahead, as fast as you can go without losin' control!"
Kate returned to the room with her backpack, dropping it on the bed. She opened the top and rummaged through quickly, pulling out a jacket in order to see better. An object that had been caught in the fabric fluttered to the floor. Sawyer reached to pick it up, turning it over. It was the sonogram. Pulling the gun out of the bottom of the bag, Kate saw the picture and froze. Their eyes met, and he held it out to her. With a shaking hand, she took it, looking at it as if she'd forgotten it existed. Her expression changed subtly, the hard-edged intent dying out of it, replaced by something softer and more uncertain. She clutched the gun against her chest.
When Sawyer reached for the weapon, she backed away, eluding him.
"Give me the gun," he said, impatient.
She finally looked up from the picture, shaking her head almost imperceptibly. "We can't do this," she whispered.
Trying not to overreact, he worked hard to keep his voice calm and even. "What the hell do you mean, we can't do this? Hand me the gun, Kate."
"No," she said, more firmly now. "I won't let you go through this again. We can't just keep doing this forever. It has to stop."
"Are you outta your goddamn mind?" he hissed, looking at her like she was speaking a foreign language. "After everything we been through to get this far, you're just gonna throw it all away because your mommy instinct is kickin' in? If you're itchin' for something to save, then hell, I'll buy you one of them cows from the slaughterhouse, and you can feel all smug and morally superior about it. But this guy? You must have some kind of brain damage if you think I'm gonna let you screw this up. Not when we're this close."
"I don't want anybody else to die, Sawyer!" she said, raising her voice. "I don't care who he is. There has to be some other way. What about the money? If he's a bounty hunter like I thought, then he's doing this for the paycheck. We can offer him more! We can buy him off, maybe." Her voice was desperate.
"Okay then, say he takes our money," Sawyer said with scorn. "Then what's to stop him from comin' back later when he needs a little refill? Or just takin' the cash and then turning us in, anyway? You can't honestly believe that's an option. I know you ain't that stupid, sweetheart."
"If we have to pay him off for the rest of our lives, then we'll do it. It's still better than somebody having to die because of this." Kate paused, giving him a searching look. "Please."
He glanced at the floor, as if he were relenting, reconsidering under the force of her arguments. The road seemed to be getting rougher, and Kate braced one arm against the wall to keep her balance as she waited for him to come around. Sawyer looked up at her again, sighing. "You know that if we do this, there's a chance it won't work. And that means this is it. End of the line for us, kiddo."
Trying to hold back tears, she nodded. "I know that."
"And knowin' that, you're sure you want to go through with it? Because there ain't gonna be a second chance." He waited tensely for her answer, praying she would change her mind at the last minute.
She was silent for a few seconds before replying. "I'm sure," she whispered.
A flood of bitter anger threatened to rise up in him, but Sawyer held it back. Stepping close, he halted just inches away from her. "All right, then," he muttered. He held her face between his hands, staring at her for a second while she looked back apologetically, but without yielding in her decision. Then he leaned in towards her. She tilted her head back, their lips meeting softly at first and then with more intensity. Each individual kiss built to its own peak and then ebbed, the next already approaching behind it, like ocean waves. When they finally broke apart, with eyes closed, Kate locked her arms around Sawyer's neck, her face crumpling as she pressed it against his shoulder. He buried his face in her hair, breathing in deeply while his arms encircled her slender frame. With his mouth against her ear, he whispered the words, "Love you, Freckles."
He felt a slight tremor pass through her, but before she had a chance to respond, he was already moving into action, shoving her backwards through the bedroom doorframe, yanking the gun out of her tight grip. The look of astonishment on her face was only a brief flash; she realized almost immediately what he was doing. Forcing her across the threshold, he pulled the door shut even while she tried to make a grab for the knob, then he pushed the button to lock it from the inside.
"Sawyer!" Her voice was muffled through the door. The flimsy wood shook as she pounded on it with her fists. "You son of a bitch," she said, sobbing now. "Don't do this! Do you hear me? I don't want you to do this! Open the door, now!" She pounded harder, frantic now. "Sawyer!"
Blocking her out, as he had no choice but to do, he moved to the window, flipping the safety off and cocking the gun. Yanking the blinds down in one swipe, he flipped the latch and pushed the window out, sticking his arm through in the same motion. His first shot broke the windshield of the car that still trailed so relentlessly close, but it was too far to the center to cause injury. Paul swerved a bit toward the shoulder, but then corrected himself, withdrawing his own gun at the same time. With the glare of the setting sun, it was hard to make out his facial features, but Sawyer thought the man seemed less than surprised that his honking efforts hadn't been successful.
Sawyer aimed again, but this time the bullet only glanced off the hood. He felt that familiar vibrating twang down the length of his arm from the power of the weapon, along with the adrenaline rush that came with it. But the road was a mess, the potholes almost continuous now, and the jerking and jolting of the RV made it impossible for him to manage a steady aim. "Damn it," he said under his breath. He ducked to the side as a shot from Paul ricocheted off the back of the motor home, just missing the window.
He stuck his arm out again, trying his best to aim straight at the man behind the steering wheel, but when he pulled the trigger, there was a hollow, empty click. He tried again. Nothing. Jerking his arm back inside, he checked the chamber. He'd been sure there were at least six bullets left. He didn't think he'd need more than that. But it was empty. Shit. Now what?
Before he could come to any decision at all, another shot echoed from Paul's car, immediately followed by a loud blast and a sharp, squealing turn to the right as the RV left the road and flew at sixty miles per hour uphill over open, rutted ground. Sawyer was thrown against the wall, and then a few seconds later the wall itself ejected him as it became the floor, and then the wall again, and then the ceiling. It was only later that he was able to piece together what must have happened - that Paul had deliberately shot out one of the back tires, causing the RV to leave the highway and travel uphill the length of a football field, then jackknife and roll down into a gully, ending up on its side, wheels spinning futilely in the air. At the moment it happened, however, he perceived it as nothing but a violent, jumbled chaos.
When the motion stopped, Sawyer opened his eyes to see the bed attached to what was now the wall, above him on his left. He hadn't even realized the furniture was bolted down until this moment. Was it just to keep it from moving around while driving, or was it so people wouldn't steal it? But what the hell was he thinking about? Who cared about the damn furniture? He suddenly understood what had happened, and that the insistent shouting from the other side of the door had stopped. There was nothing but silence.
Pulling himself up, he glanced around for the gun, locating it near him in a corner. He grabbed the backpack, which had fallen against the wall. He wasn't sure if there was any ammo left, but if there was, it would be in here. Carefully, he unlocked the door and pulled it open, letting it fall downwards toward what was now the floor. He crawled through it. "Kate!" he bellowed, his chest tight with dread. "You all right?" Please God let her answer. Please, God. "KATE!"
As he picked his way through the cluttered, destroyed interior, he saw something move beneath the bench/table combo, which was now on its side just above the floor. Kate was crouched in the small space, seemingly disoriented. He kicked aside a sofa cushion and moved toward her, already reaching for her outstretched arm to pull her out. "You okay?" he asked as she stood up, an edge of panic in his tone.
"Yeah," she said, her voice shaky. "I'm fine."
He looked her over, certain she must be mistaken.
"I fell under there right as we went off the road, so I didn't get thrown around much. At least I don't think I did," she said, staring around her distractedly. "Meg?" she called out.
Sawyer looked around, remembering his aunt for the first time. In his fear for Kate, he hadn't given her a second thought.
Together, they both began to make their careful way toward the front. Kate pulled Sawyer's coat from the stove range where it had fallen, tossing it at him. "Put your coat on," she said.
"Why, you afraid I'm gonna catch cold?" he asked, bewildered that she would think of something so trivial at such a cataclysmic moment.
"It has the money in it, Sawyer," she answered, pissed. He glared at her, but pulled it on. Though if she still thought they were bargaining, she was dead wrong.
"Meg!" Kate shouted again, her voice echoing in the eerie silence they'd suddenly been plunged into. They reached the front. The driver's and passenger's seats were empty, and the windshield was shattered, most of it gone. "Where is she?" Kate asked, desperate. She started to climb out through the gaping opening, ignoring the spikes of jagged glass. "Hey, easy... easy!" Sawyer warned, helping her over it as much as he could and cutting his hand in the process.
Kate slid down the hood while Sawyer climbed through the windshield, following. The sharp, icy air was like needles in the lungs after the overheated interior. "Meg?" Kate said, scanning the area. Various pieces of furniture and luggage had been thrown from the RV, surrounding it like the debris field of a miniature tornado. Kate picked her way through this, searching. Then he saw her stop, her hands coming to her mouth in a gesture of horror. "Oh my God."
He quickly came to her side, following her gaze. The sight that met his eyes made him freeze for a second, as he tried to assemble the assorted images into one coherent whole. Against all logic, it was a scene from The Wizard of Oz that first popped into his head, the part where the wicked witch had had a house dropped on her. But this was the reverse, because Meg's legs weren't sticking out. Her legs, all the way up to her hips, were underneath the vehicle. Her torso rested on the ground, emerging from the RV like an unrolled sleeping bag.
Dropping to her knees beside her, Kate touched her face. "Meg? Can you hear me?"
The older woman's eyes fluttered open, and she raised her head slightly, taking in the situation. Letting her head fall back to the ground, she said in an ironically satisfied tone, "Look at that. It isn't every woman that can run over herself, you know." Raising a hand contemplatively before her face, she muttered angrily to herself. "Broke three nails, too."
The sound Kate made in response was halfway between a laugh and a sob. "Can you feel your legs?" she asked.
Meg thought about the question. "No," she said. "But I can't see that it matters too much at this point."
"We're gonna get you out of here," Kate said, in what Sawyer believed to be the most optimistically delusional statement he'd ever heard her utter. Even to his untrained eye, it looked like Meg's pelvis was crushed. There were probably significant internal injuries. Even if there was a hospital across the highway, she might not make it. And there wasn't a hospital across the highway.
The sound of a furiously revving engine reached their ears. They were on the other side of a ridge that obscured the hill they'd traveled up from the road, but it sounded like Paul was doing his best to follow in their tracks. In such a tiny car, he must have gotten stuck. But they couldn't count on him staying stuck.
"Who the hell is he?" Meg asked, hearing the noise.
"It's the guy who was after us back in Ontario, where you picked us up," Sawyer explained.
"Well..." Meg said, grimacing at a sudden pain. "You've got to admire his persistence."
Kate jumped to her feet, as though with a sudden resolution. She touched the side of the motor home. "Sawyer! We've got to get this off of her somehow." He didn't move. She cast an accusing look back at him. "Are you gonna help me, or not!"
He stared at her like she was crazy. "Help you do what? Thing weighs close to three tons, sweetheart! And I'm sorry to break it to you, but I didn't remember to pack my superhero cape!"
"We have to do something!" she said, on the edge of despair.
"What you have to do is get yourselves the hell away from this thing before that bastard makes it up here, which it sounds like he's fixin' to do," Meg said, sounding calm even though her face was drained of color. "You'd best go into those woods over there. I'll see if I can't distract him when he gets up here... Tell him you're both still inside." Sawyer looked toward the woods she referred to, which he hadn't even noticed until now. They'd come to a stop just on the edge of a thick, dark forest. It didn't look inviting, but it did look like a good place to hide from a pursuer.
"You think we're just gonna leave you alone here?" Kate asked, kneeling down beside Meg again as she tucked her own hair behind her ears.
"That's exactly what you're gonna do," Meg said. "You've got more important things to worry about than an old woman under a motor home." She gave a dry cackle at her own joke, but then immediately stopped, as if the laughter hurt her.
"I'm not leaving," Kate said obstinately, fighting tears. "I don't care what you say."
Meg sighed heavily, closing her eyes. "Don't get all sentimental on me, hon. You know I don't appreciate it." With an effort, she dragged a slip of paper out of her back pocket and shoved it toward Kate. "Those are the coordinates of the ranger's station and Clifford's place... Don't lose that."
In the manner of a child who believed she could deny the reality of the situation by simply refusing to cooperate with it, Kate didn't take the paper. Sawyer reached down and grabbed it. The car engine on the other side of the hill revved louder. "We need to move," he said to Kate in a low voice. "There's no bullets left."
Meg looked up at Kate. "You hear that, girl? Time to shake a leg." Her voice was fainter now, but she still sounded authoritative. "I'll figure somethin' out. Still got my trusty cell phone, don't I?"
"You won't get service up here," Kate argued, wiping a shaky hand across her eyes in an effort not to appear distraught.
Smiling weakly, Meg took this hand and squeezed it. "I hope that kid turns out to be as stubborn as you are." Then she looked at Sawyer, locking eyes with him. "Get her out of here, James. I don't want to have to slap her."
Before he could touch her, Kate leaned over, pressing her head against Meg's shoulder. "I'm so sorry," she whispered, her voice hoarse and broken with sobs.
Raising an arm to Kate's back, Meg said with closed eyes, "All right, you said it. Now I don't want you to ever say it, or think it, again. Not for the rest of your life. You understand me?"
Kate couldn't answer. Sawyer reached down and grabbed her from behind, pulling her up and away from Meg. She shoved his hands off her, backing away from him. The look on her tear-stained face bordered on hatred. As she glared at him, the engine over the hill stopped and a car door slammed. Paul was continuing on foot. There was no more time to lose. Glancing toward the hill with a hunted expression, Kate turned and, without letting herself look at Meg again, started toward the woods.
Meg didn't seem to have enough strength to keep her eyes open, now. Sawyer stared at her with misery, suddenly wondering what the hell he was doing. Maybe Kate was right. How could they just leave her here? As if she sensed his uncertainty, Meg opened her eyes and leveled a direct, no-nonsense stare at him. "March," she commanded, angling her arm toward the direction Kate had started in. It was the same tone she'd used when she'd chased him toward the bathtub as a kid after he'd been playing in the dirt all day.
Tearing his guilt-filled gaze from her, he moved away, stopping to grab Kate's coat from the ground where it had miraculously flown out of the RV still attached to the rack it had been hanging on.
He caught up with her just as she reached the border of the trees. Within seconds, the dark forest had swallowed them both without a trace.