Clementine removed the last couple of bags from her backpack and stuck them on the shelf. After finding most of the visitor center undisturbed, Clem had hoped its restaurant would have a veritable bounty of unclaimed food waiting for her. Instead, all she found was a small stash of dried pasta and a lot of things that went bad when the freezer lost power over a year ago. She couldn't even find any spaghetti sauce, and since they didn't know how to get propane for the Brave, they couldn't even use the stove if they wanted to boil the pasta. And for the second day in a row, it seemed unseasonably cold compared to the rest of the time they had spent in this part of Florida.

Clementine reached into the bag sitting on the shelf and pulled out a peppermint. Before Clem had checked the restaurant, Sarah had checked the gift shop again, finding a bag of individually wrapped candies and another box of freeze-dried ice-cream in the back, along with claiming some extra film for their new camera.

Candy staying good had been hit and miss in Clem's experience, but she thought these peppermints tasted as good as she remembered. As nice as having sweets was, it still paled in comparison to a good meal. The taste of peppermint helped Clem ignore her hunger pains for a while, but it couldn't quite quell them, and with relatively little food left, the girls had started rationing what remained to make it last longer. Freeze-dried ice-cream was good, but they couldn't live off it alone.

Clem closed the closet and headed to the bedroom. Omid was pulling on the top of his crib, almost as if he was trying to escape. She watched as he managed to take a few steps while holding onto the crib before letting go. Clem looked on in surprise as Omid stood on his own for a moment, then fell on his bottom.

"You're getting so big and strong," said Clem as Omid used the crib's rails to try to stand up again. "Before long you'll be walking, and then maybe you'll start talking…"

"Dah-boo," mumbled Omid as he tried walking while holding onto the crib again.

"And then… and then I won't know what to say." Omid let go of the crib again and Clem watched intently. The boy stood there, wobbling slightly, then moved his foot to take a step, only to fall.

"Good boy," praised Clem. "You deserve a treat for trying so hard. I'll get you something sweet." As Clem collected a peppermint from the bag in the closet, she heard a loud stomping from above. "I guess Sarah's ready to come in." Clem moved to the door and unlocked it. Right after that, Sarah came in carrying the other thing she took from the gift shop this morning.

"Any luck with that thing?" asked Clementine as Sarah set the telescope in the corner.

"I had to mess with it for a while, but I think I got it now," said Sarah as she leaned the telescope against the wall. "I can see a lot further with it than the binoculars, especially on the roof."

"What did you see?"

"Well, not much here, but there's a bunch of trees and buildings blocking my view in the parking lot. Once we get out of here, I can probably see more."

"Let me just give OJ his peppermint and we'll go."

"You're giving those to Omid?" asked a concerned Sarah.

"I was about to," said Clem as she held up the peppermint.

"He could choke on this," said Sarah as she snatched the candy from Clem's hand.

"Oh, I… I didn't think about that."

"You never give babies anything hard and small because it could get caught in their throat. That's why they always put those choking hazard warnings on toys with lots of little parts."

Clem sighed and looked down at her feet. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," assured Sarah as she placed her hand on Clem's shoulder.

"No it's not," refuted Clem. "I could have killed him."

"Well, I mean maybe, but he'd probably be okay. I just want to be—"

"Careful," finished Clem. "Which I'm not, just like yesterday morning."

"Clem you're—"

"No I'm not."

"Well… let's work on that."

"Work on it how?"

"How about this?" Clem watched as Sarah moved to the driver's seat. Instead of sitting down, she turned and motioned to Clem.

"You… you want me to drive the Brave?" asked Clem.

"You should try it," said Sarah. "I'll help you, and it's not too hard."

"I don't know," said Clem as she approached the chair, intimidated by all the gauges and buttons in front of it. "What if I break it… even more?"

"Just be careful," teased Sarah as she popped the peppermint into her mouth. "And if you ever want to stop, just tell me and I'll take over."

"Umm… okay." Clementine sat down in the driver's seat. She had a little trouble seeing over the wheel and she had to stretch to reach the pedals.

"Here let me move the seat up." Sarah pulled a lever at the bottom of the seat and Clem felt it being pushed forward. "How's that?"

"Better," said Clem as she set her feet on the pedals. "I still can't see too well."

"Hang on." Sarah rushed to a cupboard and removed something. "Sit on this." Clem stood up as Sarah laid a thick textbook in the seat. "And you only want to use one foot for the pedals."

"Okay." Clem sat down on the book, which let her see over the dashboard a little easier. "So, what do I do?"

"First, we're going to take the parking brake off." Sarah stood up and moved behind Clem. "Before we do that, put your foot on the brake pedal, that's the little one on the left."

Clem looked down at her feet and located the brake pedal. "Okay."

"Next, we take off the parking brake." Clem found Sarah's hand guiding her away from the wheel and onto a lever.

"I thought my foot was on the brake."

"It is, this is the parking brake," said Sarah as she wrapped Clem's fingers around the lever. "This is what we use when we park, so you want to push it forward, like this." Clem felt Sarah's hand moving the lever and a loud click sounded from under the RV.

"All right, take this." Clem turned to see Sarah holding the keys for the Brave. "Just put this one in the ignition and turn it." Clem slowly took the keys from Sarah, keeping her fingers clenched around the big one. "Go ahead. It just goes in the slot near the steering wheel. Clementine located the ignition and, with a couple of tries, slid the key into it.

"Just turn it?"

"And press down on the brake pedal while you do," said Sarah.

"Why?"

"I think it's a safety feature."

Clementine pushed down on the brake and turned the key forward. A dull sputtering sounded for a few seconds before erupting into a loud rumbling and the girl found herself instinctively grabbing the steering wheel with both hands. "Whoa!"

"Okay, next you want to shift into reverse." Sarah guided Clem's hand onto a lever sticking out just past the ignition. "See the gauge with the letters?"

"Um, yeah."

"You want to pull on this until the arrow is pointing at the little R." With Sarah's help, Clem shifted the lever and selected the correct letter.

"So now we'll go backwards, right?"

"Yeah. But before you do, remember, the Brave is really big, so you got to be careful when you back up." Sarah stood up and moved behind Clem's seat. "You want to watch this little screen." Clem turned to her left to find a tiny LCD screen mounted on the dashboard.

"What is this?" asked Clem.

"That's the screen for the backup camera."

"Camera?"

"Yeah, in the back of the RV, for when you back up."

"Do all cars have those?"

"I don't know, but this one does. You've also got your side view mirror." Clem turned her head to the left to find a large mirror posted just out the window. "Now, very gently, press the gas pedal."

Clem moved her foot off the brake and slowly inched it towards the gas. The second she applied a bit of pressure, the engine grew louder and she took her foot off the pedal.

"It's okay," said Sarah. "Just be gentle."

Clem lightly pressed down on the gas and she felt the whole RV move, prompting her to take her foot off and cause the vehicle to stop suddenly. "Sorry," said Clem. "I—"

"It's fine," said Sarah as she sat down next to Clem. "I did the same thing when Ed taught me to drive. It's a weird feeling, everything moving just because you touched something."

"Yeah, it's kind of scary."

"After you start to feel the RV move, just keep your foot there," explained Sarah. "And here." Sarah tilted the steering to the right. "When you're backing up, the wheel has to be backwards too, so it needs to be turned right to move the RV to the left."

"I'm not sure about this," admitted Clem. "Maybe—"

"The parking lot is pretty much empty, so don't worry about hitting anything. Just try it, and if you get scared just put your foot on the brake."

"Okay." Clem took a breath as moved her foot back to the gas pedal. The sudden and slight jerk startled the girl, but she resisted the urge to remove her foot from the pedal. As the Brave rolled backwards, Clem found her eyes frantically darting back and forth between the mirror and the tiny screen. After seeing there was nothing to crash into nearly a dozen times, Clem finally looked up at the windshield and watched as the Brave swung around to face towards the exit.

"Wow."

"Now you want to shift into drive to go forward. That's the big D." Clem moved her hand to the lever. "But before you do that, straighten out the wheel."

"Right." Clem pulled the wheel back into its starting position, then shifted the Brave into drive.

"Remember, go slow, we have a flat tire."

"I will." Clem took great care to gently apply pressure to the pedal and inched towards the end of the parking lot. "It feels like it's going left even though I'm not turning the wheel left."

"That's probably because of the flat," said Sarah. "Just move the wheel a little right to make up for it." Inching past the edge of the parking lot, the RV lurched onto the road. "Okay, you want to go left. But remember, the Brave is big, so don't turn too fast."

"Okay." Clementine started tilting the wheel to the left and the Brave followed. Moving towards the shoulder, Clem started turning the wheel faster to turn more sharply.

"You might have to back up and—"

"Wait, I think…" The Brave pivoted left and neatly turned onto the road. "I got it."

"Great job." Sarah's praise gave Clem a boost of confidence. The young girl straightened the wheel and drove forward, reaching an intersection where she made another left that brought them back to the main road.

"So, we just go this way to get out of here?" asked Clem.

"Should be, just keep it under twenty-five." Clem located the gauge to see how fast she was going and pressed down on the pedal. She watched as it quickly moved past fifteen and steadied her foot as it inched past twenty. "Make sure you watch the road."

Looking up from the gauge, the young girl saw trees zipping by on the sides as the open road rolled out in front of her like a red carpet.

"I'm… I'm driving," realized Clem as she tightened her grip on the wheel. "I'm actually driving."

"See, it's not so hard," said Sarah. "And Ed told me one of the good things about the world being messed up is you don't have to worry about other drivers on the road anymore. Just abandoned cars."

"Sarah," said Clem.

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for doing this for me."

"It's nothing compared to the millions of things you've done for me."

"It's not nothing," insisted Clem.

"Okay." Sarah smiled at Clem. "But you've still done a million—" Sarah started making gagging noises.

"Sarah?" Clem slammed on the brakes and forced the Brave to a sudden stop. "Sarah, what's—"

"I'm okay," croaked Sarah between deep breaths. "I'm okay… I just swallowed my peppermint." Sarah coughed a couple of times before clearing her throat, prompting Clem to bite down on the brittle remains of her own peppermint and swallow what's left before turning back to the road.

"Sarah?"

"I'm okay," assured Sarah as she started breathing normally.

"Look." Sarah looked up to find the trees and bushes surrounding the sides of the road had thinned away enough to reveal the water just beyond it, and on the horizon they could see the road narrowing until the greenery was gone and all that remained was a bridge over the shimmering sea that was stretched out before them.

"We found it," announced Clem.

"Yeah, that's good I guess," spoke a less enthusiastic Sarah.

"You guess?"

"I just hope there's not a bunch of lurkers waiting on the other side," said Sarah. "Or worse."

Clementine looked out on the horizon and took a deep breath, realizing even after crossing the bridge, they still had a very long way to go.