Running away is easy
It's the leaving that's hard
Running away is easy
It's the leaving that's hard

-VANO 3000

They checked out and decided to take it more carefully today, crawling through back-alley roads and small towns instead of the major highways. They only made it to the center of Nevada before deciding to stop. They were about to run out of the United States Highway System quickly and choices had to be made and put down about where they would hole up and hide.

In the next motel, Eddie sat with a US Map spread out in front of him, fingers tracing different highway systems and towns. They'd found one with a Walgreens across the street and Chrissy had darted across the road to pick up a few things, such as pillows and towels and some other clothes, hopefully, a better selection than before.

When she came back into the room, Eddie looked up, "Los Angeles, Portland, Salt Lake City, Sacramento, Phoenix-,"

Chrissy was setting her pillow on her bed and fluffing it, "What?"

"I didn't take you as someone who failed Geography."

"No, I know cities, but, what?" She repeated, handing him a pillow of his own.

"I don't think I can do a small town again. Too many idiots too close together. I'm saying…we're going to reach the great beyond tomorrow. We should know where we're gunna plant our feet into the ground."

Chrissy sat on her bed and leaned over to see the map, "Err…I…" She bit her lip, "I don't know."

"No preferences? I mean, I don't want you to hate where we're going-,"

"I already hated where I was," She said quietly, "So it doesn't matter."

"Well, huh, okay. I don't have any ideas either. I only heard about these things in movies, you know?" He said. He snapped his fingers, "Ah-ha! I got it!"

He flipped the map to a closer view of the west and found a dime in his wallet, "We flip it onto here. The closest city it lands on is where we go, right?"

"That's how you want to decide?" Chrissy asked with uncertainty.

"Let fate decide! It's clear that neither of us is great at making important choices, so, maybe we shouldn't. No offense." He added quickly.

"Well…" Chrissy pulled on the strings of a new sweatshirt she'd gotten, something oversized that nearly swallowed her whole, "Okay." She said slowly.

"If we both just hate what fate declares, we flip again," Eddie said.

"Isn't that against the rules?" Chrissy asked.

Eddie looked up, spreading the map carefully on the ground, "Cunningham, that's the beauty of it. We make our own rules now." He shined the dime with his thumb, "Kiss it for good luck?"

"I think I'm a harbinger of bad luck," Chrissy pouted, "Better not."

Eddie wanted to protest but felt like he had already pushed her good mood too much. So, he shrugged and flipped the coin high in the air. It landed on the paper with a dull thud.

Chrissy and Eddie leaned over, seeing where it had landed.

"Las Vegas?" Eddie echoed. The coin was almost touching the outskirts of what he assumed was the city limits, "What do you know about Las Vegas?" He asked cautiously, unsure how virginal Chrissy truly was.

"I know that, uhm, some…bad things happen there," She coughed.

"We can re-flip again," Eddie said with a wince, now thinking the coin idea was really stupid, but he saw Chrissy shaking her head.

"I…well…did you ever read the Great Gatsby?" She asked.

"Pretty sure I was assigned it three times, but nope, never read a single page. The dude sounds pretentious."

"He is, not the point," Chrissy said, "There's this line…big parties are so intimate. I think…" She titled her head, "It's a big city where everyone is so focused on themselves that we'd hardly even be on anyone's radar. Plus, we can't be the first…criminals," She stumbled over the word, "To hide there, right?"

"Las Vegas," Eddie considered carefully, "Are you sure? Super sure? It's…well…" He blushed a bit, "Not a place for a girl like you."

"A girl like what, Eddie?" Chrissy asked sharply, her eyes squinting in anger, "A good little cheerleader?"

"Yes, well-,"

"She's gone," Chrissy said a bit bitterly, "I'm pretty sure she left as soon as she killed her boyfriend."

"Awe, fuck, Chrissy," Eddie pressed his cheek against the side of the bed, against the itchy top cover, flopping over and trying to hide his shame for digging up something she clearly didn't want to be touched, "You're not…you're still you."

"I don't feel like it." She said quietly, "And it's for the best, anyway. We aren't supposed to be us, not anymore. Which…" She got up, pulling one of the plastic bags onto the floor, "I saw missing kid posters in Walgreens. Not ours, but it could have been. And I realized that we have probably already messed up, but we can change it now."

"Change what now?" Eddie asked.

Chrissy produced a set of items that made Eddie nervous; bleach, hair dye, and scissors.

"We need to change our appearances. They're looking for a 'girl next door' with blonde hair that you can put in a ponytail and a rocker dude with hair down to his shoulders. So I'm going to be dying my hair brown and you'll-,"

"No way, Jose," Eddie said, jumping up onto the bed, as though the items were snakes.

"Eddie," Chrissy looked up at him, "Your hair-,"

"Is fucking gorgeous!" Eddie sputtered.

"-And very recognizable." She said logically.

"You want to cut my hair? You want to strip Sampson of his power?" He asked, mouth ajar. He thought he could trust Chrissy! How could she even suggest such a thing? The idea was laughable.

"I want us to stay alive," Chrissy said, "Hair grows back. If this blows over-,"

"When," Eddie pinched his nose, "We gotta believe 'when', not 'if', 'kay?" He didn't think he could survive being on the run forever.

"Right, 'when'...you can just…grow it back. You shaved your head in middle school and it got to this, right?" She said.

"Yeah, but," Eddie crossed his arms, "I won't dye it. I think I'll look different enough with a cut. I sort of hate blond men on principal now." He said, shuddering to think he'd resemble Jason in any way.

She frowned, "Can you grow a beard?"

"Maybe," He said, inching closer, glad she was willing to negotiate, "I've never…tried."

"I think that would make a difference too. Boys have a baby face without them," She said. She stood up, "We should do it tonight."

"I don't get a night to say goodbye to my hair?" Eddie asked, holding it up, rubbing it like an animal.

"You get however long it takes for me to dye mine," Chrissy said, and then realizing that she sounded demanding, "Is that…okay?"

Eddie was just relieved someone else was taking control. He could do it, but man, he hated to.

"Yeah," He muttered glumly, "I want to hold a Viking funeral for it," He called as Chrissy vanished into the bathroom, "I want to have girls crying at the burning pile. I want a full military taps send-off."

"We'll make a grave for it when we get to Las Vegas," Chrissy said as she shut the door, "Now, tell your hair you love it and that it's you, not them."

Then, she shut the door with a soft close.

After a semi-tearful goodbye to his hair, Eddie spent the time mapping their route to Las Vegas. He also started calling around; he'd prefer to be out of hotels (which were money burners) and in a rented place as soon as possible. For Chrissy's sake, he didn't want to live out of suitcases forever.

And Eddie, despite his bravado, had this sinking, worrying fear that it would be forever.

He started taking some notes on prices and locations, but it was all Greek to him. He only knew the jokes about strippers and casinos and didn't know locationally where any of these apartments were listed. And, unfortunately, he was running into the issue that almost all of them had about a month's wait or were requiring background checks, something he knew they wouldn't be able to give.

His 'this will work' attitude was slowly deflating as the worry began to set in.

He was deep in his own panic and self-hatred for pulling Chrissy into this, and not just turning her away when she asked about drugs the first time when Chrissy exited, a plastic bag on her head.

Eddie chortled.

"It's to lock the color in. Don't want it patchy; then it would be like a neon sign saying I tried to do it myself." Chrissy said, gingerly touching the plastic over her hair, "It's your turn now."

Eddie's smile dropped.

"I'm not ready," He moaned as Chrissy sat him on the edge of his bed. She put a towel underneath him and came to sit on her knees behind him.

"I'll go slow," She snorted.

"Can't we just…leave a little length?" He asked. Then he thought about it. Chrissy wasn't doing this to be cruel, she was trying to save his life, "Nevermind, never mind. Yeah, cut it all off."

He physically wined at the fist snip, but after that, the motion of someone touching his scalp and cutting his hair was…nice. Physical intimacy was one of those things you didn't realize you were missing until you had it again. Even though Chrissy's touches to his hair were only light drags through his locks, it made his body shiver and yearn for more.

"Should we put the T.V. on?" She asked, "To distract you?"

"No," Eddie winced. Neither of them had gathered the courage, sure they'd see 24/7 news teams running stories about how they'd fled, their faces lit up on pixelated displays. They'd probably use a great picture of Chrissy but that bad photo of him from his junior year yearbook photo where he was sneezing halfway through and they refused to re-take it.

"We could flip super quick."

"I'd rather not. Uhm, just, talk to me."

"About what?" He could almost guess that her face was screwed up in concentration from the tone of her voice. At least she wasn't just going 'whoopsie' with his hair and taking it as a casual thing.

"Like…maybe tell me why you wanted to leave too?"

He felt Chrissy pause.

"Eddie…I…"

"It's personal, I agree, but I think we're far past that phase. My life is in your hands and vice versa. You know my story, but I barely know you."

"You know a lot."

"You're a cheerleader, you like your shirts oversized, and you felt like you were going crazy for a minute," He listed, "But damn, we didn't even have one class together. I know you're a good person and I know Jason was insane, but…" He trailed off, "Nevermind, forget I asked it." His reasoning sounded less sound as he said it out loud.

However, Chrissy sighed, "My mom. Nothing was ever good enough." She said, "I don't want to say more, not right now."

"Damn, I'm sorry," Eddie said. He didn't know what he'd been expecting, but somewhere, he thought it would have been something stupid, like that she got into a fight with her best friend about what color she should paint her nails. Shallow shit. The sort of stupid thinking that he thought about any cheerleader before he talked to Chrissy.

But still; on the outside, her life was perfect. It was hard to imagine she had any strife. It was still impossible for him to imagine she'd just...drop it all. It didn't compute to him.

"What about your grades? Friends? Future?"

"My grades tanked earlier this year. I just couldn't muster the urge to care, I guess. I like to think I would have come around to it, but I don't know," She said softly, speaking evenly, "I didn't have many friends. Jason always wanted me to spend time with him and I guess I had my cheerleading team, but a lot of those girls…they'll be nice to your face and mean to your back. And my future?" She gave a rickety laugh, "I hadn't gotten a single acceptance to college yet. And even if I did….I don't know what I'd want to do. It would just be a waste of my parent's money."

"Oh."

"Is that enough 'sharing'?" She asked, a bit snappishly.

"Uhm, yeah," Eddie said, "Sorry. I didn't mean to force you to say all that."

Chrissy didn't answer. She just exhaled through her nose, "Why don't you…tell me something? Something you wouldn't offer up by yourself? Make it fair."

"Okay," Eddie said, trying to think. The one on the tip of his tongue was that he had developed a crush on Chrissy at the beginning of the year at the first pep rally, but he didn't think that was the right sort of thing right now.

She'd just lost her boyfriend, she didn't need anything else fucking up her love life. Nor did he want them to become awkward and strained. They needed each other; they needed to be a team, and he didn't want an admission of lust to get in the way of that.

"I think I failed twice on purpose," He said softly, "I didn't know either…what I wanted to do. So I just…delayed it."

"It's not the worst idea," Chrissy said, "I think lots of kids are tempted to do that."

"Yeah, but I did it. I don't know if that makes me stupid or brave or childish, or maybe all three," Eddie said, "And I said I would graduate this year, but some part of me knew that I just had to flunk one final at the end of the year and I'd have one more school year to figure shit out. I promised myself after the first time I'd be really proactive and decide, but I didn't. I tend to run away from things."

"Sometimes running is necessary." Chrissy said, "We'd be arrested if we had stayed. We could have been on death row."

"Yeah, but," Eddie tilted his head and it was sharply re-adjusted by Chrissy, "I don't usually like how it makes me feel."

"One day, we'll return. We won't run," Chrissy said, "But not today."

That was enough of that, Eddie decided.

They sat in silence the rest of the time. Not uncomfortable silence, but not quite comfortable. The sort of silence in which you knew that after a bit, you needed to say something.

Such as;

"Done."

"I don't know if I can look," Eddie moaned, running his fingers through his hair. Not as shortly shorn as in middle school, but he could tell it was still short.

He gulped in preparation.

He opened his eyes slowly by slowly as he turned toward the mirror over the dresser.

He was still recognizable; the eyes, he felt, were always the same. But his hair…it was gone. His lovely, long, rocker locks were sadly collecting in piles on the floor.

"I look normal," He pouted.

"I think you look handsome," Chrissy argued, and then laughed as she realized what she said.

"You think I'm hot?" Eddie asked, grinning widely.

"I said handsome, don't twist my words," Chrissy wiggled a finger, starting to brush his hair into a pile with his foot, "I think you'll still have a lot of choices in girls."

Eddie patted his hair, "Yeah, girls are pretty far down on my list of concerns right now, you know?" He asked.

Chrissy just sighed, scrunching up her nose, hugging herself, "Yeah, I think I know."