It’s just after five now as I take an exit just before Valdosta. On the radio Norah Jones is singing ‘The Long Day is Over’ while the sun is going down. The gas gauge is almost on “E”, and my stomach is too. I pull into a station to fill up the tank and buy ice. While I’m paying—in cash—an old beat-up Volkswagen Beetle rattles up to the next pump and a woman gets out from the passenger side while the guy stays behind the wheel. The woman is pregnant and I think that the guy is a bastard for making her pump the gas. She looks happy, though, young and probably about six months along. Soon she hops back into the car and they pull off, but not before the guy leans over and gives her a quick kiss. He doesn’t look the type who would beat her child out of her then take her to the hospital next morning with the story that she fell off of a ladder.
I take the time for a cheeseburger and a 16 oz. shake at the quick-stop next to the gas station. Quinn used to pinch the skin at my waistline looking for excess fat. I order the biggest chocolate chip cookie the place has to offer to go.
Now I don’t go over seventy miles an hour on the road. I should probably make better time, hurry to ditch Francine’s car, but why sweat it when they are going to catch up with me anyway? Not today, probably not tomorrow, but eventually. I don’t know yet if I’ll still have my trophies when they do—that’s why I packed Quinn’s hands in the ice in the make-up case and wrapped the hacksaw in the towel—but I’ll just hold onto them until I decide. It doesn’t matter either way. Quinn had it coming and I’m not going to deny what I did nor try to plead insanity.
But I will enjoy this cookie and this taste of freedom.