Chapter 1: Not Everyone Gets a Goodbye Party.

August 2017.

Wyoming was on fire.

At least, that’s what the unexpected explosion of color first looked like to Jane. After two days of flat land, the sudden change in scenery was shocking. The hills were littered with daisies and dirt, hues of red and orange tumbling up and around themselves for miles.

She pulled off at the first opening on the side of the road. Looking around herself, all she could see were hills. She let her eyes adjust to the strangeness. It was like drinking whiskey after a dry spell, the summer after a winter full of South Dakota’s corn fields.

She got out of her car and walked up to the small metal barrier that was supposed to save you from falling off the road. When she was a kid she thought she was supposed to walk on these and, while attempting to pull herself onto one, almost killed herself. Her mom wouldn’t stop yelling about how it would have ruined their entire trip if she had died. Still, she liked the steadying feel of the steel against her shins, so she leaned her bodyweight forward and looked down.

Yep, more hills.

Jane took a deep breath and had to fight the urge to cough. After New York, she thought she’d welcome fresh, unfiltered air, but for the majority of this trip had found it sharp. She imagined the air was filled with spiteful, rectangular bugs, intent on burying themselves into her lungs as punishment for ten years of city-living.

Maybe it’s the allergies, she told herself again. She blamed most things on allergies. A light cough in the morning? Allergies. Sniffles in the afternoon? Allergies. Blinding panic when someone tells you they love you? Allergies, probably.

She walked back to the car and reached into the open passenger side window, grabbing the pack of American Spirits she’d bought as a bon voyage treat for herself while driving out of Brooklyn. The purchase made no sense — she was only ever a drunk smoker at best — and the need to buy them seemed even stranger when compared to how hurried she was to get out of town. But stopping for them had seemed cathartic; the box made her nostalgic for something she wasn’t sure she had experienced and the yellow color of the wrapper seemed appropriate for the open road. The pack had come in handy. Ten hours through rural Pennsylvania can really start to mess with your mind and, while clutching her knees in a surprise panic attack on the side of the highway, the cigarettes were the only thing that stopped her tears.

It wasn’t like she wanted to leave New York, she thought again bitterly, for what felt like the thousandth time. Being forced on a spontaneous cross-country move would freak anyone out and after the last year, she was more anxious than she’d ever been in her life.

The vivid image of her hastily packing up her apartment flashed in front of her eyes. Her cell phone had just kept ringing and ringing, a warning she had prepared ahead of time with a friend. But she wasn’t done. Panic stung her throat like bile and she knew she was running out of time.

Jane stopped her thoughts with a long drag of a cigarette, but still looked around herself quickly to make sure she was alone. She wasn’t going to think about that for at least another few hours. As she drove out of the city, she promised herself she would think about nothing until she got to the Badlands. That felt like a good halfway mark between where she was and wherever she was going. But it’d been a day since she parked on the side of a dirt road and looked into the abyss and she still wasn’t ready.

Next time I reach a real city, she thought. I’ll figure it out then.

Besides, she didn’t want to disrupt the calm quiet with stuttered thinking and gasping breath anyway. She threw her almost finished cigarette into the ravine below her, a children’s song popping into her head about the dangers of littering, and turned around to head back to her car.

Parked, facing hers, was a black Camry. An old man with a white beard stood beside it, peering down at the view below. He looked cheerful, like a mall Santa. Jane remembered she hated mall Santas and a repulsed shiver ran down her back.

Maybe cars are quieter in Wyoming, too.

She chastised herself for not being more aware of her surroundings. What a rookie mistake for someone recently on the run. She hadn’t felt safe for the last six states but Wyoming, with it’s ocean of flowers and shores of rocks, felt comforting for just a second.

Stupid, Jane. Nowhere is safe.

She fidgeted with the pack of cigarettes as she casually walked back to the car, trying to avoid the attention of the stranger. As she reached for the driver’s side door handle, he called out.

“Nice to see another face here. I was beginning to think no one lived in this state at all.” He was watching her in a friendly way, hoping to engage.

“I’m not sure anybody does,” she responded. He stared at for her a second, thinking.

“Maybe not,” he said, with a smile and a shrug, and turned back to his view.

She dove into her car and started her engine, throwing the pack of cigarettes beside her. Reaching for the back seat, she ruffled the ears of Sugar, her eighteen-year-old cat, who had been sleeping peacefully on a pile of pillows and blankets. Sugar meowed and stretched lazily, enjoying the summer heat through the windows.

“Sorry for this,” Jane muttered to her, and hit the gas hard. Sugar toppled out of her seat with a hiss.

As Jane tore out of the rest stop, she self-consciously checked the rearview mirror. The old man was staring after her. Just as she was rounding the corner, he pulled out his phone to make a call.