Part 41 (2/2)
They have half a tank of gas in the Centurion, and at least one gas card. They have two partially smoked packs of cigarettes. They don't have any spare clothes or any toiletries.
They go back to Rapid City and find a Wal-Mart. Andrew and Mouse stick together in the store and keep up a running conversation, the better to resist unauthorized switches. They each pick out a couple of tops, underwear, socks, and blue jeans; they get gauze and disinfectant for Andrew, some aspirin for Mouse, and toothbrushes and toothpaste for both of them. At one point Maledicta, lurking in the cave mouth, spies a kerchief that she likes -- a red, white, and black bandanna with a motif of flaming skulls -- and asks if Mouse would ”please” buy it for her. Mouse is surprised both by the request and by the unprecedented (if sarcastic-sounding) courteousness of its phrasing. Since the kerchief is only $4.99, she agrees to get it, although she will pay for it separately, in cash.
At checkout there's a moment's suspense as the main purchase is rung up, but the charge on Andrew's credit card is accepted. They change clothes at a gas station on the outskirts of the city, and are about to get back on the Interstate when Maledicta speaks up again from the cave mouth: ”Could I please drive for a while?”
”What?” says Andrew, noticing Mouse's reaction. Mouse tells him what Maledicta has just asked her. ”Oh,” he says. ”She wants to hang out with Aunt Sam. I told her she could if she was polite -- and if it was OK with you.”
”You did?” says Mouse; she doesn't like the position this puts her in.
Andrew comes to her rescue: ”Tell Maledicta I said not today. It's too soon after what happened this morning. Maybe tomorrow, if I feel stronger.”
”All right. . .” Mouse starts to repeat Andrew's refusal, but Maledicta cuts her off: ”I heard the f.u.c.ker! Tell him he's a lying c.o.c.ksucker! He f.u.c.king promised!” Mouse does not relay this message.
By evening they are in Sioux Falls. It's still light out when they finish eating dinner, but Mouse is very tired. ”Do you want to stop here for the night?” she asks Andrew.
Andrew is conflicted. He would like to stop here, but as he tries to explain to Mouse, he is concerned that he not appear to be procrastinating. ”Maybe we could go just a little farther?”
”I don't know,” says Mouse, consulting the road atlas. ”I'm not sure that we can go just a little farther, on this highway. . . it looks like the next big town is all the way on the other side of Minnesota.”
Andrew frowns, not wanting to pressure her, but not wanting to give up yet, either.
”Maybe. . .” Mouse muses. ”Would you like to drive?”
He shakes his head. ”I can't.”
”You know you don't really need a license,” Mouse tells him. ”I mean, as long as you're careful, and don't speed or crash the car.”
”It's not just the license; I don't know how to drive.”
”I can show you how. It's not hard. There won't be much traffic, either, so it's mostly just keeping it between the lines.”
Mouse isn't trying to challenge Andrew -- she's just worried that if she keeps driving, she'll fall asleep behind the wheel -- but that's how he seems to take it. He takes a deep breath, lets it out, and says: ”OK. I can do this.”
”You don't have to,” Mouse tells him. ”Maybe, if I just took a nap --”
”No, I can do it.”
They get in the Centurion, and Mouse explains the rudiments: gas, brakes, s.h.i.+fting, turn signals.
When Andrew looks like he's got it all down, Mouse has him switch seats with her again. ”I'll drive until we're out of the city,” she says.
She gets them out of Sioux Falls, to a rest stop near the state line. Then Andrew takes the wheel.
He's nervous at first -- and Mouse is too, wondering if this is a mistake -- but he gains confidence quickly. Too much confidence: soon Mouse has to remind him to watch his speed.
”Sorry,” he says, easing off on the accelerator. ”You were right, though. This isn't hard.”
”I'm surprised you never learned,” says Mouse. ”It's very convenient.”
”Too convenient,” he says. ”Like having a cash card. My father used to love driving, but having access to a car could also be a bad thing, when he lost time. Eventually he decided it wasn't worth it.
When I came along I suppose we could have taken it up again, but the truth is I never really felt like I needed a car. It's not like I get out of Autumn Creek all that often.” He looks out at the roadside. ”This is actually the farthest I've ever traveled.”
”Do you know where we're going?” says Mouse.
He nods. ”The town in Michigan where Andy Gage was born is called Seven Lakes. It's on the west side of the mitten, near Muskegon and Grand Rapids.”
”But you've never been there before?”
”Not personally. But I have looked it up on a map a couple times, so I know about where it is, and my father can give us directions when we need them.”
Mouse studies him. ”Are you scared?”
”Of going there? Yes,” Andrew says. ”But I'm curious, too. I'd like to see the house where Andy Gage grew up, if it's still standing. As for the stepfather -- I guess in my gut I still don't quite believe I could have killed him, unless. . . unless it was an accident.” He looks at her. ”What do you think? Do you think that I, that one of me, could have --”
”I tried to kill my mother once,” Mouse says.
”You did?” says Andrew, sounding surprised but not shocked. ”How?”
”In the hospital. I put my hand over her mouth. . .” She tells him about it, summarizing at first but then adding more and more detail until she's pretty much covered the whole story of her mother's death -- everything except what she did with her mother's ashes.
”It doesn't sound to me like you were really trying to kill her,” Andrew says, when she's finished.
”It sounds like you were fantasizing about killing her. Which it seems like you'd have to be superhuman not to do, under the circ.u.mstances.”
”It wasn't just a fantasy. I had my hand over her mouth.”
”But not pressing down hard enough to stop her breathing, you said. And you stopped right away when you realized what you were doing.”
”I shouldn't have been doing it at all. It was wicked.”
”Well I'll tell you what, Penny,” Andrew says. ”If we get to Seven Lakes and I find out that the worst I ever did was pinch the stepfather's nose shut one time when he was sleeping, I'll be happy to live with the guilt for that.”
”What did he do to you?” Mouse asks. ”Do you know?”
”My father didn't tell you?”
Mouse shakes her head. ”We talked mostly about what happened after he left home -- how he figured out he was multiple, and dealt with that. I got the feeling he didn't want to talk about it before.”
”It's true, he doesn't like to,” Andrew agrees. Then he tells her: ”I know in general what the stepfather did. For one thing, it was a lot more s.e.xual than what happened between you and your mom. I mean, there was violence, too -- he had a bad temper -- but mostly it was about using Andy Gage as his toy. As his, his f.u.c.k doll.” Andrew winces at his own choice of words, and Mouse, remembering Loins's tank top, feels her ears redden. ”It started really early, too -- just how early exactly I can't say, but my father thinks it was early enough that, that it's beyond the point where you could even call it obscenity.
And then the whole time Andy Gage was growing up. . .” He pauses, his teeth gritting involuntarily, then continues on a different tack: ”We, they, were pretty isolated too. Seven Lakes is about the size of Autumn Creek, but the Gage house was out beyond the edge of town. It'd be the equivalent of living on East Bridge Street, four or five miles past the Reality Factory.”
”And it was just you and the stepfather?”
<script>