Four hours of winding through the mountains, watching the West Virginia hills give way to Pennsylvania farmland.
Four hours of silence so thick I can taste it.
Vanna sits in the passenger seat of my truck, curled against the door like she's trying to make herself as small as possible.
She's wearing one of my old hoodies—the gray one with the frayed cuffs that she used to steal from my closet back when stealing my clothes was the worst thing she ever did.
It swallows her whole now.
She's lost so much weight that my clothes hang off her like she's a child playing dress-up.
I grip the steering wheel tighter and keep my eyes on the road.
The past week has been a blur of phone calls and paperwork and trying not to think about how many times I've done this before.
How many times I've let myself hope, only to have that hope crushed under the weight of her addiction.
But she said yes this time.
She said yes, and there was something different in her eyes when she said it.
Something I haven't seen in years.
Fear. Real fear.
The kind that comes from finally understanding what you stand to lose.
I want to believe that fear is enough.
I want to believe that this time will be different.
But I've been burned so many times that hope feels like a luxury I can't afford.
"You hungry?" I ask, breaking the silence that's been stretching between us for the past hour.
Vanna shakes her head without looking at me. "Not really."
"You should eat something. It's a long drive."
"I'm fine, Garrett."
She's not fine.
She's pale and shaky, her body already starting to rebel against the absence of the poison she's been pumping into it for years.
The doctors at Ruby Memorial gave her something to take the edge off, but it's not enough.
It's never enough.
I don't push.
I've learned that pushing only makes her pull away harder.
We pass a sign for a rest stop, and I pull off without asking.
Vanna doesn't argue when I park and get out, doesn't say anything when I come back with two bottles of water and a bag of pretzels.
She takes the water when I hand it to her and sips it slowly, her eyes fixed on something I can't see.
