She imagines Father standing behind her shoulder, nestled in the shadows. Following her. Waiting for the moment James leaves her alone to snatch her back. Every drop of her ink should have burned in the fire, but what if Father has more stored somewhere? He was always prepared. Heis. Nelle hopes he burned alive, but there were windows in the study. She would be naive to believe that he won’t be able to find her.
“I want to come with you.”
James rounds the car and opens her side. “C’mon then.”
“I can’t yet,” she says. “You have to ...”
“Oh, right.” He opens the vial she refilled earlier, dabs the tip of his finger, and writes on his arm,Nelle goes into the gas station.“There you go.”
Inside she gawks at an aisle of neon candy packets and crackers and chips, overwhelming options that seem so sterile and plastic compared to her usual organic diet. Based on packaging alone, none of it remotely resembles food.
“Find what you want?” James comes up beside her, the bags under his eyes dark under the fluorescent lights. Behind the counter at the other end of the store, a man sits on a stool, his baseball cap hanging an umbral shadow over the top of his face.
“I don’t know.” She points to a jar of pickled eggs atop the shelf. “Maybe that?”
James makes a sour face. “Maybe not.”
There are at least twenty-five different chocolate bars, over forty bags of candy, a rainbow of gum packs, tins upon tins of mints, and—
“I can pick out some stuff to try.”
A minute later, she has a lime-green pack of candy, a bottle of black soda with a red label, and a crinkly bag of chips. James slaps a pocket-size yellow legal pad on the counter beside the snacks. The tattooed man scans each item.
“Do you have an ATM?” James passes over a stack of ones.
The man points to the far corner where a machine sits beneath a bug-plastered bulb.
Carrying their snacks in a translucent bag, Nelle watches the machine spit a stack of twenties into James’s palm. She pieces together that it is money fromhisbank account, but he is able to access it here.
“What does ATM stand for?” she asks.
“Automated teller machine.”
The twenties keep on coming.
“You don’t need to take it all out.”
“Don’t worry, this is just what I’ve been saving for pocket money this semester.” He folds the bills into his wallet. “My scholarship covers tuition, but even if it didn’t, I’d rather spend my money on this. Onyou.I can always get another job.”
With his back to the cashier, he uses his fingertip to scrawl a command in the new pad.Nelle walks to the car.
“What about your family?” They cross the empty parking lot. “Did you say goodbye to them?”
James sucks in a breath. “I left them a note.”
“Is that normal?”
“Is what normal?”
Nelle shuts the car door and locks in her seat belt. “For your family not to care what you do?”
“No. They caretoomuch.” He cranks it, and the engine roars. “Ever since I went off to college, my mom’s had an issue with letting go. She and my dad have all these rules for my life, liketheyknow what’s best forme. I want to make it clear to them that I’m an adult. That I can do what I want.”
“Leaving in the middle of the night without asking permission? I’d say that sends a glaring message.”
“Glaring, really?” James pales. He runs a hand over his face. “God, I know my mom will take it as a personal attack, but it’s not. I just, for once, want to make my own decisions and fuck the consequences.”
“And now that you’re fucking the consequences, how is it?” Nelle opens her bag of candy and picks out a purple one.
