She hiked the length of the dirt road, day pack on her back, guitar in hand. By the time she reached pavement, she could hear church bells ringing in the distance. Back in Eliotville, Lynne would be waking up for the second morning with her gone. Was Lynne sad? Or was she busy emptying drawers, packing things away, at least a little relieved?
Did she miss Blue? Did Blue miss her?
A pickup slowed to a stop beside her. Inside was a middle-aged man, with a curly-haired little boy in the passenger seat. "That's a lot of stuff to be carrying. You need a lift?" She nodded, hopped in.
He gave her a ride as far as town. Not Albany, someplace smaller, but big enough to catch a bus in. The bus tickets were sold in a bookstore next to the stop, full of the smell of old books and dust. The woman behind the counter hadn't showed any interest when Blue slid her note across to her, just took her money and handed her a ticket.
She'd guessed about a destination. Rochester, a city-sized blot on the map of upstate New York, seemed like the right direction. Not that she had much to go by, beyond the boots, but there was a little.
There had been four phone calls from Cass over two years, each from a blocked number. The first to tell Lynne she was okay. The second call, three months after she'd gone, came on a Saturday. Blue had been at Teena's. Just a "Hi, I'm doing fine," left on the machine. The third call arrived almost a full year after she'd left—her Halloween message for Blue.
The fourth, eighteen months after Cass had gone, Blue had answered, heard Cass's voice, felt her heart rush into a gallop as she gripped the receiver tight. "Where are you? Are you coming home? I miss you." As if she were six, as if Cass were away on business, as if her return were guaranteed. What she heard in response was distance. The sound of traffic, voices on a city street, a muted siren. "Blue," Cass had said, as if eighteen months translated to endless miles and sisterhood amounted to geography, not soul. "That's not home. Not for me."
A slap, the sting following the blow. "What are you doing?"
"Looking for what's mine."
"But where are you?" Give me a map, show me how to find you. Don't leave me alone.
The blast of a car horn through the receiver. She jumped, as if she were on the street with Cass, not standing by the kitchen bar, a half-eaten peanut butter sandwich in her hand.
"I'm following a trail. You know the one." A laugh, sharing something, but Blue didn't know what. "Listen, I'm fine, tell Lynne. I have to go."
No good-bye. Just a click, silence. Cass, there and gone.
She hadn't had a clue what Cass was talking about at first. She didn't know any trails outside of Maine, at least not any with names. But two nights later, lying on Cass's bed next to Mama's guitar, she'd gotten it. Mama had left Maine two years into college. She said she hadn't been sure where she was going, just that it was time to go, time to make music. Tish said she'd woken up one morning on her family's ranch, looked out at the land that would soon be covered in snow, and decided high school wasn't something she needed to finish. Instead, she'd taken her fiddle and a bag and headed up "toward the music." The Gully, she and Mama had named the path they took toward each other, made it sound as if Mama's guitar and Tish's fiddle had called to each other until they'd finally met up.
The trouble was, Blue didn't remember anything about the stops along their journey. She'd been little when she listened, and they'd always told it as if it had been a fairy tale, not a tour map. Tish had grown up somewhere in Wyoming, she knew that much. If Cass was following the Gully, she'd be headed that direction. Northwest. The boots had agreed so far. Rochester was on the way.
While she waited, she paced. Back and forth, back and forth. Not much in the way of traffic, all of it passing quickly until a silver sedan slowed. The driver looked out at her. An older guy, graying hair cut military short, eyes hidden behind sunglasses. Slower, slower, one hand rising as if to wave. A chill creeping along her spine.
A roar, a rush of air, and the bus pulled into the stop. She grabbed her guitar, ticket in her free hand, and fell in behind the old woman. By the time she'd boarded the bus, the car had vanished. He'd probably been looking for directions. Shouldn't have been scary.
Still … She settled into her seat, happy to not be standing on the side of the road.
By the time the bus reached Rochester, Blue could have eaten her own hand. Not in a vague, metaphorical way, but in an I-haven't-eaten-for-too-long way, because gnawing at herself began to seem better than going without. Stepping out into the cold air only made it worse. The light was fading fast, and she stood outside the station and looked up and down the street for somewhere to eat.
She saw nothing. A busy road, traffic shooting past, the station set off by itself. More roads, and some run-down buildings farther along. She gripped her guitar a little more tightly. Again, the empty space where speech should have lived surrounded her. No calling after the people walking away from the bus, the little woman with the plastic bags. The bus driver, quick to disappear into the building.
She was alone. Almost. A woman, a little shorter than Blue, a little stout, dressed in a blue fleece jacket and a bright green fleece hat, watched her. When their eyes met, the woman smiled.
"Traveling? You look like a traveler."
Blue nodded.
"I knew it." The woman smiled like Blue's guidance counselor, phony through and through. "Not that you look much different from the Eastman students, but I just knew. In my heart, you know?" She pressed her hands to her chest.
Your heart, my ass. Not really the sort of thing she'd say out loud, even if she could, but it didn't mean it wasn't there. She hoped her smile was sweeter than her thoughts.
If it wasn't, that made no difference to the woman. "You're so lucky. Out here, meeting people, learning about the world. The opportunity for growth gives me goose bumps."
Shrinking's more likely if I don't get some food. This close, the carved rings the woman wore—not too expensive, but not cheap, either—and the opals in her ears shimmered as she moved. Someone who dressed her money down.
Blue scribbled quickly.
Yeah, it's cool. Just got into town, looking for a place to crash.
A tinny burst of sitars sounded. The woman rummaged through her patchwork purse, held up one finger as she answered the phone. Blue studied her. Black leggings stretched over short legs; a woven scarf, Mexican maybe, around her neck. An expensive smell—sandalwood softened with something sweet—wafted from her.
The conversation sounded private, but the woman stayed put, as if Blue were a tree instead of a girl. "I know," and "I miss you, too," and "We should never have tried that to begin with, but you know how these things are." Blue's stomach twisted with hunger. She checked her watch. The screen was blank. She tapped it with one finger, shook her wrist, but the blankness stayed.
She began to wonder whether the raised finger had been for her or was just some reflex associated with the phone. Standing on the sidewalk wasn't getting her any closer to eating. She picked up her guitar from where she'd set it and started down the street. She made it twenty feet before the woman yelled behind her.
"You, wait a minute, come back."
She turned back, pointed a finger at her chest. The woman nodded and returned to her conversation.
Exactly how long was she supposed to wait? And why? So they could talk about how cool it was to be wondering where she would spend the night? If she'd known where to go, she wouldn't have waited, but nothing looked promising along the road. She stood a few more minutes, the ache from her boots traveling up her legs, her frustration traveling down until they met somewhere around her waist.
She couldn't put her finger on what it was about the woman. Didn't matter. The woman was annoying, and Blue's stomach had swallowed her patience and dissolved it completely. She picked up her guitar again.
"I'll be home soon. You should call me later tonight. No, you should call. I won't remember. We can make real plans then." The woman tucked the phone back into her bag.
"You know how it is when you're thinking about someone and then they call you, just like the universe recognizes that energy and opens right up for you? I knew she needed me, and I opened myself, and there she was. Just like with you. That's just how things are for me. It's a gift, though it can be hard sometimes."
Blue waited, one foot cocked. The sinews in her ankles, her knees, felt stretched to their limits, as if they might tear at any minute, letting her legs walk away without her. Finally, she wrote.
Well, gotta go. Need to find food and a place.
"Oh, no, come stay with us," the woman said, with a patient smile. "It'll be a blessing for us. Travelers are considered magical in so many cultures, you know. We could always use a bit of luck." She gave a little laugh, as if luck were the punch line to a private joke.
You are off your rocker, lady. Not that Blue considered herself very threatening—average height, average build, curly brown hair, no ink, just a couple of loops in her ears—but still. She could have had Beck's bowie knife in her backpack, could have been pretending not to talk because it made her look harmless.
"Come on, I'm parked over there." The woman pointed out a black SUV.
Blue hesitated, but only for a moment. Truck-driving Lou had said to trust her gut about people. This woman, this nameless woman who did nothing but talk, didn't make her nervous. Annoyed, yes, bored, maybe, but she didn't make Blue's skin crawl the way a dangerous person would.
Besides, she needed food, and a place to sleep, and this beat wandering around in the cold and using up her cash. The wad of bills had seemed like a lot when she got it out of the bank, but the motel on the first night had cost more than she'd expected, and she didn't know how many nights she'd need a place to stay.
She hurried down the street after the woman.
