A Song for the Road

little-boy kisses she mourned to this day. The evening she kissed him good night and realized his cheek was stubbly. And the day he folded himself into the space between the top step of the kitchen stool and the carrying handle. He was all arms and legs, still skinny enough, but too tall to really fit. It must have been so uncomfortable, yet he sat there for fifteen minutes while she cooked dinner, because he needed to talk through a situation at school.
Memories took no time at all; Miriam was only a couple miles south of town when the sight of a bestickered suitcase and green backpack recalled her to the present. It took a moment to realize why it looked familiar. Then she remembered the pregnant girl who’d been sitting outside the quick stop yesterday. The one she’d thought was waiting for a bus.
Clearly, she hadn’t found one. And now she was walking. Walking through the back country of back countries. Hadn’t this girl ever seen Deliverance?
More to the point, where had she slept?
Teo would already have hit the brake. “Come on, Mira. Shelter the traveler, right?” He’d elbow her, give her his big, goofy grin, making a joke out of the works of mercy to deflect attention from how effortless he made them look.
She couldn’t just drive past. She knew too well how it felt to be pregnant and alone.
Miriam stopped in the middle of the deserted highway. The girl was a quarter mile behind her already. She muscled the car into reverse and let her foot off the clutch, promptly killing the engine. Good thing Becky wasn’t here to see Miriam abusing her car.
By the time she made it back to the hitchhiker, the girl had her wary face on. “I’m fine, thanks,” she said before Miriam even opened her mouth.
Miriam put the car in first to coast alongside. At least, that was the idea. A standard transmission in first gear wasn’t built for rolling; the car moved in fits and starts. “Running away from home?” she ventured.
The girl didn’t stop walking, but she did shoot Miriam a withering look. “Please. I’m twenty-two. I’m not running away from anyone.”
Well, maybe that hadn’t been the best approach. But Miriam knew desperation when she saw it. The girl was definitely running from something. Miriam studied her a moment. She was lovely, with that tawny beige skin and her myriad short, puffy ponytails. It was like looking at Talia, only a year or two older and biracial. “Please let me give you a ride,” she said.
“I don’t need help.”
Miriam sighed as the girl walked on. Teo would have already coaxed her whole history out of her. He’d always been better at that sort of thing.
Wait a minute. Was that leaf debris stuck to the girl’s jacket? And her socks? And her hair?
Miriam had the engine off and the door open before she realized she’d decided to act. “Did you sleep in the woods?”
The girl whirled. “Who the hell are you?”
Miriam stopped, raising her hands in a nonthreatening gesture. “I’m not following you! It’s just, you’re covered in leaves. And you’re … you’re pregnant.”
“Really?” The girl released her suitcase to flutter her hand over her heart. “Is that what all that kicking around in there is? Good thing somebody finally explained it to me!”
Miriam eyed the bump in the girl’s midsection. Six months, maybe? What on earth could have made this self-possessed, self-reliant young woman desperate enough to sleep in the woods?
Whatever it was, she clearly had no intention of letting herself be cowed. Miriam liked her already.
Even if she was stubborn to the point of cussedness, she thought as the girl started walking again. The psychedelic suitcase bumped awkwardly along the uneven shoulder.
Miriam hurried forward. “Look,” she said. “I’m not a psycho. I’m a church music director and a—”
The reality of her loss crashed down again. A child who lost its parents had a name: orphan. But what did you call a woman who had lost her entire family? She’d lost even her identity. “Well, I used to be a mother,” she said quietly.
A look Miriam couldn’t decipher flitted across the girl’s face. Finally, she’d made an impression.
Miriam rallied. “Look, it’s sixty miles before you’re going to hit an interstate, let alone a town where you can get a hotel room or a reasonable bite to eat. Think about your baby. Let me give you a ride.”
The girl stared her down. Then something seemed to give way. For a fleeting moment, Miriam saw again the lost look that had tugged at her heart yesterday. Then it disappeared into a casual shrug. “Fine, whatever.”
It took a little rearranging to make room for the huge suitcase in the trunk. The backpack the girl kept in the front seat, her arms wrapped around it. She wore a bright blue metal bracelet on her wrist. It had writing on it, but Miriam couldn’t see it well enough to read it. As the Hyundai started moving again, the girl glanced around the car. “That’s a guitar, right?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“What’s the other thing?”
“A cello.”
A beat, while the girl waited for an explanation Miriam had no intention of giving. Then: “Okay,” she said.
Now it was Miriam’s turn to make conversation. “So where are you headed?”
“Charleston.”
“South Carolina?”
“West Virginia.”
West. Not south. Miriam hadn’t realized she’d been hoping for an excuse to turn around. “Is Charleston home?”
“No, it’s the nearest bus station.”
“Oh.”
“What about you? Where are you headed?”
“Who knows?”
The girl gave her a quizzical look.
Miriam shifted through the gears and settled into sixth. She cleared her throat. “My kids wanted me to see this part of the country.”
“Your kids are …?” Clearly, the girl didn’t want to be the one to say it.
“They died.”
“How?”
“A car accident.” Miriam had no intention of going into further detail. “They wanted me to take a trip across the country. A flip-a-coin road trip with a bunch of stops along the way.”
The girl sucked in a gasp that unceremoniously launched a coughing fit. A bad one. Miriam