Chapter 5

“So it turns out, I love strawberry pie,” he says, picking at the first of the road pies as we pull away.

“You think you know a guy…” I tease.

He looks at me. We laugh. He’s dribbled a little red splatter of pie-jelly onto his chin, and instantly my Purpose in Life becomes clear: I’ve been brought here—to this life, to this country, to this half-forgotten stretch of desert highway, to the driver’s seat of this very car—to clean George Cortner’s stubbly moon-cheeked face with kisses. Involuntarily, I lean toward him. He raises an eyebrow.

I hand him a napkin and gun it up the on-ramp onto the 15.

Miles of brown desert and big blue sky unfold into many more miles of more brown desert and bigger blue sky. The 15 freeway unspools before us in great, uninterrupted lengths, and we follow it around curves and through map-speck towns because by this point in the drive, once we’ve blown past Zyzzyzx Road, alternatives are few and unappealing.