The Mor Road

by Jennifer AlLee

  While Lindsay continues her tirade, I take my phone out of my purse, dial 911, and console myself with a platitude: after this, there's nowhere to go but up.

  Otherwise, we're in a whole mess of trouble.

  15

  Lindsay and I are sitting on the edge of a concrete planter in front of the Santa Monica Police Department when Jade pulls up and honks her horn.

  "Finally." It's the first word Lindsay has uttered in over two hours. She stopped talking to me after I lost my temper back at the pier and yelled that the loss of her iPod didn't qualify as a catastrophe.

  I clutch my purse close to me, thanking God one more time that I chose to carry it on the pier rather than leave it in the car, and get into the front seat. Lindsay is already sulking in the back.

  "Thanks, Jade."

  "No problem." She puts on her blinker and pulls smoothly away from the curb. "I should warn you, though. If you plan to make a habit of this during your trip, you're on your own. One police station visit a year is plenty."

  "That won't be an issue. I have no intention of doing this again anytime soon."

  My stomach rumbles and I look down at my watch. Three o'clock. No wonder. "I'm starving."

  "Do you want to stop and get something?" Jade asks.

  "Yeah, I do."

  "What sounds good?"

  "Hmm. I don't know. What about you, Lindsay?" I look back at her. "What sounds good to you?"

  "Nothing," she grumbles, her face pressed against the cushioned backrest.

  Fine. Then we'll just get what I want. "Anything sound good to you, Jade?"

  She laughs. "If you're feeling brave, we could head over to Taco-Rama. Thirty-four percent beef can't be beat!"

  I sigh and shake my head. "I used to love those tacos. Now I can't go near them."

  "Aw, come on. You ate them for years. What's the difference now?"

  "Well, now I know that only 34 percent of the ground beef actually is beef. So what's the other 66 percent made of?"

  "You don't want to know."

  "That's my point."

  I catch motion out of the corner of my eye. Lindsay is waving one hand in the air, while holding the other up to her mouth.

  "Ruby!" she calls.

  "It's Jade."

  "Whatever. Pull over."

  Jade addresses Lindsay through the rearview mirror. "You don't look so good."

  "I'm gonna be sick."

  Jade pulls over. The car barely comes to a stop before Lindsay pushes the door open, stumbles out, and loses it on the side of the freeway.

  "Your sister's a real charmer," Jade says with a smirk.

  I should jump to Lindsay's defense, but all I can do is nod. I stare through the front window, trying to ignore the sound of retching from outside the car, but it's impossible. "Do you think I should go out and help her?"

  Jade purses her lips. "I think she's doing just fine on her own."

  "I'm serious."

  "So am I. What could you possibly do to help?"

  "I could give her moral support. Let her know I'm there for her."

  "Trust me, she'll just feel worse if you're watching her toss her cookies. There are some things a person has to do all by herself."

  And there are some things a person wishes she could do all by herself. Right now, I wish I could drive to Illinois alone. It was bad enough when I thought I just had to share the car with my sister's lousy attitude. Now, I've got her delicate stomach to worry about too.

  Not funny, God. Not funny at all.

  16

  It's another three days before we're ready to leave on our trip. Not only did I have to arrange for alternate transportation, I had to take Lindsay shopping to replace her clothes and other essential items. During that time, Lindsay has stayed at my house, bunking in the guest bedroom. She locks herself in there for hours on end. She says she just wants to be alone, but from the muffled sounds coming through the door, I can tell she's on her phone, most likely talking to Ben.

  Every morning I half expect her to be gone. And every morning when she opens the door to her room and comes out for breakfast, I feel a twinge of disappointment. Followed swiftly by guilt.

  But this morning is different. The loaner car sent over by my insurance company—an amazing convertible that I'm sure was supposed to go to some car-less celebrity but was mistakenly delivered to me—is packed and ready to go. Jade, who will be house-sitting while I'm gone, sits at the kitchen table, her hands cupped around her Starbucks cup, a frown indicating her displeasure at getting up so early. It's a look mirrored by Lindsay as she shuffles in with her purse slung over her shoulder and a backpack of sundries hanging from the crook of her elbow.

  That's okay. Let them both be grouchy. I have no idea what this trip holds in store for us, but I'm itching to find out. For the first time in a long time, I'm excited about something. And no one is going to bring me down.

  "I must have been crazy to let you talk me into this."

  Not even my crabby sister.

  Jade stands up and I walk into her open arms. "Have a safe trip," she says against my hair.

  I pull away and blink back the unexpected emotion of the moment. "I'm going to miss you."

  She waves the thought away. "Are you kidding? You won't even think about me. Not with Little Miss Sunshine keeping you company."

  I laugh, despite the glare Lindsay shoots at us. "If you need anything, call me."

  "I will."

  "And if Tony gives you any trouble—"

  "I'll sic your lawyer on him. I've got it. Now get going."

  Quickly, I take a last look around the kitchen. Even though I'm coming back, there's something final about leaving this time. It's one more door I'm closing on another part of my old life: the meals I cooked here, the times Tony came up behind me as I stood at the stove so he could poke a finger into whatever pot I was stirring and tell me it needed more salt, how I'd laugh and tell him one cook in the kitchen was more than enough. Moments like those will never come again.

  I wonder . . . does Erin cook? Does she hold out a wooden spoon for him to take a taste? Does he pull her to him for a kiss, their unborn baby sandwiched between them?

  "Natalie." Jade's voice breaks in on my reverie. "Everything's going to be fine. Have fun."

  Have fun. A tall order. The excitement I felt earlier has dissipated, leaving nagging dread in its place. What am I doing with my life? Am I throwing it all away? Was Pastor Dave right? Should I have fought harder to save my marriage?

  Lindsay puts her free hand on her hip with a grunt. "Are we leaving or not?"

  There stands my sister, so different from the girl I thought she'd be. Maybe I've made a mess of my life, but it's not too late for Lindsay to turn hers into something she's proud of. And the first step is to get her far away from her abusive boyfriend.

  "You bet we're leaving." I head to the garage door, motioning for her to follow. "Adventure awaits us."

  Lindsay falls asleep in the car as soon as I pull out of the driveway. It's entirely possible she's faking in order to avoid talking to me. I don't really care. In fact, having her in a state of unconsciousness, be it real or put on, is a blessing I plan to savor.

  I push the button on the stereo, thankful for a car with satellite radio. The next time my insurance company sends me a survey I'm going to give them five stars for service. I may even remember to put it in the mail this time.

  The first leg of our journey is made up of roads with which I'm extremely familiar. From Foothill Boulevard, down Shamrock, then east on Huntington Drive until it turns into another segment of Foothill Boulevard, I try to look through different eyes. The eyes of an adventuresome explorer, seeing things she's never seen before: the Aztec Hotel in Monrovia, looking like it was left behind by a lost tribe; the Route 66 Memories antique shop in Rancho Cucamonga, guarded over by a menagerie of metal dinosaur sculptures; and lots of Historic Route 66 signs. All unique and interesting, but nothing worth disturbing my sleeping sister. Until
we reach Fontana and the giant orange.

  As I pull the car over to the curb, Lindsay peeks through one eye. "Please tell me we've made it to Illinois."

  "Nope. Just the first of many great photo ops." I hop out of the car, camera in hand, but she makes no move to follow. "Come on out so I can get a shot of you with the orange."

  "The what?" Both of her eyes are open now as she turns to look at the structure behind me. "You've got to be kidding."

  I turn on the camera and, holding a guidebook off to the side where I can still read it, start narrating. "This is Bono's Historic Orange in Fontana, California. Built in 1936, it was saved from demolition in the 1990s by the Fontana Historical Society and moved three miles to this location in 1997." I swing the camera to the right. "It sits beside Bono's Restaurant and Deli, which, sadly, appears to be out of business."

  Behind me, the car door closes. I turn around and point the camera at Lindsay. "What do you think?" I ask her.

  "It's big. And it's orange."

  Thank you, Captain Obvious. "Yes, it is. They used to sell orange juice out of it. But now, it's a reminder of a simpler time."

  "A simpler time when men made drink stands shaped like fruit."

  I laugh, and am rewarded by the glimmer of a smile playing at the corner of Lindsay's mouth. Maybe this trip won't be so bad after all.

  She looks around, whipping her head from side to side. "Is there a bathroom around here? I've got to pee."

  Ah, another beautiful moment recorded for posterity. I shut off the camera and move toward the car. "Come on. There's a gas station on the corner."

  While Lindsay takes care of business, I fill up with gas and ponder just how scenic this trip should be. I had been planning on seeing as many sights as possible, but that was before I took into account the demands of a pregnant woman's bladder. Now I'm thinking it might be better to take a more direct route.

  When Lindsay pops back in the car, she's carrying a bag of potato chips and a huge soda cup with "thirsty-two ouncer" emblazoned on the side.

  "This should hold me until we reach the big banana," she says, then takes a slurp through the straw.

  "What banana?"

  "I don't know. I just figured there'd be more enormous fruit along the way."

  Oh, yeah. It's looking like the shorter this trip is, the better.

  17

  Nothing makes my sister happy.

  When I stay on the highway, she complains there's nothing to see. When I venture off onto old 66 and stop at what I think is a fun and interesting sight, she complains about how lame it is. The hotel we stayed at last night was, I hoped, a compromise. It had authentic old-time charm, but the sign out front boasted air-conditioning and color TV. Unfortunately, the TV only got three stations and the air conditioner rattled like a rock tumbler. Chalk up one more bad choice for me.

  This morning, after our complimentary breakfast of cold cereal and instant coffee for me, milk for Lindsay, I gave her control of the radio. At least if she chose the music, she'd have one less thing to complain about. That's what I hoped, anyway.

  "I can't believe this." She punches a button, listens to five seconds of a song, then changes the station. Again. And again. "There are like, fifty stations, and nothing good on."

  I want to slap her hand away from the controls, but I restrain myself. Maybe, if I sing a song in my head, I can tune her out. The first thing that comes to mind is less than ideal, but once it starts playing in my brain, I can't get rid of it.

  I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts . . .

  "I wish I still had my iPod."

  . . . there they are all standing in a row . . .

  "But no, you had to be all Steven Spielberg on the pier."

  . . . big ones, small ones, some as big as your head . . .

  "If we hadn't stopped, my stuff wouldn't have been stolen. I should never have come with you in the first place."

  "That's it!" With a squeal of tires I jerk the car to the side of the road, gravel spraying out from beneath our tires. "Get out."

  "What?" Lindsay clutches the dashboard with one hand, her shoulder strap with the other.

  "You heard me. Get out. If you're so unhappy, get out of the car."

  "Are you nuts? We're in the middle of the desert."

  "Fine. Then I'll get out."

  I've completely lost my mind. I push the car door open, slam it shut behind me, and start walking down the road. As luck would have it, I picked part of old 66 on which to have my mental breakdown. There are no other cars around, no sign of life that I can see. But I don't care. I need to get as far away from my sister as I can.

  "Natalie!" She calls after me. "Natalie? Where are you going? You can't just leave me here!"

  Oh, can't I? Tony left me. Just up and walked away. He didn't care how much it hurt, how he broke my heart, destroyed my career. Why should I care about anybody else now?

  With every step, emotions churn faster, hotter. Is it too much to ask that I be appreciated by somebody? Tony doesn't need my love. Lindsay doesn't want it. The sun beats down, but a chill sweeps through my body, freezing me to the cracked pavement beneath my feet.

  I'm a failure. I failed in my marriage. I failed at my career. I'm even failing at being a sister.

  Who am I now? Who have I ever been?

  The gravel crunches behind me and a hand grasps my arm. I turn to see Lindsay, her blond and burgundy hair blowing in the breeze, her face white as a surrender flag. "Natalie, I'm sorry. Please come back to the car."

  Please. Say the magic word, Mom used to tell us. Back when we were kids, saying please would get us almost anything. Funny how well that word still works on me.

  "Okay."

  An SUV roars past as we trudge back to the car. Once we're sitting down, I take a swig from my water bottle. Then I look at Lindsay. "I can't fight with you anymore."

  Her eyebrows furrow. "We weren't fighting."

  "Maybe I wasn't fighting with you, but you were fighting with me." She opens her mouth, but I put my hand up before any words come out. "Since the minute I got to your apartment, you've been unhappy and hostile toward me. Everything I've done has been wrong."

  "You have to admit, the trip's been kind of bumpy so far."

  She's right about that. But I can't help thinking the bumps would be less annoying if she weren't so crabby. "Look, I know I'm not perfect, but I'm doing the best I can. It would help if you'd try too."

  "How do you know I'm not?"

  "Doing the best you can?"

  "Trying."

  It hadn't occurred to me that, after all these years, maybe this was the best Lindsay could do with me. With thirteen years separating us, we'd barely known each other as children. As grown women, we don't know each other at all. Not in any way that matters. Essentially, we are two strangers who decided to take a very long, potentially life-changing drive together.

  I reach over and pat her hand. For once, she doesn't roll her eyes or make a face at the contact. "I guess all we can both do is try."

  "Does that mean you're not going to ditch me on the side of the road?"

  "No." I turn the key in the ignition, bringing the car back to life. Now that we've established a shaky rapport, I can't resist teasing her just a bit. "Not today, at least."

  18

  Welcome to Oatman." A grizzled fellow calls out with a wave as I park the car in front of an old, wood-frame building. One strong wind could probably blow the place over.

  Lindsay gives him a halfhearted wave in return, then whispers to me, "Are you sure you want to get out here?"

  "Positive. According to Alice, Oatman is a must-see town."

  "Alice?"

  "My automobile club advisor."

  Her lips form a silent "Oh" and we get out of the car.

  Oatman, Arizona, is busier than I expected. Young couples, families with kids, and older folks who I assume are retired, stroll up and down both sides of the street. But the most interesting visitors in Oatman are the four-leg
ged kind.

  Lindsay keeps her back plastered against the car. "There's a donkey on the sidewalk."

  I tap her shoulder and point behind us. "There are a few in the street too. And one's about ready to walk into the general store."

  The animals are everywhere. Lindsay wrinkles up her nose. "Is it always like this?"

  The man who welcomed us to town barks out a laugh and slaps his thigh. "You bet it is. Them are gen-u-ine descendants of gold rush–era burros. When the gold ran out, so did the miners. But they left their asses behind."

  I'm struck speechless by his colorful turn of phrase, but Lindsay is warming up to the fellow. She takes a step forward, looking at a big, dark-gray burro walking around the corner of the building. "Are they friendly?"

  "Depends what you consider friendly," the man says. "Mostly, they're big beggars. Sometimes they bite, but usually only cuz they're in a hurry to eat whatever's being handed out."

  Lindsay grins. "Can we feed them?"

  "No," I say.

  At the very same time, the stranger answers, "Yeah!"

  Okay, the animals are kind of cute, but they have really big teeth. And more than a few germs, I'm sure. "We don't have anything they'd like."

  "No problem, there. Every business in town sells burro chow."

  Lindsay looks at me and I shrug. "What's burro chow?" she asks the man.

  "Feed pellets. Lots of places have carrots too. In fact . . ." The man reaches into the deep pocket of his baggy jeans. "Here you go. This one's on me."

  Lindsay takes the limp carrot he hands her. "Thanks."

  It's the most unappetizing vegetable I've ever seen, and I can't imagine it interesting any of the burros. But the steady clop-clop of hooves tells me otherwise. Three of them are walking straight at Lindsay.

  Two of them poke at her with their muzzles while the other shakes his head up and down, his upper lip pulled back to offer a toothy grin. With a yelp, she drops the carrot on the ground. She backs away from the trio as they ignore her and fight halfheartedly over the discarded treat.