Chapter 11
Brenton lay more than two hundred miles west. Rachel measured the distance against the scale in the margin and counted twice.
Two hundred and twelve miles, give or take.
On foot, even without delays, the trip would take at least two weeks and maybe three.
Every day between here and there would be another day Hannah and Caleb woke to a world without power and a mother who hadn’t come home.
She felt the pull in her chest as sharply as hunger.
She wanted to start walking. Every hour she delayed was another hour her children spent wondering whether she was alive.
Walter would keep them safe as long as he could, but he was one man in a town facing the same collapse she was seeing.
Two weeks was too long in a world where nothing worked.
She made herself look east. The road toward Sophie’s aunt ran through smaller towns, crossed the state line into Pennsylvania, and ended in a county she’d visited twice for other placements.
The distance was about fifty-five miles.
Against Brenton’s impossible distance, it almost felt manageable.
It meant four days of walking, maybe five, depending on the roads and how well Sophie held up.
Sophie had eaten half the granola bar she’d kept from earlier.
Rachel hadn’t told her to ration it, but the girl had broken it deliberately, eaten one half, and tucked the remainder into her pocket without being asked.
She stood beside the SUV now, one hand resting on the hood near the edge of the map, and Rachel watched her eyes move from the western section Rachel had been studying to the eastern route.
“Are we going to Brenton?” Sophie asked.
The question hung between them. Rachel could have answered immediately.
She could have said yes and started packing for the western route, and part of her wanted to do exactly that with an urgency that made her fingers tighten on the map’s edge.
She didn’t answer because the honest answer was that she didn’t know, and Sophie deserved more than a lie delivered for comfort.
Sophie was still in her custody. The paperwork existed in a file at the county office that might as well have been on another planet now, but the responsibility hadn’t vanished with the electricity.
More importantly, leaving a thirteen-year-old with strangers along a collapsing highway wasn’t something Rachel could live with.
She had removed children from situations where adults had made exactly that choice, and the case files had never let her forget what followed.
If Rachel reached Sophie’s aunt, Sophie would have family and shelter.
She would have an adult legally responsible for her, one who had passed a home visit and a background check, for whatever those things were worth.
Rachel could leave Sophie there with a clear conscience and turn west alone.
Without a child beside her, she could move faster and cover more ground each day.
The logic was clean, and it made sense on paper.
It was still unbearable because it meant walking away from her children for every eastbound mile.
Each mile would carry her farther from Hannah’s doorway, from Caleb’s question about what time she’d be home, and from the conversation she’d promised would happen at six o’clock.
Each mile east was a mile she wasn’t traveling west, and that fact tightened her ribs until it hurt.
Rachel traced the route with her index finger.
The road followed the state route through small towns she’d never visited, crossed a river she couldn’t name, and led into the county where Sophie’s aunt lived.
She had seen photographs of the house, but she’d never stepped inside it.
Sophie watched her hand move across the paper.
“You’re taking me farther away from your kids?” Sophie asked.
She hadn’t phrased it as an accusation. Her voice was flat and certain, which made the question harder than shouting would have. Rachel looked at her. Sophie’s gray-green eyes stayed on the map and on the line her finger had drawn away from Brenton.
“Yes,” Rachel said.
The word came out quieter than she intended.
She didn’t qualify it or explain it or soften its edges because Sophie had asked a direct question and deserved a direct answer.
The girl absorbed this without visible reaction.
Her hand remained on the hood of the SUV, her fingers splayed against the warm metal, and for a long moment she said nothing at all.
The highway continued emptying around them.
A family with young children passed on the shoulder, the parents carrying bags while the children walked between them.
Their shoes scuffed through grit and broken glass, and the hot air carried the sour smell of exhaust from the stalled lanes.
An older couple moved more slowly, the man supporting the woman’s elbow with careful attention.
The sedan that had been sitting with its hood up all morning was finally abandoned, its owner walking east with a backpack and a determined expression, suggesting he had made his decision and wouldn’t be returning to check the ignition again.
Rachel folded the map along its creases and set it on the tailgate.
Fifty-five miles east meant miles away from Hannah and Caleb.
She would still make that choice, because leaving Sophie behind wasn’t a choice she could live with.
Sophie was still looking at the map, at the folded section that now hid Brenton from view. Dry grass brushed against the backpack as she lifted it, and the strap rasped softly over her sweatshirt. She picked up her backpack from the grass and slung it over one shoulder without speaking.
“Your aunt is the closest person I have reason to believe can keep you safe. That doesn’t make it the right choice for you. I know that, but it’s the only one I can make with the information I have,” Rachel said.
“You could leave me here with one of these families. Someone with kids. They’d probably take me if you asked,” Sophie said.