Saving Grace (4 page)

I looked over at Justin, driving with one hand, elbow up on the doorframe. Since I'd had the baby I hadn't seen that much of him. I'd heard a rumor that he was seeing some other girl. Some of my so-called friends just couldn't wait to tell me stories like that. I didn't even listen because I knew it was just certain people who were jealous of me and Justin and
wanted to hurt me. I'd even told Justin about all the gossip and he'd said it wasn't true—which I knew. He'd said he hadn't been around much because he didn't want to do anything to get my dad pissed off at me. But now we were going to be a family. Once we got to Montreal it'd just be me and Justin and Brianna and we'd be happy.

Justin looked down at the dashboard and muttered something I didn't hear. “What is it?” I asked.

“You got much money?” he said.

“Some,” I answered carefully. “Why?” Brianna coughed in her sleep and moved around in the car seat. Her nose was running again. I found a Kleenex to wipe it. There was still some dried crusty stuff on one side, but I was afraid I'd wake her up if I tried to pick it off.

“We need to stop for gas.”

“What do you mean?”

Justin leaned over and knocked on my head with his fist. “Knock, knock, Evie. Anyone home?”

I pulled my head away. “Cut it out, Justin,” I said. “Do we have to stop now? Can't we go a little farther?”

“No.”

I could tell by his voice that he was getting mad.

“You wanna get to Montreal?” he snapped. “You wanna get five more freakin' minutes down the road? We need gas.”

“Okay. Fine,” I said. I found my purse and pulled out a twenty. “Is this enough?” I asked, holding out the money.

“It's not going to get us very far,” Justin said.

I found another twenty-dollar bill. “Here. But that's it. Brianna's gonna need diapers and food and stuff when we get to Montreal.”

Justin mumbled something, then grabbed the money, jamming the bills into the pocket of his jeans. “Watch for a gas station,” he said.

We both spotted the place at the same time—a convenience store with a couple
of gas pumps. Just as Justin slowed down to turn, I smelled it. Something awful, a smell like a backed-up sewer, filled the truck.

“Aw, shit,” Justin said. “What the—” He put the back of his hand up to his nose.

I remembered that smell from babysitting. It was the part I always hated. But this was different because Brianna was my baby. “It's just a dirty diaper,” I said to Justin. “I can change her right here while you get the gas.”

He pulled in next to the gas pumps, shut off the truck and got out. Brianna was still sleeping. She was such a good baby.

I undid the belt and lifted her out of the seat. She was warm and she didn't smell very good, but I could've held on to her forever. She settled in on my shoulder. I brushed bits of her fuzzy hair off her forehead. She had such long eyelashes—just like Justin. And her fingernails, they were so tiny. I'd never
seen fingernails so little. How the heck was I going to cut them?

Brianna had the same long fingers as my mother. Piano-player fingers. My mother could play the piano without even looking at music. She used to say the music was in her head. She tried to teach me to play, but there wasn't any music in my head at all. And my fingers were short and stubby.

After my mom died, my dad sold the piano and gave all her CDs to the Sally Ann. He didn't even ask me if I wanted them.

I leaned over and kissed Brianna's fingers. Maybe there'd be music in her head. Maybe she'd play the piano for me when she was older, just the way my mother had done. All of a sudden there was a lump in my throat and I had to swallow hard a couple of times to get it to go down.

Brianna coughed, opened her eyes and made whimpering noises. “Shush, Mama's here,” I told her.

She twisted in my arms and made more fussy sounds. It was hard to hold on to her and get out the diapers and stuff I needed, but I managed to get everything, spread the changing pad on the seat and lay her down. I had to open
the truck door, stand outside and lean over the seat.

Brianna wouldn't stay still. She kicked and squirmed and I could barely get the snaps undone on her sleepers. She'd loaded her diaper. I didn't know what the Hansens had been feeding her, but it was rank. The smell made me gag. For a second I thought I was going to puke. I knew Justin would freak if I puked in his truck.

I turned my head and sucked in fresh air. Well, not totally fresh. It smelled kind of like gas a bit, but it was better than the baby poop smell.

I got the diaper off and folded it into a little package, but I didn't know what to do with it. I should've brought some garbage bags. I felt around under the seats and found a rag Justin used to rub spots off the truck. It wasn't exactly a rag. It felt kind of like a suede jacket.

I wiped all the poop off Brianna using a bunch of baby wipes. Then I wrapped them and the diaper up in Jason's truck-cleaning
cloth. I hoped he wouldn't be mad, but there wasn't anything else to use.

Before I could get a new diaper on Brianna, she peed. Some of it ran off the changing pad onto the seat of the truck. I grabbed a handful of wipes and mopped up most of it. Finally I got the clean diaper on her and a new pair of sleepers. The diaper was a little bit big, but the sleepers fit perfectly.

Justin finally came back. He had a bag of Cheezies and a can of Coke in one hand. “It still stinks in here,” he said.

“I need another bottle of water and some apple juice,” I said as I fastened Brianna into the car seat again. He just stood there. “Justin.” I glared at him.

He held out his hand. “I need more money.” I gave him five dollars. He set his Coke and Cheezies on the seat. While he was gone I used another one of the baby wipes to get the crusty stuff off the baby's nose.

Justin came back with a bottle of water and a little bottle of juice. The water wasn't very cold.

“Didn't they have any water colder than this?” I said.

He shrugged. “That's all I saw.”

I filled a baby bottle about half full of the apple juice. Brianna sucked it down. But before I could even undo the belt in the car seat, she puked. It went everywhere. On her clothes and blanket. In the car seat. On the truck seat.

“Aw, Jesus,” Justin shouted. “There's freakin' barf all over my truck.”

I'd already grabbed a handful of baby wipes from the box. I cleaned Brianna's face and hands first. “She's just a baby,” I said over my shoulder to Justin. “She can't help it. Babies puke. And maybe you don't remember, but you've puked in this truck a couple of times.”

“This is a total piss-up,” Justin raved. “I just cleaned the entire inside last night. Now it stinks.”

“Too friggin' bad,” I yelled at Justin.

He grabbed the can of Coke and fired it across the service station lot. It hit
a telephone pole and bounced on the pavement. Brown foam sprayed all over the ground.

I'd pretty much cleaned up Brianna, the car seat and the truck. I dumped a heap of dirty wipes in the garbage can between the gas pumps. I wadded up the blanket that was over the baby and threw that away too.

The cloth with the poopy diaper and wipes was still on the truck floor. I picked it up and turned to throw it away too.

“What the hell are you doing with that?” Justin yelled. “That's my polishing cloth. Don't throw that out.”

I dropped everything in the garbage. “It's a rag,” I said. “You can get another one. I needed something to wrap up the dirty diaper and stuff.”

“That's not a rag. You are so stupid! That's a polishing cloth for doing the truck bumpers.”

“Big hairy deal,” I shouted back. “Like anyone cares what your stupid bumpers look like.” I reached down to
find a blanket in my backpack, and Justin grabbed my arm.

“I'm not doing this, Evie,” he said. His face was so close to mine that bits of spit hit me as he said the words. “I'm done. We're going back.”

“No.” I tried to wrench my arm away but he held on tightly.

“Yes.”

“You're Brianna's father and you don't even care about her.”

“I don't want to be her father,” Justin said. “She was a freakin' accident. We screwed around and we screwed up. She's only here 'cause the condom broke. I'm not her father, Evie, and you're not her mother. Not for real. Her real mother and father are back there in that house probably going crazy worrying about her.”

I finally managed to twist out of his grasp. I could see the red imprint of his fingers on my wrist.

“We're her family,” I said. “We're the only family she needs.” Brianna
was crying. I put my hand on her head. “You're scaring her, Justin.”

“Give it up, Evie,” Justin said. He pulled his hand through his hair again. “We're not a family. She has one but we're not it. You think you're gonna be a fashion designer in Montreal? Right. You'll end up working at the dollar store. You saw that house. Those people can give her stuff that you can't.”

“You mean like a big house and fancy clothes? That stuff doesn't matter. Nobody can love Brianna like I do.” I straightened her little hat and she twisted her head away from me.

“She doesn't even like you, Evie,” Justin said quietly.

“She just doesn't remember me. But she will,” I said. “She spent nine whole months inside me. She knows me. She'll remember.”

“You just don't get it. It's not happening.” Justin wiped his hand down the side of his face. “We'd be lucky to even get close to Montreal. You think the
cops aren't going to catch up with us? You kidnapped a baby, Evie. She isn't yours anymore.”

“You know, you're acting like you don't even love your own kid,” I said.

“I don't,” Justin said. “But the Hansens do. We have to take her back. Maybe they'll let you come and visit and stuff. You know, like at Christmas and her birthday.”

“I don't want to visit a couple of times a year,” I shouted. “I want to be with her all the time. And after this do you really think they'd let me anywhere near her? I'm not going back.”

“I'm not doing this,” Justin said. “It's over, Evie.” He snapped the side of my head with his thumb and finger. “Get that through your head.” Then he turned and stalked away.

My heart was pounding and my hands were shaking. I made myself take some deep breaths in and out, but they were all jerky. I got back into the truck and bent over Brianna. She'd stopped crying.
Her face was flushed. “Don't worry,” I told her. “Nobody's taking you away from me. Not Justin. Not the police. Not anybody.”

I looked around the service station lot. Then I saw Justin inside the building. He was talking on the phone.

No.

It felt like someone had punched me in the gut. Tears filled my eyes and rolled down my face. I swiped them away with the edge of my hand. There was no time. “It'll be okay,” I whispered to the baby.

I felt around on the floor of the truck and shoved everything into the backpack—the bottle of water, the rest of the juice, my purse, everything. Then I unfastened the seat belt that was holding
the car seat in place. I looked over at the convenience store again. Justin was still on the phone. My heart felt like it had jumped up into my throat, but I knew what I had to do.

I reached up and turned off the little dome light in case Justin looked this way. I opened the truck door, slid down off the seat and hiked my pack onto my back. Then I grabbed the car seat and, staying low to the ground, scurried across the parking lot and let the darkness swallow us.

There wasn't any traffic on the road, but I stayed way over on the edge of the pavement just in case. It was slow walking with the car seat. It kept banging against my leg every time I took a step. After a few minutes of walking, I looked down the embankment next to the road. I could just barely make out some kind of gravel trail that wound away through the bushes. If I could get down there, I thought, there was no way Justin would be able to find me.

The bank wasn't that steep—mostly big rocks and grass. “Okay, okay, we can do this,” I said to Brianna. I wrapped both arms around the car seat and eased my way down, feeling with my feet because I couldn't really see where we were going. One foot slipped on the long grass and I lost my balance and ended up sliding the rest of the way on my butt, but I held on tight to Brianna. I set the car seat down on the ground and leaned in to check on her.

She gave me a wide-eyed
what-the-hell-was-that?
look. “We're okay. We made it,” I told her. Her nose was drippy again. I found a Kleenex in my pocket and wiped it one more time. I wished babies knew how to blow.

I got up and brushed the dirt off my pants. We were right by the edge of the trail. It turned up ahead so I couldn't see where it went, but I knew it had to be a lot safer than being up on the road. I shifted my backpack to one side a little and picked up the car seat. I suddenly
remembered something my mother used to say whenever we were going somewhere—even just to the store. She'd grin at me like it was some kind of big adventure and then she'd say, “We're off to see the wizard.” I never even knew what that meant. But I smiled at Brianna and said it anyway, “We're off to see the wizard.”

I followed the trail because I didn't really know what else to do. I needed to find a bus station so I could get to Montreal...or anywhere, as long as it was away from here. I finally figured out how to hold the car seat on one side so it didn't keep hitting my leg, but it was heavy and I still had to keep shifting it from one arm to the other.

When the trail came out of the trees I could see another road running beside it, but there were enough bushes and we were far enough away that I figured no one would spot us. And the trail seemed to be getting closer to some kind of downtown. If I could find a place with
a phone, I could look in the phone book for a bus station.