Plan D is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, which I realize about halfway to Beaufort. In all of my scheming, giddy over the visual appeal of me rolling up to dinner in this Frankenstein’s monster of a car, I failed to remember that my new whip is a stick shift.

I had to feign confidence about this to Leon, because by then he already had the keys to my Saturn and was elated about the trade-up. (“Are you sure? Your car’s in much better shape than mine. Why do you want it? Are you sure?”) In my head, it looked like this: Nicholas bought Leon’s house without consulting me, so I’d go and buy Leon’s car without consulting him. I’d stun Mr. and Mrs. Rose, who are so snobby about cars that they make the landscaper park his rusty pickup in the garage to hide it from the neighbors.

They’ll see Nicholas’s Jeep and know something’s wrong with his brain. When they see my car, they’ll believe that whatever’s wrong with his brain is me. I’m a lower-class nobody with no shame who doesn’t deserve their son. I’m a madwoman, and I’ll drag him down to my level. No country club in Wisconsin will admit their precious boy when they see what kind of wife he’s shackled to.

I paid attention during Leon’s mini lesson, but even though he told me I have to accelerate at the same time I let off the clutch, when I first tried to get going I didn’t release the clutch quickly enough and the car shot forward, knocking over a dumpster in the Junk Yard’s lot.

The poor start got me rattled, I’ll admit. As I drive jerkily down the road in a car that still smells like pine forest, white-knuckling the wheel and gearshift, my nerves start to clash with the endorphin rush I get when I visualize Deborah’s face as I squeal this monstrosity into a parking space.

I begin to think I’ve made a grave error of judgment here.

I know for sure I have when I clatter and shake into Beaufort and the car stalls at a stoplight. I’ve forgotten to either hold down the clutch or shift into neutral while braking. Or something. I can’t remember Leon’s instructions anymore because there’s a line of twenty cars backed up behind me and the light’s green, but my vehicle is throttling me like I owe it money. I brake and put the car back into neutral, but I’m stressed and my other foot hits the gas. Everything is bad. Panic overwhelms. It’s fight or flight.

I abandon the car at the intersection, leaving the door wide open. People are honking. Someone rolls down their window and yells. I want to go back and shut the door, but adrenaline is burning up my veins and I can’t go back there; I’m never going back to that car for as long as I live, or to Morris, and all I know how to do now is run. Straight down into a ditch and up the other side into the parking lot of a shuttered Kmart, running, running, my nervous system on fire. I’m going to keep running all the way to California. I’ll change my name and start a new life.

This is the sunniest prospect I’ve had in ages.

I don’t pause to catch my breath until I’m on the other side of the Kmart, November air solidifying into ice cubes in my lungs. I’m so thankful for the big, empty building shielding me from all my problems. One of the drivers who honked at me is undoubtedly on the phone with a 911 operator. The situation will be eagerly described to an officer Who Has No Time For This Shit by ten bystanders, and everyone on the scene will deduce that I’m high on bath salts. They’ll call a tow truck while a cop chases me down with a Taser.

Frankencar’s still registered to poor, well-meaning Leon and he’s going to take the fall for me. I have to go back. I’m never going back.

My thighs are cold and chafed, so the buzzing in my pocket doesn’t catch my full attention until the fourth time it happens. It’s Nicholas, of course.

You’re VERY late. Where are you??

I’m out of your reach, Dr. Rose. I’m in no-man’s-land. Good luck trying to find me out here behind the decaying husk of a superstore.

That’s what I want to reply. But according to my phone it’s fifty-three degrees with RealFeel of forty-eight, and I’m not cut out for a life of consistent exercise. I’m so out of shape that I’m still wheezing, dreams of California dissolving into the wind. I’m going to get stabbed out here. I’m so glad I’m wearing real clothes instead of pajamas.

Save me, I reply instead. I whine it aloud, too.

From what?

You. Your mother. Frostbite.

I snap a picture of the parking lot and send it. Car broke down. I’m stranded.

His phone call cuts me off midsentence: I’ve got Dots candy in my coat pocket. I’m going to leave a trail like Hansel and

“Naomi?” He sounds afraid. “How far into town are you? What happened?”

“That car is crap!” I exclaim. “It tried to kill me.”

“I told you a million miles ago to change your oil and you said it was none of my business.” In his mind, he’s twirling through a field of I-Told-You-So’s. That’s his idea of heaven.

“Not that car. I traded it for Leon’s clunker. It’s a stick shift, Nicholas. I don’t know how to drive a fricking stick shift! Bad things happened and I left it in the middle of the road. Now I’m in a Kmart parking lot.” I kick a rock and squint up at the gray building, then a scattering of other dark buildings with empty parking lots along the same strip. I’m in a retail graveyard. “Maybe it’s a Toys R Us.”

“Jesus Christ.” I can hear cars whooshing by on his end of the line. He’s out on the sidewalk.

“Don’t let me die here. I want to be somewhere warm when I go.”

“Yeah, better ease into those warmer temperatures. It’ll get a lot hotter once you arrive at your destination.” I’m about to wail. “You need to tell me exactly where you are.”

I wring my hands. Nicholas is on the phone, which makes him feel close, so it’s okay to freak out now. He’s going to remain calm no matter what. We’ve always been balanced that way: when one of us loses it, the other can’t. Whoever didn’t call dibs on instant hysterics has no choice but to keep it together.

“The first stoplight when you get into town. I went off, uh, into a ditch. Not in the car, I mean. I left on foot.”

“Why did you leave your car?”

“I don’t know! It all happened so fast. Give me time to think of a better excuse.”