A Thousand Ways To Run

Chapter 21

The only way into Delaware was through a toll road, unless I wanted to venture a couple miles south down the border. Which I didn’t, not really. The Pontiac I was driving had Maryland plates and a full tank and it was borrowed. Only borrowed.  

By the time I paid the small fee of entering the great state of Delaware, I had missed the sign saying that the state held all rights to photograph and use video surveillance on drivers. That’s when I started cursing a lot and driving faster.  It was just past noon. Time would only tell when my face could be tracked down. I tried to ignore how stupid I felt and just move through traffic like a taxi driver. I cranked the radio and tried to sing along, even though I knew none of the songs. It helped a little.

Subconsciously, I kept checking behind to see if anyone was pursuing me. I was too paranoid for my own good, but deep down I knew the day was down to a rat race. They wouldn’t miss that one piece of evidence in the haystack, all I could do was keep going.

I was headed to Georgetown, a sleepy town in the southern part of Delaware, just hours from Washington D.C. by car or boat. So close and yet so far.

At first, I was terrified that I would never be able to make it to Georgetown, as I had been the whole trip. Wasting time by taking the bus, two taxis, and then borrowing the Pontiac had been safety measures too overtaken.  No one had been following me, and acting like I had a tail was such a waste of time. Not thinking through the toll booth was worse. All my efforts and much of Warren’s money was thrown down the drain. If I didn’t get to her house soon there was no knowing if I would ever get another opportunity. I could run and hide but my options were limited.

I wished Warren and I had established a means of communication so he could tell me what was happening back home. I never even thought to ask for his cell number. I’m a horrible girlfriend. And spy.

Getting stuck in traffic by Dover made me think a lot more about Georgetown than I ever had before.

I imagined she lived in a white or lightly colored house in a neighborhood with lots of little kids. I thought about the proximity of Georgetown to D.C. Eventually, my parent’s love story was fabricated in my imagination, so tragically sweet I wished it were real.

I knew from stories that my dad was about twenty-five when he lived in D.C. I imagined my mom being a few years younger with light, almost caramel hair when they must have met. I wondered if Georgetown was where she grew up, and if she just couldn’t leave her roots. I thought about how couples meet in the movies, that maybe he saved the subway door from closing so she could get on and the rest was history.

I pictured it frozen in traffic, and suddenly such a sickening tale turned sweet.

A boat ride across the Chesapeake doesn’t take too long. Though I knew my parents must have been in their mid-twenties, their faces morphed to teenagers in my mind. I saw my dad taking ferry rides on weeknights just to see her smile. I saw him as not so hard or calculating, just misunderstood. Sneaking up and throwing pebbles at her window, so enamored with each other they were willing to defy societal expectations.

I found myself smiling.

And then I realized there is a reason why dreams are fictitious. They’re happier that way.

In reality, my dad was probably some sort of self-entitled lothario, and I was probably a mistake. I wasn’t probably a mistake, though. I was just a lucky enough mistake to survive. And my mom was a mystery.

There wasn’t a trace of love in that story, no matter how hard I hoped things could work out. Some cuts will never heal, just continue to scab over and scar. All that was left of their relationship was a scar each one carried like a sick reminder.