Guyaholic (8 page)

When I get back to the house, I hurry straight to the computer and research my plans. The distance between Brockport and San Antonio, using the route I want, is 1,850 miles. If I drive 370 miles every day, it will take about five days. So that means I could leave Brockport one morning and stay in a motel somewhere in Ohio that first night. Then I’d drive through Chicago and sleep over with Mara, before heading down to St. Louis, where I’d do another motel. Aimee has some friends in Springfield, Missouri, so I could see if they’d take me in for a night. Then a motel in Oklahoma and, from there, I’d head down through Texas. So that makes three or four motels and seven or eight tanks of gas and I guess food and tolls. I check my bank account. If I don’t spend money on anything stupid, I definitely have enough for the trip.

By the time I sit down with my grandparents that afternoon, I’ve prepared every answer under the sun. But when I announce that I’m driving to San Antonio, my grandpa leans back on the couch, crosses his arms over his chest, and says, “Absolutely not.”

My grandma shakes her head. “I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“It’s not just a bad idea,” my grandpa says. “It’s out of the question.”

“Can I at least tell you my plans?” I can feel the anger pulsing down my arms. At least they have to hear me out before they shoot me down. “I could divide up the trip enough so I’d only drive during the day. And I’d get a good map, so I wouldn’t have to ask strangers for directions. And I’d have my cell phone, so I could call —”

“This isn’t even worth talking about,” my grandpa says. “There’s no way you can handle almost two thousand miles of highway driving. You haven’t even had your license for a year.”

“But you let me drive to Syracuse for that show. That’s over a hundred miles on the highway. This is basically like going back and forth to Syracuse eighteen times.”

“Honey,” my grandma says, “this is a little different than driving to Syracuse . . .”

“Aimee
really
invited you to Texas?” my grandpa asks.

“Are you saying I’m lying?” I snap. By this point I’m not just angry. I’m
furious.
“Are you saying she doesn’t want me to visit her? Because as much as you might like that to be true, you’re wrong.”

“We just think after what happened at graduation . . .” My grandpa pauses. “Maybe these things would be better discussed in thera —”

Goddamn!

I storm up to my room and slam the door. But the fighting is far from over. We have another round on Tuesday morning before they leave for work. That night, when they still won’t listen, I finally inform them that they’re not my legal guardians, so they can’t actually tell me what to do. When I say that, my grandma turns pale and my grandpa says, “So we’ll call Aimee and ask her. I’m sure she’ll agree with us.”

He plucks up the phone and marches onto the side porch.

Aimee ends up giving me the green light. Later that night she recounts to me how she told my grandpa that when she was my age, she was practically a mother, so what’s a little cross-country drive? I tell her I’ll probably leave Sunday or Monday and arrive by the following weekend.

On Wednesday I give notice at Pizza Hut. On Thursday I bring my car in for an oil change and a tune-up. On Friday I go to Lift Bridge Book Shop and get a spiral-bound atlas. On Saturday I buy Pringles and pretzels and energy bars to eat on the road.

I e-mail Mara in Chicago and Aimee’s friends in Springfield. Every time I sit at the computer, I try not to obsess about how I still haven’t heard from Sam. Of course, I fail miserably and end up reading old conversations we had online until my eyes are bugging and I’m so depressed I want to die.

One afternoon my grandma goes to Dick’s Sporting Goods and comes home with supplies for my trip. As she presents me with a Swiss Army knife, a compass, a cooler, and a zero-degree sleeping bag, I have a hard time disguising my amusement. A zero-degree sleeping bag? Because the Midwest in July is so frigid? And a compass? I’m only taking major interstates, so it’s not like I’ll be bumping down dirt roads, searching for the magnetic North Pole.

“Sweetie,” my grandma says as she tucks everything back into the bag, “you’re coming home after this, right?”

“Yeah,” I say. I just don’t mention that I’ve recently realized I have no idea where my home actually is.

“And college is still on?”

“Of course.”

“This may sound like a strange question,” my grandma says after a minute, “but what are you looking for out there?”

I stare at her. For the first time in four days, I don’t have an answer. To be perfectly honest, I have no idea what I’m looking for out there. And I have a feeling my new compass won’t help me find it.

On my last night at Pizza Hut, Linda gives me all her tips.

“For your drive,” she says, her espresso-brown eyes filling with tears.

“No way.”

I try to hand back the envelope of cash, but she shakes her head. “I’ve also written down my cousin’s number for you. He and his wife live in Erie, right on the lake. Really nice people. They have two children, a little older than you. I called Darren this morning and told him about you. He said you’re welcome to sleep over at their house anytime.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

Linda wipes her mascara smudges with the side of her finger. “I wish I knew people all the way across the country.”

I tuck the envelope into my bag and wrap my arms around Linda. “Thank you so much . . . seriously . . . thank you.”

Linda hugs me back and doesn’t let go for a long time. “I still can’t believe your grandparents are letting you do this drive.”

“Neither can they,” I say. “But my mom is my legal guardian, and she said it’s okay.”

“Well, I can’t believe your mom is letting you go. I’d never let my daughter drive to Texas by herself.”

“Sierra is only thirteen.”

“Even when she’s seventeen, she’s not getting in a car and driving two thousand miles.”

“I’ll be eighteen in September.”

“Well, then.” Linda pauses. “Will you take good care of yourself?”

“Yeah.”

“Does Sam know you’re going?”

Terrence, our shift manager, bursts into the kitchen.

“Ladies!” he shouts. “Time for V’s good-bye party!”

Linda links elbows with me, and we head out to the dining room, where the servers, the dishwashers, and three of our regular customers are standing around a long table filled with pan pizzas. I’ve spent the past four days working double shifts to save money for my drive, so I’m pizza-ed out. But I’m still touched by the party, especially since before today I never even realized these people cared if I showed up for work. As Terrence passes out soda, Russell sidles over to me.

“Want to hang out later? We could have a little good-bye party of our own.”

I tell Russell I’m leaving first thing tomorrow and need to pack tonight.

“Attention, everyone!” Terrence shouts, whacking a fork against a hard plastic cup. “Let’s all raise a glass for V.”

Terrence makes a speech about how I’ve been a dedicated employee of Pizza Hut for almost a year and everyone is going to miss me. When he’s done talking, he presents me with a Pizza Hut gift card.

“This baby is filled with enough cash for you to eat pizza at every intersection from here to Texas,” Terrence says.

“Just what V wants,” Linda murmurs.

One of the regulars gives me a book called
Let’s Go USA.
The other dishwasher unscrews a jug of cheap wine. Terrence launches into a lecture about how he doesn’t condone underage drinking and, if anyone asks, he didn’t see it. Then he passes out another round of cups, and everyone starts making toasts and telling road-trip stories and asking me to send them postcards from Texas.

When I wake up the next morning, my car is gone.

I was planning to get up at eight and hit the road by nine, but I was up until two thirty in the morning, so when my alarm rang, I whacked it off and fell back asleep until ten. I hadn’t meant to stay up so late, but I was peeling photos off the walls and riffling through piles of clothes, tossing things into a suitcase for my trip, debating whether or not to bring makeup and padded bras and sexy tops. They went in and they came out and, finally, they went in again.

Around midnight I called Chastity down in Florida to tell her I probably wouldn’t be back until the end of the summer. Trinity grabbed the phone and started babbling about the party scene in Daytona Beach and how it makes Brockport look like the Vatican. I’d just hung up with the twins when Amos called. For a second I got a rush from hearing his voice. But as he began describing in intimate detail his camping trip and how he’d crossed rivers and fended off frostbite and caught trout, which he gutted and roasted over a bonfire, I remembered that Amos and I are only good when we’re going at it.

As soon as I notice that my car is missing, I rush down the stairs. There’s a note from my grandparents on the cutting board saying that they drove my car out to Albion for one more checkup and they’d be back by ten, eleven at the latest.

I crumple the paper in my fist.
Damn.
They know I got a tune-up last Thursday. They even offered to pay for it. I quickly call my grandpa’s cell phone, but it goes straight to voice mail. Five minutes later he calls back with this big story about how Kent is the only mechanic he trusts and it’s a good thing he brought my car in because they’ve discovered that my odometer has surpassed seventy thousand miles, which means the timing belt needs to be replaced and it’s no small job, but Kent is making it his top priority, so they should be home by one, two at the latest.

After we hang up, I stomp around the house. What the hell is a timing belt anyway? I drop some frozen waffles into the toaster and then douse them with syrup. I drink a Dr Pepper. I leave a message with Aimee. I take the padded bras out of my suitcase and then tuck them back in again.

My grandparents don’t get home until four thirty. By this time I have my luggage piled at the end of the driveway. My grandpa pops the hood and points out the cover of the timing belt, as if the inner workings of a Volkswagen mean anything to me. Then he rambles on about valves and pistons and how if the timing belt slipped, it could cause serious engine damage, leaving me stranded on the roadside.

Once he’s done I haul my suitcase into the trunk. I set my snacks on the passenger seat, along with my iPod, my phone, and my bag. I toss the wilderness supplies from my grandma into the backseat because she’d probably flip if I didn’t bring along the compass or the pocketknife. As I’m leaning into the back, I notice that my strappy graduation sandals are still on the floor.

“Do you know where you’re sleeping tonight?” my grandpa asks, staring down at my atlas.

“Probably Pennsylvania,” I say. “It depends on how far I can make it before dark.”

“Do you know how to get onto the thruway?”

“I take Nineteen through Bergen.”

“Right,” he says. “Head west, toward Buffalo.”

“Buffalo,” I repeat, tossing the atlas onto the backseat.

“That hockey puck you have on the dashboard,” my grandma says. “Is it the one that hit you?”

I glance into my car. “Yeah . . . that’s it.”

“Have you told Sam you’re going to Texas?” she asks.

I shake my head.

“Don’t you think that’s a good idea? He may stop by, and I’d hate for him to —”

“Sam’s in California,” I say.

“California?” my grandparents ask in unison.

I can see where this conversation is headed and I don’t like it, so I quickly say, “Okay . . . well . . . I’m going to go.”

They hug me really tight, and then I slide into my car and turn the key. I’m about to back down the driveway when my grandpa rushes to my window.

“We can still buy you a plane ticket,” he says. “It’s not too late to change your mind.”

“Thanks,” I say, honking twice and pressing my toe on the gas.

When I reach the end of Centennial, I take a right. I’m heading south on Route 19. In about nine seconds, I’ll be passing the entrance to Sweden Village, where you turn to get to Sam’s house. I consider doing a quick drive-by, but then I remind myself that’s not why I’m going on this trip, so I accelerate through the light, up the hill, and out of town.