Slowly, with difficulty and little grace, I exited the trunk and slammed the lid down. I turned to find three ladies watching me, and I serenaded them each in turn and their eyes glazed over, their faces softened, and they went about their business.

I started the car and pulled out into the early evening traffic snarl, remembering with remarkable clarity the map I had studied at the motel. I felt a great need for Pennsylvania. I sensed also that Boyd was already with Sarah, and he would waste no time in his pursuit.

I had no sooner brought the car up to speed than my headlights reflected the patterned clothing of a couple, a man and a woman, standing by the side of the road. I sped past them, making decisions, then pulled off onto the shoulder. They both ran toward me, illuminated from behind by the string of approaching headlights. The man opened the door and looked in. As he did, a terrible noise erupted, blanketing all the freeway traffic sounds, and the woman began to dance around, shrieking. Automatically I sent music to calm, but the noise continued, heightened, and a little yellow cat, its fur horripilated, fell out of the woman’s coat and danced, stiff-legged, around the blacktop on its toes.

“God!” the woman said. “He ripped my chest to shreds!” She brought a bloody hand out from inside her coat. The cat continued to hiss and spit, fuzzed up and frenzied, and I tried to calm it with music, but to no avail. I tried to bring some semblance of reason to the agitated scene outside my open door, but the woman was crying and the man torn between his loyalties to the cat, to the woman, to this rare ride that would take him where he could be finished traveling with woman and cat. My messages were confused and I could do nothing in the situation. The sight of her blood made my skin tingle and I was rendered impotent by the variety of emotions that swirled just outside the car door.

I stomped on the accelerator, the door slamming on its own, leaving them to stand there in the cold, dealing with their own problems. My emotions reeled from the confusion, my legs ached, my heart pounded, my hands stiffened on the steering wheel in the freezing cold.

Limitations. There were limitations.

I took deep breaths and recreated my environment. I eased the pain, erased the cold, settled my stomach. I could ill afford to allow another situation to distract me so.

But the blood on her hand . . . The blood on her hand . . .

The night was new and I was a lover.

Thoughts of Pennsylvania fled as I slowed the car and kept my eyes open for the lone person on the highway.