"Stop the goddamn truck!" This time it's a hoarse scream. She doesn't mean it to be, but that's how it comes out. And the reminder of how little control she really has only furthers the feeling that she is weightless, dizzy, spiraling into a yawning black hole.

Louis is kind enough not to punch the brake. He eases it in, slow. The hydraulics whine. He brings the truck over to the shoulder and lets it idle.

"Okay. Calm down," he says, putting his hands out.

Miriam grits her teeth. "That's the worst thing you can ever say to somebody who's not calm. It's just gas on a fire, Louis."

"I'm sorry. I'm not… trained in this."

This? He means dealing with crazy people. Which she is, probably.

"I'm not trained in being this way, either." Though, she thinks, I'm getting better with it. Week by week, month by month, year by bloody year. One day, it'll be water off a duck's back.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

"That's the million-dollar question."

"You can tell me."

"I can't, I really can't. You wouldn't–" She takes a deep breath. "I have to go."

"We're in the middle of nowhere."

"It's America. Nowhere is nowhere. Everywhere is somewhere."

"I can't let you do that."

She fishes the cigarette from her lap and, with trembling hands, tucks it behind her ear. "You're a very nice man, Louis. But you will let me get out of this truck, because you know now that I am off my bloody rocker. I see the look on your face. Already you're thinking, she's not worth the trouble. And I'm not. I'm a curse. I'm an infected boil on your neck. Best thing I can do for you is get away from you. Best thing you can do is lance the boil."

Grabbing her messenger bag, she pops the door.

"Wait!" he says.

She ignores him and hops out onto the cracked and crumbling highway shoulder. Her feet plant into a murky puddle, soaking through.

Louis slides over onto the passenger side and pops the glove box.

"Wait, here," he says, going through the compartment. He pulls out a white envelope, and as he cracks it, she sees what waits within:

Money. A thick wad of it, all Andrew Jacksons.

With a callused thumb and forefinger he peels out five bills, then thrusts them at her.

"Take it."

"Go fuck yourself."

He looks hurt. Good. She needs to hurt him. She hates doing it. But it's like medicine. Everybody needs their medicine. Tastes bad. Does wonders.

"I have plenty."

It's the last thing she wants to know. It makes him a mark. She can't help but picture him as roadkill now, and her picking at his exposed guts with a vulture's beak.

"I'm not a charity case," she says, even though she knows she is.

His hurt has already scabbed over and become something else. He's angry now. He grabs her hand, hard enough to force her but not so it hurts, and presses the money into her palm. "It's a hundred dollars."