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Chapters (62)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. I.
  5. 1
  6. 2
  7. 3
  8. 4
  9. 5
  10. 6
  11. 7
  12. II.
  13. 1
  14. 2
  15. 3
  16. 4
  17. 5
  18. 6
  19. 7
  20. 8
  21. 9
  22. 10
  23. III.
  24. 1
  25. 2
  26. 3
  27. 4
  28. 5
  29. 6
  30. 7
  31. 8
  32. 9
  33. IV.
  34. 1
  35. 2
  36. 3
  37. 4
  38. 5
  39. 6
  40. 7
  41. 8
  42. 9
  43. 10
  44. 11
  45. 12
  46. 13
  47. 14
  48. 15
  49. 16
  50. 17
  51. 18
  52. 19
  53. 20
  54. 21
  55. 22
  56. 23
  57. 24
  58. 25
  59. 26
  60. About the Author
  61. Also by Joyce Carol Oates
  62. About the Publisher

But followed after them in their car: tires screeching in the gravel, horn blaring, a terrifying twelve-mile run ahead from Edgarsville to the village of Glenkill: Sheila, white-faced, forced to drive at speeds varying from forty miles an hour to eighty-five, in her desperation to escape: and Monica, Monica limp with the conviction they would both die, hunched beside her, quietly sobbing, whispering, Why oh why why the hell, why. . . . Fitch was too drunk to drive so one of his buddies drove, pulling up alongside Sheila, edging toward Sheila as if to force her car off the road, roaring ahead, threatening to cut in front of her, while Fitch leaned out the window of the passenger’s seat, shouting obscenities, gesticulating, a raised third finger jabbed into the air, a clenched fist shaken, at several points the two cars were so close that Fitch very nearly smashed Sheila’s window, flailing at it with his fist, all drunken high spirits, all in good fun, just teasing the girls, just joking around, but the girls were cock-teasers themselves they were asking for it one of these days they were going to get it they hadn’t better show their faces in Edgarsville again. . . .

The chase ended at the Glenkill village limits; the men dropped back; Sheila sped ahead.

At Monica’s house Sheila said, putting her hand on Monica’s arm, “Look—we’re all right and we weren’t in any real danger but if you’re upset, I mean if you’re really upset, I can stay the night here, or”—and here her voice wavered, here, she sounded frightened, herself, “you could come home with me, I feel responsible for this, I feel like hell.”

Yes, Monica thought, in anger, you should feel responsible: you—!

Aloud she told Sheila that she was really all right; she was grateful to be alive; she only wanted the evening to come to an end.

“You’re not angry . . . ?” Sheila said.

“I’m too exhausted to be angry,” Monica said, opening her door, wanting only to be alone, gone, away from Sheila.

6

Sheila said carelessly that suicide, in her family, wasn’t all that “significant” an act.

“The thought is—when you’ve had quite enough you’ve had quite enough,” she told Monica.