No one answers the door at Dane’s cabin the next morning. After a minute or two, I take April’s hand and start walking toward the lodge, ignoring the nods and good-mornings of the handful of people we pass along the way.
“What are we doing?” April asks, half-running to keep up with me.
“Looking for Dane.” Just as I say his name, I spot him in the parking lot, loading a large tote into the Winnebago. The sight of him sparks something in my brain, a memory—his hands gripping the wheel of his parents’ Volkswagen as we drove away from the grocery store, the road wide open ahead of us.
Our door is always open for you, my godmother Traci said in our last phone call, shortly before we left for the ranch. In all the chaos and uncertainty of the past couple of weeks, I’d almost forgotten that she lives just three hundred miles south of here. Only half a day’s drive…if I can convince someone to take us there.
“Hey,” Dane says when he sees me. “I was just about to come looking for you. We’re leaving for the campground soon, and I wanted to….” His voice trails off when I move closer, and he sees my frantic expression. “What is it?”
Before I can answer, Kiana sticks her head out from the Winnebago. “Oh. Hi, girls.” She takes in the scene—me standing in front of Dane, a look of desperation no doubt plastered all over my face, while April whines and tries to detach herself from my tight grip. “Hey, April,” she says cheerfully. “Want to help me get Winnie here ready for the road?”
I let go of her hand, and she heads toward the RV. Once she’s inside, I lead Dane to the edge of the parking lot, stopping near a dusty pickup.
I keep my voice low even though there’s no one within hearing distance. “How do you feel about another road trip?”
“What?”
“I hate that I’m asking you to do this, but there’s literally no one else.”
His forehead creases. “What are you asking me to do?”
I glance around us. Dad rarely leaves the construction site before lunch, but I’m still hyperaware of every sound. “April and I need a drive to Stanfield.”
“Stanfield? Isn’t that like a four-hour drive from here?”
“Five.” Someone is walking toward us—it’s the tall blond guy who greeted us at the archway the night we got here. I watch him, muscles tense, but he turns and heads toward the main lodge. I wait until he’s inside before I turn back to Dane. “My godmother lives there. I have to go see her.”
“Why?” he asks, thoroughly confused. “Is she sick or something? Can’t your father—”
“My father doesn’t know we’re going,” I explain quickly. “And he can’t know, either.”
“Isobel, what…?” He shakes his head. “Are you telling me you’re running away? And you want me to help you do it?”
I nod, my eyes fastened on his. “After we got back to the cabin last night, Dad and I had a huge fight. He’s determined to keep us here, and I can’t let that happen. Traci is like family; she said I can go to her if I ever needed help.”
“Are you sure about this?” Dane asks me seriously.
“I have to get out of here. I can’t even trust what my father says anymore. He said one extra week, then he bought a membership. Now that he’s secured us our spots in this place, it doesn’t make sense for us to go home anymore. He wants to move us here, and I just—” Panic blazes through me, making me dizzy. “I can’t. I hate it here, Dane. I don’t want anything to do with this place.”
“But your father….”
“He won’t listen to me,” I say, desperation clawing at my stomach. “He’s put so much time and hope into this ranch. He’s so sure it’s the answer for us. He’s not going to give up. I’m worried that the longer we stay here, the harder it’ll be for him to leave.” I take his hand, squeezing it. “Please try to understand.”
Dane searches my gaze for a long moment, then he looks away and scratches his jaw, deep in thought. When he turns back to me, he’s frowning. “I don’t know if I feel comfortable with this.”
My heart sinks. If he doesn’t agree to help me, we’re stuck here. “Please, Dane. There’s no bus from here to Stanfield. A taxi would cost way more than I have. No one else here will help me. I’m trapped in this place, and unless I find a way out of it, I’m going to end up stuck here until college.”
And what about April? Eventually, she’s going to figure out what this ranch is. Is that how I want her to grow up? Spending weekends here, going through survival training and learning about all the horrible ways the world as we know it might end?
Of course I don’t want that. Our father wouldn’t either, if he could actually think about it clearly. But he isn’t, so it’s up to me to make sure that particular future doesn’t happen for her. We have little control over the end of the world, but we can control how we live in the meantime.
An idea strikes me, and I squeeze Dane’s hand again. “She can vaccinate you. Traci’s a pediatric nurse.”
He stares at me for a moment, not saying anything. He still looks unsure, but there’s a flicker in his eyes. “Without my parents’ consent?” he asks doubtfully.
I nod, even though I have no idea whether Traci would stick needles in his arms without clearing it with his moms first. But it’s the last card I have to play.
“It’s one of the battles you chose, right?” I ask. When he nods, I add, “Well, this is one of mine. I need to get out of here. If I stay, I’m giving in.”
He stares at me for another few seconds, then his expression softens, and he lets out a sigh. “When do you want to leave?”
My body lightens. “As soon as possible?”
He glances back at the Winnebago. “I need to help my moms get us set up at the campsite, so it’ll have to be tomorrow. I’ll come back after dinner tonight, and we can work out a plan, okay?”
“Okay,” I say. “And Dane?”
He looks at me, his expression slightly wary.
“Thank you.”
The wariness fades, and a smile lights his face. He nods once, and for the first time since we left home, I feel like I can finally breathe.
We decide to leave our bug-out bags behind.
“But what if we have to evacuate?” April asks, saying the last word slowly. She’s sitting on the top bunk, watching as I remove piles of clothes from the dresser. We’re not taking our suitcases, either—too conspicuous—so I have to figure out some way to stuff everything we need into our backpacks.
“We won’t,” I say, my hands shaking slightly as I pull open another drawer. I still can’t believe we’re actually doing this. No, I can’t believe it’s come to this.
It almost didn’t happen. By the time Dane returned to the ranch last night, I’d already chickened out about ten times. But then Dad came home early and grilled burgers for dinner, all the while pretending that everything was normal and fine and our fight the night before never happened. I realized nothing is going to change unless I change it myself. His mind is set, and there’s nothing I can say to convince him otherwise.
So I didn’t feel all that guilty later as Dane and I sat in the guard tower, watching the sunset and forming a plan. We decided to keep it simple. He’d tell his parents the truth, mostly—that he was driving me to my godmother’s house and would return the next day, though he’d leave out the part about it being more of an escape mission than a visit. And I’d tell my father that the three of us were spending the day in Holcomb, which has a movie theater and a strip mall and other signs of civilization. Dane’s moms aren’t at the ranch anymore, so there’s no chance of them comparing stories with my dad. I fed April the same white lie, but only because I was worried she might let something slip if I told her the truth.
Now, though, with our father gone for the day and Dane due to pick us up in thirty minutes, I figure it’s time to let her in on it.
“April,” I say, turning as I stuff several pairs of underwear into each of our bags. “We’re not going to Holcomb today. We’re going to Traci’s.”
She moves to the edge of the mattress and swings her legs back and forth in the air. “Oh,” she says, unmoved by this vast change in plans. “Is Daddy coming too?”
“No.” I watch her face, bracing myself for confusion or questions or even tears. But she just nods and continues to play with Twilight Sparkle, pretending to make her jump over the bunk bed rail like she’s a show horse at an eventing competition.
For a moment, I wonder if she understands what I’m actually saying, but then I realize it has nothing to do with comprehension. She just trusts me. I’m her big sister, and as far as she’s concerned, big sisters always do the right thing.
Guilt wriggles in my stomach again, but I push it down and continue packing. We’re running low on time.
At nine on the dot, April and I head to the parking lot by the lodge, where Dane and I agreed to meet. I hold my breath as we walk, terrified that Dad will appear, notice our overstuffed backpacks, and get suspicious. But the ranch is practically deserted this morning, and no one but a trio of curious squirrels is there to witness our escape. I don’t resume breathing again until I see the red Volkswagen, parked in the lot as promised. Dane stands outside of it, rifling through the open trunk. He looks up at the sound of our footsteps on the gravel.
“Hey,” he greets us, smiling. As usual, in his T-shirt and board shorts and sunglasses, he looks like he’s bound for a day at the beach instead of a secret, impromptu road trip to a stranger’s house.
April, clad in her pink-framed sunglasses, grins back at him and skips up to the car. She wiggles out of her backpack and drops it in the trunk, making sure to rescue Twilight Sparkle from the front pocket first.
“You sure you want to do this?” Dane asks me quietly as I place my bag in the trunk next to April’s.
I look up at him, seeing my pale image reflected in his sunglasses. “Yes. Are you?”
He shuts the trunk and glances around the quiet ranch like he’s seeing it for the last time, even though—unlike April and me—he’ll certainly return. “Yeah, I’m sure,” he says, his gaze back on me.
Guilt twists through me again, this time because I feel bad for asking so much of him. This is more than just a favor for a friend. He stretched the truth about our trip to his parents. He’s helping me outright lie to mine. He’s driving six hundred miles round trip on the vague promise that he might get something he wants in return. All for a girl he met a few weeks ago and may never see again.
Am I using him? Does he think I am? I don’t know, and I don’t have time to figure it out now. It’s time to go.
I don’t look back as we drive under the wooden arch and away from Endurance Ranch. I don’t need to. Everything important—well, almost everything—is in this car with me right now.