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Sandra was the last student to leave the studio. For Joyelle’s sake, she had waited for Gertrude to leave and then had followed her out—to make sure she really left.
Sandra smiled and nodded to Calvin and then followed Joanna to their minivan. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Calvin drive away. The stakeout vehicle was gone, but she had the strangest sense that she was being watched.
“Mama, the seatbelt is stuck again.”
The seatbelt was stuck more often than it was unstuck. It was an old minivan. “Hang on, I’ll come get it.” As she wrestled with the deteriorating safety device, part of her was aware that Joyelle came out of the building, got into her car, and drove away.
“Hurry!” Bob cried from out of nowhere. And then he was in the front passenger seat.
“Hurry what?” She continued to yank at Joanna’s seatbelt.
“Can’t she sit in a different seat?”
“This is my seat!”
“Just give me a second.” She pulled harder.
Suddenly, Bob was beside her, and the seatbelt came free.
Joanna giggled. “Nice job, Bob!”
Sandra slid the door shut, and Bob was back in the front. “Let’s go!”
Sandra jumped into the front. “What are you so wound up about?”
“April is following Gertrude.”
“How do you know that?”
“I saw her with my eyeballs. She was parked across the street. Go, go, go!”
“Bob, I’m not getting into a high-speed chase with my child in the car.”
“Since when?”
“Since I lost sleep for weeks after doing it last time! And that was different!” She wasn’t sure how that time was different, but she was desperate to defend herself.
“Please drive!” Bob pressed on the dashboard as if that would make the van move.
“We’ve already lost them.”
“We can find them.”
“No.” The more Sandra argued, the more resolute she became.
“Gertrude could be in danger!”
Her resolution wavered. “Let’s call Chip then.” She reached for her phone, but there was nothing there. “Joanna? Where’s my phone?”
“Oh no.”
“Joanna?”
“Please drive!”
“Where’s my phone, Joanna? And why do you need me to drive? Can’t you fly?”
“I don’t need you to drive. I need you to interfere when we get there. Once you get going, I’ll go ahead and tell you where they’ve gone. But I dare not go ahead as I don’t really trust you to get going!”
“I’ll call Chip. Let me go back in—” She remembered that Joyelle had already left. “All right. Go ahead. Tell me where to go. But if I think for even one second that Joanna is in danger, I’m out.”
“Go, Mama, go!”
Sandra started the car, and Bob disappeared. Again.
She stopped at the end of the drive. “Which way, Bob?” she called out to no one.
No one answered.
After thirty seconds of waiting, Joanna said, “Just guess, Mama!”
Sandra hesitated. She didn’t want to be wrong. But she also didn’t want to continue sitting on the side of the road, a spectacle. She turned left and drove. Every few minutes, she called out to Bob to see if he was within earshot, but no one answered.
“Where are we going?” Joanna asked, sounding as though she were having too much fun.
“You’re the one who told me to guess. I have no idea where we’re going, honey.”
Joanna giggled, and Sandra continued south on 27. Then she had a thought. Gertrude had said she lived in Somerset County. This wasn’t a great clue because Somerset County was monstrous, but right now, they weren’t headed toward it. She pulled into the parking lot of a convenience store claiming to offer the original brownie whoopie pie. Her stomach rumbled, and her mouth watered, but she ignored the craving in the name of saving Gertrude. Maybe. Maybe Gertrude wouldn’t need to be saved, and she could come back for a brownie whoopie pie.
She opened her glovebox and rooted around, unsure she even owned a paper map anymore. Eureka! Score one for never cleaning out the glovebox. She unfolded the old map and took a look. Oh good, she wasn’t so far from Somerset County after all. She just needed to stay on Route 2. She pulled out of the parking lot and turned left, heading east, away from whoopie pie temptation.
Bob reappeared.
“What took you so long?”
“I got distracted.”
“By Gertrude?”
“No, by a football injury in Skowhegan.”
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
He leveled a sober gaze at her. “I never kid about football.”
“Did you see if April is really following Gertrude?”
“I’m positive. Gertrude stopped for some pizza and a slushie, and April waited across the street with her headlights off.” Bob shuddered.
“A slushie? What is she, five?”
Bob shook his head. “She is not five. But she did put five different flavors into one cup.”
Joanna giggled. “I like Gertrude.”
“Lots of people seem to,” Bob said. “Anyway, I’m going back to watch, but her little pit stop bought you some time.”
“Wait!” Sandra cried. “I don’t even know where I’m going!”
Bob told her the address. Interesting. She hadn’t been through Mattawooptock in years. She never had a reason to go there. She thought this was the case with most people.
