The Flight of Women in Various Modes of Resistance

Nephi, UT

 

Emily was now on the way to the wedding. Driving down I-15. She passed Draper, Thanksgiving Point. She passed Lehi, Orem, Provo (noting the large Y up on the mountain above the town designating BYU, her old college), then Spanish Fork. The black road in front of her. The Colombian music turned up. Occasionally she’d roll the window down and let the hot, dry air blow through her hair. Her eyes becoming dryer than the wind itself.

She was going to the wedding. She didn’t care if Mark disapproved.

It was family. Shouldn’t family be the most important thing regardless of whether you agreed with said family?

Yet it wasn’t like Emily to be so impulsive and disrespectful. I mean, leaving her children to go to Zion? But, then again, it was only a weekend. Mark and the kids would survive. She was done trying to be the respectful, courteous wife.

She had left this morning, after she and Mark had fought the night before, which she now felt bad about. She had come home last night, and after the kids were put in bed, she carefully and (she thought) respectfully, broached the subject of having dinner with Wendy and her family. Mark had flipped out, albeit in his own passive-aggressive, slouching way: What did I already tell you? You know I just had that meeting! Besides, they’re in dangerous territory. They’re not people we should be associating with. And how would this make us look? How would it make me look? No, I won’t allow it, I can’t, and on and on. Emily could see the hardness in his eyes and knew he would not budge. Funny, how marriage can very occasionally allow you to read someone else’s mind with ease and efficiency. But she had steeled her gaze back.

“So, that’s how it is, huh? Fine, but if we’re not having dinner,” she said, “then I’m going to the wedding this weekend.”

Mark opened his mouth as if to speak, but instead just stood there for a second with an empty hole on his face. She knew he couldn’t refuse her. She knew they had no plans this weekend, that, as usual, Mark might go golfing and spend the rest of the day puttering around the house. She had planned her statement well in advance. She knew more than anything the state their household was in and that if there was any weekend to leave Mark with the kids, it was this one. She’d patch things up with Mark when she got back. It wouldn’t be difficult. He was easy to handle.

Emily stopped for lunch in Nephi. She ordered a chicken salad and a lemonade at Café Zupas. After lunch, Emily drove on, stopping at a Maverick station two hours later for gas, where she also picked up an Arizona iced tea and some dark chocolate. She would get to Zion in plenty of time for the wedding. Then she would find a hotel, stay the night—well, that is, if there were any hotels available. Then she would drive the five hours back to Sandy on Sunday afternoon. It was a long drive for one weekend. But Emily didn’t mind. She was no longer focused on laundry to fold, what to prepare for the evening meal, what school meeting to attend, church politics, and all the rest. Her soul was still. Focused purely, intently, on the road in front of her and the drive to see family. The present now. She called Lee to him know she was on the way.