Scraping up the will to get up off the ground was hard enough as is. Once I was on my feet, I needed to scrape up even more to take a step. Then another. I stood up, my body feeling heavier than ever. I made it a few steps before I fell back onto my knees and rested against my heels. What was the point of going further anymore? I could lie here forever and let the cold freeze me, and then it would be over. It would finally be done, but a little piece of me kept edging me on. That piece pictured Jacob waiting for me, trying to survive long enough for me to get to him. It would take him a long time to find me dead out here, and when he did, he would be devastated. Well, if he did. If he couldn’t find me, he would never know or understand what happened to me. He could spend forever and waste his life away while he tried. Most of me didn’t care, not anymore, but I had to keep going. I took a few more steps before stopping again. I really just wanted to sink to the floor. I couldn’t do that, though. It was a constant state of tug-of-war in my head. It didn’t matter if I didn't make it very far, but I always made it a few steps at a time until I reached a state where I just kept walking.

  It was easier when I got to the highway, where it was freshly plowed again. I could walk without my thighs burning from wading through the snow. I could feel the discomfort in my leg wound, but it didn’t hurt as much. The only thing I could feel was the urge to collapse less and less. I would keep on walking, silencing my thoughts or daydreaming about what could have been. I could have moved up North and had a family on a farm and baked bread and pies every morning while my husband worked the ranch. That could have been perfect. I could have been with Tristan if I had just been less stubborn about staying put in Hartland. I lifted the gun straps a little more onto my shoulders. They were constantly reminding me that the American dream wasn’t real. Still, in another life, I was sure I was with Tristan, or maybe even Colton if worse came to worst, living off the land. I wondered if I would be a good mom, but I knew I would be so overwhelmed and wouldn’t survive staying at home all day taking care of a child. Then again, maybe I would. I would never know, though. It wouldn’t be productive enough for me. Maybe I wasn’t meant to live the American dream afterall. I released a sigh as I came to that conclusion. A different version of me somewhere was, and I was content with that for now. I started to focus on myself instead. On what I was feeling and hearing. The metal in my stud earrings in all six holes was getting very cold. The ring I had attached to my gold chain was getting cold, too. So was the purple heart pendant that my brother had given me for my birthday a while back. I consciously kept my breaths at a steady pace. They were creating an even rhythm. I was always cut out for long-distance trekking. Afterall, it was my favorite pastime back in the day. I wondered what it would be like to walk through the woods again, carrying nothing but myself and the clothes on my back and no care in the world about what might be out there. I wouldn’t have to worry about the animals or people coming out to kill me. I could just walk again and feel the peace.

  I started to think about Sophia, too. Sophia and Malachi. I had some of my friends here with me, but people like them? People I grew up with and had such a close bond with were gone. Malachi used to text me some nights, sharing his innermost thoughts that he always kept from the world. I was one of the only people he trusted enough to be that vulnerable with. He would spend the night at my house for days at a time, and I missed that. There was a time that I took him to his hometown, just him and me. He reunited with his stepfather after five years, and I got to meet his old friends: April, the twins, and some dealer from his old school. Then there was Sophie, who was my other half. I’ve known her longer than I've known anyone else. We immediately hit it off from day one, and we went through everything together. Everything. We looked the same, talked the same, acted the same. No matter how long it went without seeing her, we would always make our way back to each other eventually. Not this time, though. I missed the friends I haven’t seen, and I missed the ones barely out of reach, but sometimes I would remember that the perfect life is overrated. Anytime the drama would finally subside, and everyone was on good terms, there was still a hole missing where the bad things were supposed to be. I always had so many friends and an even bigger family, but being perfect with them just made everything a whole lot worse. The more I lost people, and they moved on, forgetting about me, or they consistently would do me wrong, I would still just keep giving. I was always there for everyone, no matter what, and they always expected me to be there after all was said and done. Being the people pleaser I was, I would let it happen, but nobody can shoulder that for as long as I did. I was bound to break eventually, and it burned me out of everything I had. I was burned out, and I was pushed into survival. Surviving is what saved me from my inevitable death. The worst thing to happen to this world saved my life.

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  I think that was why the burn was so deep when I thought about my family that I lost. Conner and Gunner. Last time I spoke to them, it wasn’t on good terms, but I wasn’t upset about that. The wrong that had been done to me had always made me want to disappear somewhere where they didn't exist, and they couldn’t find me, and I felt guilty for feeling free. I was in that place where they didn't exist. I had that freedom. I couldn’t be happy here either, though, not truly. I was human afterall.

  I self-consciously counted the exit ramps as I walked. By the time night fell, I had made it to the second one. I climbed up underneath it instead of finding a house to sleep in and curled up in a corner elevated from the ground. I felt safer here than I did in any building I had been in for the past few years. There was one entrance to me that was hard to climb, and I was in a small space where I could see everything around me. I was safe. Cold, but safe. I couldn’t fall asleep for too long, or I would freeze to death, so sleeping in small intervals all night while being tightly wrapped and rolled up in my blanket was the only way to function. Sometimes when I felt like I was getting too hot, it was easy for me to fall asleep. When the sun rose, I was well rested enough to keep walking. I climbed out from underneath the overpass and skidded down the concrete back onto the highway. The snow-covered sign showed me how many miles I had left until the next exit, and my heart sank. Fifty miles. A smaller sign was nailed onto this one, calling it the highway of doom. I walked up to the sign and wiped the snow off it. The letters were faded, but I could see them well enough to read them. People were known to die on this highway. It was a long stretch of road with no towns, minimal gas stations, and 10 miles near the end of it had a treacherous drop off. I let my hand rest against the sign as I closed my eyes and dropped my head. I started to take a few breaths to soak it all in, and then I swung my fist. My jaw clenched. I broke through the sign and kicked the metal pole. That was all I could manage to afford at the time, and I walked back onto the road. This would be a long walk.