Crossing Line

She told the last lie that morning when she said "I love you, too."

It was always the last thing Mark said to her just in case he died before he saw her again so that she could sit and remember that the last words he said were "I love you." And if she hadn't lied and told him the same with each little word, he would have suspected. "Me too" was not an option. That could be misconstrued. It might not mean "I love you." Besides, he never admitted the real reason he said it: so that the last thing she would say to him was "I love you, too." Just in case she didn't make it home that night.

And as April loaded her laundry basket and the cat carrier into the car, that was exactly her plan.

She stopped by her dorm to get the last of her provisions for the trip. It was handy having half a room across town for storage. They always went to his turf; his apartment was nicer anyway. Even though he was paranoid about her keeping secrets, he never followed her to the dorm. Naturally it was the safest place for the car kennel, mix tapes and travel notebook with her route in yellow highlighter.

She heard that I-20 went all the way to California. That was her road.

She placed the kennel in the back seat of the car and opened the door to the cat carrier. The kitties were hesitant. "Come on, guys! It's okay!" She used her cheerful voice as the tears spilled over her cheeks. They didn't know how to deal with a little freedom. It scared both of the cats as much as it scared her.

The road out of the small city was familiar. She had driven to Atlanta many times before and was excited about her adventure. She let the visor down, and a picture of them on a Six Flags roller coaster floated down, causing her to swerve. The photo, taken as they started down a big drop, showed them both screaming bloody murder.

They looked like that a lot.

So she made a flimsy plan. She closed up shop on her college town and looked toward the coast. She had always wondered if she could leave, but each time she had tried, she had gotten only as far as the city limits. As they flew past her now, she was thrilled. She would always pretend to be escaping from him whenever she was driving alone; just the idea was intoxicating. Her excitement somehow lit a spark of hope that she clung to like a life jacket. It became a real goal. She was pretending the other times; she left loose ends. This time she finalized all her responsibilities: she'd dropped her classes, let the RA know she was moving, quit her job at Wal-Mart.

Mark was brilliant. He stood to make a lot of money, and his mother had already discussed how lovely dried flowers would be at the wedding. She wondered if his mother really knew her son; she doted on him as if he were an angel. He turned to acid if April ever contradicted him in front of other people. She always paid for her mistakes later, trying to hit him back as hard as he hit her. She never knew what would cause his meltdowns. She was tired from always walking on eggshells. She couldn't remember her favorite food, only his. Keeping him mellow was a constant job.

But when things got bad, April would just remember the way he used to be in high school. She'd had a crush on him from her sophomore year until her junior year. He was her dream guy. And then she got him. (She lost count of all the times the phrase "be careful what you wish for" had gone through her head.) But now he had taken his toll on her. Nobody else would ever want her.

And she couldn't blame them.

She used to be vivacious and happy all the time. Over the last two years he had whittled her down to a worn, flattened replica. His constant, gaping need kept her exhausted and resentful. If he saw her talking or laughing with another boy he automatically concluded that she was having an affair. His fiery jealousy was exciting at first but quickly became frightening and, finally, tiresome.

She wasn't sure where to start, but she was determined to find her joyful side again. She decided that relocation would be her first attempt at recovering herself. She sped down the road as she sang along to the mix tape in her cassette player. She got on the access ramp for I-20.

Her plan was to drive as far as she could and then start job-hunting. She would start with Wal-Mart since she had good references from there. Then a place to live with lots of windows so that she could see her freedom every day--so she would believe that she really made it out of her old life alive. She'd get an old breakfast table from a yard sale and sit there in the quiet on her days off, feeding the cats bits of toast and writing in her spiral notebook about her adventures.

April was determined to survive on her own, although she didn't know with certainty that everything would fall into place. She had not told her parents goodbye. They would freak out, but she was deaf to any negativity. They had always been suspicious of Mark--had suspected that the abuse was there. They warned her about getting too serious and moving too fast. She didn't want to hear "I told you so" right now. She'd call her mom and then her dad later on, once she got some road between herself and Mark. Every mile she drove added a point to her courage. She finally realized that her life was long and stretched out in front of her just like the highway. She could do anything she wanted. Anything at all.

The state line in the distance seemed to punctuate her belief. It beckoned to her to continue her journey and see what might be possible. And since she was already this far along--farther than she'd ever been before---she hit the accelerator.

She told the last lie that morning when she said, "I love you, too." And as she rolled her window down and the cool evening air cleared her head, it smelled like the truth.