“That’s what I say. What’s life without a little MSG? Anyway, then Dad would switch on Bob Dylan.” She laughed, more relieved than she wanted to admit when they turned onto the first plowed road. “One of my earliest memories of him is watching him weed his garden, with his hair down to his shoulders and this scratchy Dylan record playing on a little portable turntable. ‘Come gather ’round, people, wherever you roam.’ All he was wearing —Dad, not Dylan—was bell-bottoms and love beads.”
Jacob got an uncomfortable flash of his own father, dressed in his tidy gardening clothes, blue shirt, blue slacks, his hair carefully trimmed under a stiff peaked cap, his face quiet as he hand-pruned his roses and listened to Brahms on his personal entertainment unit.
And of his mother, sitting in the shade of a tree on a lazy Sunday afternoon, reading a novel while he and Cal had tossed a baseball and argued over strike zones.
“I think you’ll like him.”
Dragged back, Jacob blinked at her. “What?”
“My father,” she repeated. “I think you’ll like him.”
He battled down the anger that had risen up inside him. It was simple enough to put two and two together. “Your parents live in Portland?”
“That’s right. About twenty minutes from my place.” She let out a quiet, satisfied breath as they turned onto Route 5 and headed north. “They’ll be glad to meet you, especially since Cal’s family has been so shrouded in mystery.”
The friendly smile she offered him faded when she saw his expression. When her hands clenched on the wheel it had nothing to do with anger and everything to do with despair.
“Meeting my parents is not synonymous with a lifetime commitment.”
Her voice was stiff and cold. If he hadn’t been so lost in his own unhappiness, he would have heard the hurt beneath it.
“You didn’t mention visiting your parents.” The fact was, he didn’t want to meet them, or to think of them as people.
“I didn’t think it was necessary.” Her clutch foot began to tap on the floorboards. “I realize your idea of family differs from mine, but I wouldn’t think of coming back to town and not seeing them.”
Bitterness rose like bile in his throat. “You have no idea what family means to me.”
“No?” She gave a quick, moody shrug. “Let’s just say I can surmise that you don’t have a problem cutting certain members of it out of your life for extended periods. Your business,” she said before he could retort. “And you’re certainly not obligated to come with me when I go to see my family.” Her fingers began to tap in time with her foot. “In fact, I’ll be happy not to even mention your name.”
He was careful not to speak again. If he did, too much of what he was feeling would pour out, leaving too much to be explained.
She didn’t know how he felt. It was all so easy, so straightforward, for her. All she had to do was hop into this excuse for transportation and spend a few hours on what passed for a roadway. And she could see her family. By using the current system of communication she could speak with them over relatively long distances. Even if she decided to travel to the other side of the planet, some element of twentieth-century technology would provide a link.
She knew nothing of separation, of losing a part of yourself and not knowing why. How would she react if she found herself faced with the possibility of never seeing her sister again?
She wouldn’t be so damn smug then.
For the next hour or so, Jacob amused himself by sneering at the other vehicles on the road. Ridiculously clumsy, slow and absurdly inefficient. Carbon monoxide pumping into the atmosphere. Gleefully poisoning their own air. They had no respect, he thought. For themselves, their resources, their descendants.
And she thought he was insensitive.
He wondered what would happen if he strolled into what passed for a research lab in this age and showed them the procedure for fusion.
They’d probably sacrifice a lamb and make him a god.
He sat back, arms crossed. They’d just have to figure it out for themselves. Right now, his biggest problem was keeping warm, with all the cold air blowing off of Sunny.
He frowned when she pulled out onto a ramp. He hadn’t been paying close attention, but he was certain they hadn’t driven for five hours. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to get something to eat and put gas in the car.” She snapped the words off without a glance at him.
Hugging her resentment to her, she pulled into a gas station, got out and slammed the door behind her. As she reset the self-service pump, she muttered under her breath.
She’d forgotten how his mind worked. Obviously he was deluding himself into believing that she was luring him into some sort of trap.
Maybe she was in love with him—and that was a situation she dearly hoped could be reversed—but she hadn’t done one single thing to pressure him. Or to lead him to believe that her heart was all aflutter at waiting for him to get down on one knee.
If he thought she’d intended to flaunt him in front of her parents like so much matrimonial beefcake, he had another think coming. The jerk.
Jacob sat a moment, then decided to get out to stretch his legs. And get a look at his surroundings.
So this was a refueling station, he mused, studying the gas pumps. Sunny had stuck the nozzle end of a hose into a compartment on the side of the Land Rover. From her expression, she didn’t look too happy about standing out in the cold with her hand on the switch. Behind her, the pump—the gasoline pump, he elaborated—clicked as numbers turned over. The odor of fuel was strong.
Other cars crowded the pump islands. Some waited in their vehicles for a man in a cap to come out and go through the procedure Sunny was doing for herself. Others did as she was, and shivered in the cold.
He watched a woman bundle a trio of children around the side of a building that was set farther off the road. The children were arguing and whining, and the woman was snatching at arms. He had to grin. At least that much hadn’t changed over time.
On the road, cars chugged by. Jacob wrinkled his nose at the stench of exhaust. A sixteen-wheeler roared by, leaving a stream of displaced air in its wake.
There were plenty of buildings, such as they were. Tall ones, squat ones, all huddled together as if they were afraid to leave too much room between them. He found the style uninspired. Then, less than a block down the street, he spotted something that brought him a pang of homesickness. A pair of high golden arches. At least they weren’t completely uncivilized, he thought. He was grinning when he turned back to Sunny.
She didn’t respond.
Ignoring him, she screwed the gas cap in place and hung up the hose. Silent treatment or not, he told himself, he would not apologize for something that was so clearly her fault. Still, he followed her into the building and was distracted by rows of candy bars, shelves of soft drinks and the prevalent scent of crude oil.
When she took out paper money, Jacob had to stick his hands in his pockets to keep himself from reaching out to touch it. The man in the cap ran grimy fingers over the keys of a machine. Red numbers appeared in a viewbox. The paper was exchanged, and Sunny was given metal disks.
That was money, too, Jacob reminded himself. Coins, they were called. He was frustrated when she dumped them in her bag before he could get a close look. He wondered how he could approach her for some samples.
The woman he’d seen earlier herded the three children inside, and the room was immediately filled with noise. All three fell greedily on the rows of candy bars.
“Just one,” the woman said, an edge to her voice. “I mean it.” She was digging in her purse as she spoke.
The children, bundled in coats and hats, set up an arguing din that ended in a shoving match. The smallest went down on her bottom with a thump and a wail. Jacob bent automatically to set her on her feet, then handed her the smashed candy bar. Her bottom lip was quivering, and her eyes, big and round and blue, were filled to overflowing.
“He’s always pushing me,” she complained.
