Yet again, I can’t sleep.

It’s almost daybreak before I even bother pulling my arm out from underneath her, numb and tingling. I sit up and rub my face, sighing to myself. At the way I’ve so completely fucked up my own rules.

This was a huge mistake.

The only thing worse than letting myself get involved with Lila to begin with, knowing how easily I could slip up and ruin her life, is doing it again. Everything I told her at the motel is still true—but how can I possibly ask her to respect my decision now, when I didn’t?

I’m not sure why I even came here with her. We both knew I wouldn’t be much help in finding her mom: there was nothing I could find out that Lila couldn’t on her own. Even protecting her was just a fluke. If I weren’t here, maybe she wouldn’t have gone to get food in the first place.

I ease out of bed, making sure she’s still asleep, and find my bag. I cram my feet into my shoes, no socks, and write her a note on the hotel stationary. It’s the least I can do.

And, finally, one last scumbag move to remember me by: I take five twenties from her wallet, sticking out of her purse on the floor. I feel like complete and utter shit as I pocket it, but I know I won’t get far on what I’ve got left.

Then again, $100: it’s a small price to pay for getting me out of her life, nice and early. A good deal, even if she’ll never know that.

I kiss her forehead. She sighs in her sleep, just a reflex, but it kills me. Like even now, she realizes I was going to disappoint her all along.

The front desk calls a cab for me. I sit on the curb to wait.

Two businessmen step out, smoking and talking about airlines. I study the clean fit of their suits, how their hair is combed back, their stances relaxed but sure. It reminds me of sitting by the chapel as a kid, while the congregation poured out onto the sidewalk in their Sunday best.

I used to want to be a businessman. I never knew what business, exactly: I didn’t think that far ahead. All I knew was that I wanted a suit and people calling me “Mr. Jones,” like they did my Uncle Killian. Dad, of course, chastised me for it.

“You remember Luke 18:25, right?” he’d asked, on more than one occasion.

“Yes, Dad,” I grumbled, and said it with him, every time: “‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.’” He’d always stop halfway through, smiling with surprise as I finished the rest of the verse without him.

“Good job, son.”

He didn’t get it. It wasn’t about the money. It was about respect, being a big shot. When you were important enough, you didn’t have to turn the other cheek, because people didn’t dare screw you over in the first place. You didn’t have to be meek: your confidence was what people wanted to see.

“Uh, hey,” I call out now. One of the guys looks over, while the other stares at his phone. I get to my feet. “Can I bum one of those?”

“Sure, man.” The guy shakes another cigarette out of his pack and lets me take it. I thank him and dig my matches out of my jeans, edging back to my seat.

An entire year without smoking, gone. It should bother me more than it does. I feel my nerves settle a little, until the smell reminds me of Lila and twists my stomach all over again.

My cab arrives. I put my luggage in first, sliding in after it, and flick my cigarette onto the pavement.

“Bus station,” I tell the driver.

The hotel fades behind us. I slump in the seat and remind myself that this is best. Not for me, of course—but then again, it’s about time I did something good for somebody else, without getting anything good in return.

Once upon a time, I knew a verse for that, too.

I stare at the note for so long, the sweat on my fingers makes the paper wrinkle.

Lila:

I’m sorry. I still have too much of myself to fix.

-Shepherd

He did it again, the classic cop-out. It’s not you, it’s me. Only this time, he isn’t going back on his word, breaking his own rules. He’s really gone.

I take a breath as the tears hit. “He’s gone,” I whisper, barely making a sound at all. “Accept it.”

It doesn’t work. I don’t want to believe he isn’t here, or that he was right all along: he isn’t a good guy. If abandoning me right when I need him most isn’t proof enough, the money missing from my purse has to drive the point home.

Part of me—a big part—wants to curl up in this bed and go back to sleep. I can’t handle this on my own, not yet.

Then I see the picture from the locket, and the note from the adoption agency, sticking out of my wallet where the money used to be. I can’t remember if I put them there. Maybe Shepherd did it, moving them from my luggage to tell me, yes, I can do this on my own.

Well, screw him.

I will do this. Not because he’s inspired me, but because I’m done letting guys’ decisions determine mine. Shepherd’s gone, it hurts—but I’m not going to sit here and pout like some pathetic mess.

With the listing and set of directions in one hand, and my luggage weighing down the other, I check out and head to the car. At least that’s one good thing I can say about Shepherd: he didn’t leave me stranded.

1922 East Cedar Court is twenty minutes from our hotel, a timeframe I spend chain-smoking and grumbling curse words at every motorist in my path. I refuse to think about Shepherd for more than a few seconds at a time. I don’t need him. I can do this.

The house is a small rancher painted yellow, and the mailbox is twisted sideways on its post. There aren’t any cars, but I park on the street and let my legs, shaky and sore like I have the flu, carry me up the porch, just the same.

My pulse is humming. I lift the brass knocker and tap twice. Then I step back and wait.

This is your mom, I tell myself. You’re about to meet your birth mom.

Ironically, my little forced-acceptance trick works this time. When the door opens, it’s not a woman there at all, much less one that looks like me.

“Who are you?” the man asks. He shuts the door to just a few inches. I hear a television behind him, blasting louder than Uncle Wayne’s game shows.

“Hi. I’m, uh…looking for Tillie?”

The guy, who looks at least a couple decades older, gives me the once-over. “Asked who you were.”

“Kathryn,” I answer. Using my birth name comes more easily than I expected, but I suddenly wish it hadn’t. For some reason, I don’t trust this guy. My stomach knots up just looking at him.

“Got the wrong house,” he says. The gap narrows. “Sorry.”

I start to protest, but he’s already closed the door. I hear a chain lock slide into place, his footsteps heavy as he goes back to his television.

Great. I check the address on my sheet again, even though I know I haven’t made a mistake: this house is it. It matches the photo. The address is right, even if one house number is missing, just a darkened patch of brick in its place.

I don’t let myself cry until I’m in the car. It still makes me feel ashamed of myself, breaking down after all my talk of not pouting, but at least no one can see.

This was stupid. As much as I hate to admit it, Shepherd was right. Not that I ever believed the idea wasn’t flawed, or even crazy—but I did think, deep down, it wouldn’t be a waste of time. After that first night on the road with Shepherd, I figured I would at least have him, no matter how the rest ended. Now, I’ve got no one.

I light another cigarette and pull the car around to the end of the street, in front of an empty lot that’s been dug up for construction. There’s a crane poised over a ditch.

Logically, I know the only thing left to do is go home. I’m done here. But my energy is sapped, and the longer I stare at that empty lot and all that upturned earth, the more I wish I had a hole to crawl into and disappear.

So I just sit there and keep crying. I cry for Tillie, who had me so young, who tried to keep me and couldn’t. I cry for myself. I cry for Mom and Dad, missing them more than ever in this moment.

I wanted to find Tillie for a lot of reasons: curiosity, some kind of kinship—but the biggest was so that, whenever I finally did accept Dad was gone, I could at least say, But I’ve got this other person, too. I’m not alone.

Maybe that was the real reason I held onto Donnie as long as I did. I knew, even before Dad admitted his kidneys were failing, that he wouldn’t be around forever. And Aunt Betty and Uncle Wayne, while in good health, were even older. One day, I would be completely alone—but if I had Donnie, at least that was something.

Now, I don’t have my parents. I don’t have Tillie. Donnie, Shepherd, every guy I’ve ever dated or liked: they’re all history. Right now, with so many miles between myself and Indiana, I’m on my own.

You’re on your own, I tell myself. This time, it takes only once to accept it.

* * *

By the time I’m cried out, I can feel my heartbeat in both temples, my sinuses raw. I wipe my face with napkins from our on-the-road lunches and bravely chug the only thing in the car, watered-down cola. It’s disgusting, but clears my head.

I put the car in Drive and check the directions list again. I didn’t think to print the reverse copy, but maybe I can follow it backwards. Getting anywhere but here feels good enough.

As I pull away from the curb, I see a car coming towards me. It cuts the wheel hard and bounces into the driveway of 1922 East Cedar. The same house I was just at. The wrong one.

But when I creep the car closer, I see a woman get out. She gathers some groceries from the backseat and rushes inside.

It could be anyone. I have no reason to pull back up to the curb, one house down this time, and shut the car off. No reason to close my door with a soft click, so no one can hear me, and no reason to slink up to the porch. But I still do.

I hear screaming. The man I met a few minutes ago is yelling like he’s gone insane, and the woman’s voice is barely audible.

“...telling everyone in town? Huh?” A pause. “Then how did some girl know your fucking name, tell me that.” The window frame actually rattles as he moves. I hear a slap, then silence, until a door slams.

I should call the police or something. Clearly, this isn’t a good situation, whoever these people are. Before I can turn back, though, I hear the front door open, while I’m still on the steps.

“Oh,” a voice says, surprised. I hear her sniff as the door shuts behind her. “Um...can I help you?”

I turn. The first thing I notice is the pack of cigarettes in her hand, like she’s trying to hide them. The second thing is the red mark on her eye, the earliest stage of a bruise, and that she’s crying.

Then, finally, I notice that Shepherd was right. She looks a lot like me.

“You’re Tillie?” I ask. Somehow, I know to whisper.

She glances behind her at the house. We hear the slamming of drawers and furniture, near the back. “Who are you?” The way she says it is different from how he asked: not at all suspicious, but sweet, genuine.

“My name is Lila,” I answer, then realize my mistake. “But it...it used to be Kathryn.”