Mourning Song by Lurlene McDaniel
At the doorway of the room, Dani held her breath and peeked out. Again, the long, quiet corridor was unoccupied. Two minutes, she told herself. That’s all the time they needed to get to the fire door. She went first, opened the door, and slid around the corner. Keeping it partially open, she gave Austin a hand signal, and he scooped Cassie up in his arms and hurried for the opening.
Dani shut the door, and the three of them stood in the stairwell for a moment.
“We’re all sure we want to do this?” Dani asked suddenly.
“Let’s go,” Cassie said.
Austin half carried Cassie, half supported her down the stairs with Dani leading the way. At the bottom, Dani darted outside and opened the door of the van. She got in and watched as Austin carried Cassie across the short space from the doorway to where the van was parked.
Dani helped Cassie inside, settling her onto the mat. Austin hopped behind the steering wheel and turned on the motor. Kneeling beside her sister, Dani asked, “You okay?”
Cassie’s breath was coming in short, gasping bursts. “I’m okay,” she whispered. “We made it.”
Dani grasped her sister’s hand, resting it alongside her perspiring cheek. “Let’s hope so,” she told her as the van began to move.
Cassie quickly fell asleep, obviously exhausted just from the escape. Dani sat in the front of the van on the passenger’s side. “She doing all right?” Austin asked.
“It took a lot out of her, but she’s coasting on adrenaline. I haven’t seen her this excited since last Christmas—before she got sick.” Dani grinned. She felt afraid but satisfied.
Austin glanced in his side mirror and accelerated up the ramp marked “1-75 South.” Leaving Cincinnati, so near to the border between Ohio and Kentucky, they were into the Bluegrass State in no time. Since the expressway was practically deserted, Dani didn’t feel the need to keep looking over her shoulder for police lights.
Austin flipped on the cruise control mechanism and settled back in the seat with a long sigh. “Don’t want to break any speed limits.”
“We made it,” Dani said, keeping her eyes straight ahead. She experienced a wave of euphoria.
“So far.”
“Getting her out of the hospital was the hardest part,” she countered.
“Don’t bet on it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I figure that if we’re lucky, they won’t discover she’s missing for another two hours. Then they’ll call your mother. Then she’ll call the police—”
“We left letters for her, explaining everything,” Dani interrupted.
He shook off her remark and continued. “The police will start pumping your mother for information on who could have helped you. And before too long, your mom will think of me. Then the police will come and find out that I told my neighbor I was going off for a few days—”
“You told your neighbor?” Dani scowled at him.
“Someone had to take care of my dog.” He ignored her angry look. “And once the cops and your mom figure out I’m driving, they’ll issue an all-points bulletin for my arrest—”
“All right! All right! Why didn’t you mention the dog before? What’s your point now? Are you thinking of turning around and going back? Because if you are—”
“I’m not. I’m just doing a mental outline of a possible scenario. We need to be prepared.”
“We are prepared.”
“My guess is that we’ve got about six hours of driving time left on this road.”
“We discussed this already.”
“We’ll have to hit some of those rural back roads we marked on the map.”
“It’ll be daylight in six hours,” she observed nervously, feeling safer under the cover of night.
“That’s right. And by seven, with any luck, we should be through the Cumberland Gap and crossing into Tennessee.”
Dani’s palms were sweating. “That’ll be good. One state behind us by morning.”
“You don’t understand,” he said. “We have to be through the Cumberland Gap by then, because this is about the only road through those mountains.”
“How bad can it be?”
He snorted and said, “It’s no fun, especially in fog.”
Dani stared blankly out of the windshield, trying not to think about the anguish her mother would be facing when she first heard that Cassie and she were missing. The soft sounds of the radio, the dimness of the interior made her feel protected. Soon, her eyelids grew heavy and she couldn’t hold them open.
Austin reached behind his seat and fished out a pillow. He handed it over, and she settled into it gratefully. She didn’t know how long she slept when she startled upright. “What’s wrong?”
“Fog,” he said grimly. “It’ll really slow us down.”
Outside, the world had lightened to a pale gray, but the van was shrouded in a thick cloud of mist. “I can’t see anything.”
“If you could, you’d see that we’re going up a mountain with sheer rock on one side and a guard rail on the other between us and a thousand foot dropoff.”
“You must be tired, too. Can we stop?”
“And have some trucker plow into us?” He had already turned on his lights and now set his flasher signal. “Maybe this will help someone see us so we don’t get rear-ended.”
She understood what he meant when minutes later, the massive back end of a creeping semi loomed in front of them without warning. Dani gasped.
Austin braked. “Imagine doing this by wagon train like Daniel Boone.”
“It’s a wonder anyone ever went west,” she complained. One thing about their part of Ohio—it was flat. And so was the road to Iowa. Flat, dark soil dressed up with standing fields of corn and grain.
“How’s Cassie?” Austin wanted to know.
Dani unbuckled her seat belt and moved to the back of the vehicle. “Still sleeping.” In the gray light of morning, her sister looked so fragile and pale that the enormity of what they were doing struck Dani hard. A very sick girl was miles away from medical help, inside a van that was crawling like a snail up the foggy side of a mountain. Dani swallowed down a sick feeling that rose in her throat.
“We’ll make it,” Austin called. “The fog’s lifting.”
Through the windshield, Dani saw the fog part in wispy sprays, like angel hair. Beyond lay the sprawling mountain splendor of the great Cumberlands. Wide-eyed, she gazed down at valleys, thick with trees, green with the ripening of summer. Rays from a rising morning sun were glorious. She didn’t speak all the way down the road through the Gap, awed by the beauty, overwhelmed by the splendor.
Less than an hour later, their van crossed into Tennessee.
Eleven
THEY PULLED INTO a gas station at the next exit, Austin filled the van’s gas tank, and they got back on the road. Cassie awoke, hungry. While Austin drove, Dani handed Cassie a muffin, “It shouldn’t make you nauseous,” Dani said.
“What would you like?” she asked Austin.
“Make me a sandwich. It’ll be easy to eat while I drive.”
Dani prepared the sandwich, then sat in the back on the floor with her sister and ate a muffin, too. Cassie reached for her duffel bag. “Did you pack my conch shell?”
Dani helped her root through the bag until she found the large pink shell. Cassie held it to her ear and smiled. “I can hardly believe I’ll be seeing the ocean soon.” Then, a frown crossed her face. “Mom probably knows by now that we’re gone.”
“It’s a good bet.”
“She’s going to be awfully upset and angry.”
“I know.”
“Dani, I told her that in my letter that it was all my idea. That I begged you to take me. I told her about the One Last Wish money and how you were going to help me make my wish come true. I told her we were only using a little of the money. The rest is for the bills and everything. I hope she forgives me.”
“I told her that it was all my idea. I wanted you to have a fabulous we
“She’ll figure out that we’re headed to the beach.”
“Probably so, but there are an awful lot of beaches in the world.”
Cassie held up her hand to put an end to the conversation. She glanced toward the driver’s seat. “So, tell me, Austin. How did my sister ever talk you into this crazy idea?”
“I figured a trip to Florida would be the perfect way to kick off an otherwise boring summer. Anyway, I’ve been all over the world, but never to Florida with two babes!”
“I think it’s nice of you,” Cassie said. “And real nice of your parents to let us use their van.”
Dani held her breath, hoping that Cassie wouldn’t ask any more questions. It wouldn’t take much for Cassie to figure out Dani had not told her the truth. Dani hadn’t wanted to worry her, so she’d purposely been vague about the details and the dangers. Inwardly, all Dani hoped for was that things would go smoothly and they would reach their destination without trouble.
She and Cassie played a game of cards, but by midmorning. Cassie started complaining of a headache. Dani’s stomach knotted. She gave her sister a painkiller, the same she received in the hospital. But the pain didn’t subside. Soon, Cassie was drenched with sweat and sick to her stomach. “I need to stop,” she mumbled.
“We have to stop, Austin,” Dani said urgently.
He got off the expressway at the next exit and pulled into a McDonald’s lot. Dani helped Cassie into the bathroom, where Cassie vomited violently. Dani stood beside her as she retched over the toilet. “The pain …” Cassie mumbled. “It’s never been this bad.”
Dani was so afraid, she felt numb all over. “Maybe you can take another pill?”
“I can’t keep it down.” Cassie gagged.
“But if you were back in the hospital—”
“They’d give me a shot.”
Dani felt panic. She had no shots for Cassie. She dampened a wad of paper towels, which she applied to the back of Cassie’s neck. “We need to get out of here,” she told Cassie gently. “Can you make it now? Try to take another pill.”
“I’ll try.”
Dani helped Cassie to her feet and outside to the van. Austin was studying a map. “She doesn’t look much better,” he whispered to Dani.
The two of them helped Cassie to lie down as Dani explained that Cassie couldn’t keep her medication down. “Give me the bottle,” he said.
He removed one of the pills, crushed it in a cup, added water, and made a paste. “Smear this on her gums and on the inside of her mouth,” he directed.
With trembling hands, Dani obeyed.
“She’ll absorb the medication through her gums, and it’ll bypass her stomach.”
Dani believed him because she had no choice. Once she was finished, Austin began to drive south along a back road that paralleled 1-75. Dani held Cassie’s hand and chewed her bottom lip while Cassie moaned, but within twenty minutes, her groaning began to lessen, and she fell asleep.
“It worked,” Dani said, climbing into the passenger seat.
“Good.” Austin tossed her the map. “We’re going to have to stop for the day.”
“But we’re barely past Knoxville.”
“No choice. She needs to rest during the heat of the day, and I could stand a little sleep myself.”
Austin had been driving nonstop since midnight. Of course, he was exhausted. “Where should we stop?”
“One of these dirt side roads.” He found one he liked and took it. Then he pulled off and drove the van carefully through the woods under the cover of trees. When he came to a clearing, he shut off the engine.
Dani was struck by the silence of the summer forest. Bright sunlight flowed through the leafy canopy, and the air grew still and hot. “Come on,” Austin said, getting out of the van. “Help me set up camp.”
“Camp?”
“Don’t tell me you’ve never camped before?”
“Sure—under my mother’s dining room table with a blanket thrown over the top.”
He laughed. “Well, it’s time you learned how to rough it.” He opened up the side of the van, and without disturbing Cassie, he hauled out a large bundle.
“What’s that?”
“A tent. Give me a hand.”
She followed his instructions, and soon they had a canvas roof and floor attached to the open side of the van. A thin, screenlike netting, to keep out insects, made up the sides of the enclosure. They spread out bedrolls and turned on portable fans to circulate the air. With Cassie sound asleep in the van, Austin stretched out on the canvas-covered ground. “You should get some sleep, too,” he told Dani with a yawn.
She lay down, but said, “I’m not going to be able to sleep.”
“You’d better—we’ve got a whole night of driving ahead of us.”
She turned on her side and stared out at the woods through the fine mesh screen. The world looked lazy and peaceful, but Dani was still feeling the strain of their ordeal. Half under her breath, she said, “I was so scared back in that bathroom, Austin.”
Austin moved closer to her. “She was pretty sick?”
Dani nodded. “She couldn’t stop throwing up. It really hit me that we’re out here with no doctors and only a limited amount of medicine.”
“We can turn back.”
She shook her head. “That would be even worse.” Dani rolled over so that she was staring into Austin’s eyes. “What if… what if… Cassie dies? Mom would never forgive me. I’d never forgive myself.”
“I thought you told me you have everything figured out.”
“I do,” she insisted fiercely. “But when I saw Cassie so sick … I felt so helpless … I don’t know. I’m scared.”
“You’ve got more than one good reason,” he said.
“What do you mean, Austin? Has something happened you haven’t told me about? Can you still drive?”
He sighed. “You’d better know. While you were in the bathroom at the McDonald’s, I turned on the radio and heard the news.” He took a deep breath. “The police are looking for us.”
Twelve
DANI IMAGINED HUNDREDS of law enforcement agents combing the countryside looking for them. “I thought we’d have more time. What exactly was said?”
“The report said that anyone who saw a black van with Ohio license plates should notify the police.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, squeezing her eyes shut. “I didn’t want to turn us into criminals.”
“Hey,” he said, smiling at her stricken face. “I’m a big boy. I knew what I was getting into.”
His expression looked reassuring, and for a moment Dani felt less guilty. “You’re not mad at me?”
“No.” He lay back down, his hands clasped behind his head, and stared up at the top of the tent. “But I think we’d better not play the radio while we travel. Cassie doesn’t need to hear that we’re being sought as runaways.”
“You’re right. No need to upset her,” Dani agreed.
“We just have to hang on,” he said. “And we’ll have to be very careful. We’ll drive at night and sleep by day. I brought a Coleman stove, so before we take off tonight, we’ll cook some supper and eat it here. I don’t want to take the chance of going into a restaurant.”
“I’ll bet someone from the McDonald’s will remember us.”
“It’s a possibility, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”
Dani tried to close her eyes, but her dream of taking Cassie to the beach seemed to be turning into a nightmare. What if Cassie got sick—so sick that she … Dani broke out in a cold sweat and forced her thoughts in a different direction. She glanced at Austin, resting beside her and felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude toward him. No one else could have helped her pull this off. “How did you learn all this camping stuff, Austin?”
He raised up on one elbow. “What stuff?” She gestured at her surroundings. “When we lived in Africa,
“What was it like living in Africa?”
“In many ways, it was beautiful. The land was wild and untamed. We took barges down the Congo and drove Land Rovers through the plains. There were no paved roads in the back country, and hardly even any dirt ones. Driving over some of the territory, it felt as if your teeth were vibrating out of your head.”
“Were there wild animals?”
“Sure. At night, you could hear the hyenas howling, but we had guides and bearers, natives who helped carry the gear. We learned a lot from the natives, as much as we taught them! They always lit fires around the perimeters of our camp when the sun went down. No Holiday Inns or hotels along the way. We camped under the stars.”
“And you were in India, too?”
“For a year. But I liked Africa best. Too many people in India.”
Dani turned to face him. “Did you spend a lot of time alone or with your parents?”
“There were schools in the big cities, and that’s where we were based most of our time. My mom and dad are teachers. I went to classes with rich locals and other MKs—missionary kids. In the summers, we traveled.”
“Cassie always wanted to travel,” Dani said wistfully.
“I’m glad she only wanted to go to Florida this trip, and not Tahiti.”
His joke made her smile. “Do you miss life abroad?”
“Sometimes. Not just the land, but the seriousness of everyday life. Whenever I’d come back to the States with my folks to raise money to help support their mission work, I couldn’t believe how spoiled American kids are. I mean, they spend half a day watching TV and the rest of the day saying they’re bored. If people didn’t work every day in India or Africa, they’d die.”
“How did you spend your time in those places?”
“I helped with chores—farming, digging wells, taking care of livestock. But I had fun, too. All missionary families lived together in a compound. We played soccer a lot. We kicked oranges when we didn’t have a ball.”