Day bled into night. A man who got off in Barstow left his book on the seat: An Introduction to German. When he didn't return for it, she took it as her own, and began re-teaching herself German. She'd taken classes in high school, but they were mostly forgotten. It made the time pass. Liz liked languages. Every time the bus stopped, Liz considered getting off to stretch her legs; if her first thought was that she could get a drink, she stayed where she was and practiced her German silently. She called herself a pathetic little shit in three languages until the bus started moving again.

She fell asleep, cramped in the seat, and got another fourteen or fifteen hours of bus sleep. It came fitfully; she woke every few minutes with cramps or when the sulky baby in the rearmost row started wailing again. When she finally did fall asleep for a while, she awoke starving, in pain and with her right hand reaching across her body to clutch at the window frame on her left. The sun had come up and there was a grossly obese woman taking up both seats across the aisle from her.

Her name was Denise, Liz learned shortly, and nothing short of full REM sleep could stop Denise from striking up a conversation. Realizing her predicament, Liz tried looking out the window, closing her eyes, and even making snide comments, but none of it worked. The monologue continued through Oklahoma and deep into Missouri. Liz heard all about Denise's children (who were in Columbus, Ohio) and her job (as a cafeteria worker in a college dormitory) and her problems, oh God yes, Denise's problems (bad back, bad neck, bad knees, some nebulous kidney issue, an equally nebulous digestive issue that apparently allowed green beans to pass through her system untouched, painful periods, astigmatism, pinched nerves, the list went on and on). Her psoriasis monologue was thankfully interrupted by a rest stop.

Liz fled the bus, dug out the peanut jar, and crossed the road to get to a big field full of the tall browning grass of late fall. She looked back at the bus station--actually a convenience store along the highway, surrounded by fields. Some of them were cultivated and already harvested, others, like the one she stood next to, had been left wild. She had fifteen minutes before the bus continued on its way through Missouri or Kansas or Illinois or wherever the hell they were; she hadn't been paying attention. It had all looked the same for most of the day. She had picked this field at random; it just felt right.