Free The Long Way Home by Karen McQuestion

saving up for retiring. It went on and on.”
    “Still,” Jazzy said, “to not go out of Wisconsin your whole life!”
    “My life isn’t over yet.” Laverne closed the window. “And I’m getting out of Wisconsin now, aren’t I?”
    “You’re not only leaving Wisconsin. You’re heading to Las Vegas,” Rita said.
    “Sin city!” Jazzy said.
    Rita said, “Home of the Hoover Dam.”
    “An oasis in the desert,” Jazzy added.
    “Gambling,” Laverne said, her eyes shining.
    And Marnie softly added, “The place where I can finally see Troy.”

Chapter Fifteen
     
    Jazzy hummed along to the music. At the start of the trip, she’d asked if she could hook up her iPod to the car stereo and the ladies were fine with it. Since then, she’d spent a lot of time scrolling through songs to make sure the music matched the view.
    They’d established a routine. Every hour or so they made a bathroom stop. Marnie said she didn’t really find it necessary, but joined the other two anyhow, just in case. Jazzy declined. She couldn’t even imagine having to pee that often. “Have you guys thought of seeing a doctor about this condition?” she asked, which made them laugh. When Rita had first mentioned frequent bathroom breaks, Jazzy hadn’t dreamt it would be this often. Good Lord, how could a person function in life with having to stop and hunt for a toilet all the time?
    Most of the time the group kept a lookout for their restrooms of choice—the parklike rest areas found along Wisconsin highways. When they stopped, the other women visited the bathrooms, while Jazzy checked out the display case and studied the large state map, complete with red arrow labeled, “You are here.” Her third-grade teacher had said Wisconsin was shaped like a mitten, and that was sort of true, although she noted now that Michigan was clearly even more mitten-shaped.
    Marnie spent a lot of her time in the car looking at a road atlas, tracing their path with her finger. Jazzy knew Marnie was wishing they could get there faster. Jazzy had involuntarily tapped into Marnie’s stream of consciousness, and was picking up her thoughts and emotions. It wasn’t a fun place to be. The woman was down on herself a lot. Her latest mental self-flagellation involved her fear of flying. Marnie had been thinking the same thought, over and over again, ever since the trip began. If I wasn’t so afraid to fly, I could be in Las Vegas already . If I wasn’t so afraid to fly, I could be in Las Vegas already. It was driving Jazzy crazy. She wanted to tell Marnie to ease up on herself. Everyone had something—some fear, some shortcoming, some problem. And some people had multiples in each area. The problems were what made people human beings—they fostered compassion and encouraged growth. What would be the point if everyone was perfect? She wanted to tell Marnie this, but Jazzy knew from previous experience that the words wouldn’t reach her. This was something Marnie would have to learn for herself.
    Out of all of them, Laverne was the most interested in the view. She looked out in rapt attention, clutching her large purse. She gawked as they passed farm fields dotted by Black Angus cattle. When they passed a sign for the city of Fitchburg she said, “Sounds like a Civil War name.” She nudged Marnie when she spotted a hawk flying overhead. Marnie feigned polite interest and then went back to reading the atlas. As they got closer to the Mississippi River, the route became hillier, and the road often dipped between walls of rock three stories high. Laverne gaped unabashedly.
    At the end of the afternoon, when they were within reach of the Iowa border, they saw a sign for the last of the Wisconsin rest stops until the return trip. “Does anyone want to stop?” Rita asked, once again.
    “You betcha,” Laverne said. Rita veered off the freeway and headed down the long exit toward the rest stop. In the distance they saw a parking lot and building fronted by