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She pulled off to the side of the road and stopped, staring through the dirty windshield at the road ahead, at the devastation left by the black stors broken, cars in ditches, fences torn away

The rosary that hung fro from side to side

More than a thousand miles to California, and ould they find there? No friends, no family I could work in a laundry … or a library But ould hire a woet a job, ould watch the children? Oh, God

“Mommy?”

Ant tugged at her sleeve “Are you okay?”

Elsa shoved the truck door open She stu the tidal wave of panic

Loreda caht Grandpa and Grandma would come?”

Elsa turned “Didn’t you?”

“They’re like a plant that can only grow in one place”

Great A thirteen-year-old sahat Elsa hadn’t

“I checked the glove box They gave us as”

Elsa stared down the long, empty road Not far away, a crow sat on a shed that was buried almost to the peak in black dirt

She almost said, I’m scared, but what kind of mother said those words to a child who counted on her?

“I’ve never been on my own,” Elsa said

“You’re not on your own, Mom”