Alice drove. She threw her head back, howling with the pounding music, as she flattened the pedal beneath her foot. The vibrations from the road flowed up her leg, reminding her. Alice was alive.
The dark miles flashed outside her window. Thankfully, no red and blue lights were flashing there. /Not this time…/
Those lights were there, another time. Alice had fled the house, hands shaking as she worked the door locks. She had climbed into the driver’s seat and crept out of the parking lot, holding her breath as the gate clattered open. Alice feared that he would come to his senses at any moment. Any noise would shock him back to the reality: she was headed outside of his control. So, she fled. Slowly, at first, much like one backing away from a sleeping predator, then quickly, all at once. Her tires hit the on-ramp and the engine roared to life, carrying the quavering Alice away. Away to anywhere but there. Then the lights.
She would have to explain the ticket. The speeding. She’d have to answer to her father. And, perhaps worse, she’d have to answer to Him. She’d have to convince him that she would be okay outside by herself. That she’d be safe and would come back, always come back, to him…
/But, not this time. No lights, this time. But I’ll still have to go back…/
Alice’s speed flagged as the realization hit her. A ghost passed over her face, haunting her features in the midnight glow of reflected headlights.
But she shook her head violently, like a dog sprayed with water in the face, and cranked the music still higher.
She would be there, soon. The two angels would sit with her on the mountain, one blind and the other in fetters, to await the break of day. Alice raced the sleeping sun to the molehill that was her mountain, seeking a freedom lost to her long ago.
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