She always did.
Trudi had taken her to the airport at the last minute. Madeline’s mother had forgotten to pick her up much like she used to forget to pay rent or buy milk or come to Madeline’s school functions. Trudi chattered the whole way, something about rodeos, which normally would have caught Madeline’s attention. But her mind was a good thousand miles away, the little knot in her belly beginning to morph into a watermelon. She didn’t like stepping into the unknown, didn’t like uncertainty in any shape or form.
At the airport, Trudi got out to hug her good-bye in front of the departures terminal. “I’m really proud of you, Mad. I think it will really help if you know more about him.”
“Help what?”
“God, you’re hopeless,” Trudi groaned. “Everything! Oh, and one last thing. I feel that as your friend, I should point out that you might enjoy the trip a little more if you’d worn some jeans or something a little more casual.” Trudi glanced down at Madeline’s suit. “You look so… official.”
Madeline was wearing her best suit, the one she’d worn to the closing of the Freemont Drive property, her first really big property sale. She had a briefcase-slash-purse slung over her shoulder, a neck pillow hooked onto the handle, and Jackson Crane’s number in her pocket. She had one small carry-on bag containing a couple of mix-and-match separates, because she did not expect to be gone more than a couple of days.
“It’s a business meeting, not a family reunion,” she said, and swallowed down another attack of nerves.
“Right,” Trudi said, seeing right through her as usual. “Just keep an open mind, okay?”
“I have an open mind!”
“No you don’t. When it comes to Sperm Donor, you are locked down like Fort Knox.” Trudi hugged Madeline tight, then let go, and walked around to the driver’s side of her car. “Call me!” she shouted, and disappeared into her car and drove away.
Madeline would be calling her, all right. In about two days, from this very airport.
Madeline had to admit that Colorado was a lot cleaner looking than Florida, what with its dark blue mountains, its crisp, cool air, and the bright blue sky with fat white clouds above shimmering gold plains. It looked a lot better in person than it did in the pictures she’d found online. Apparently, she’d have plenty of time to study the breathtaking scenery, because her usual high standard of planning every moment of the day had not exactly meshed with the logistics of getting to this ranch. To say that she did not like surprises was a gross understatement. Madeline liked symmetry in her routine and to know what to expect and when to expect it.
What she did not like was to hear phrases such as “lost your rental reservation” or “four-hour drive from here.” She liked to believe people when they said, “I’ll meet you,” as Jackson Crane had said, that they would mean the most obvious and most logical, “I’ll meet you at the airport,” instead of, “I’ll meet you in Pine River.”
But Madeline had regrouped, because that was the other thing she did extremely well. Her mother had gone through boyfriends like cheap dish towels, and they’d moved many times. When Madeline had to attend a new school, or miss a party she’d looked forward to because her mother woke her in the middle of the night, throwing clothes at her, telling her to pack, Madeline had learned how to regroup when it mattered most.
She had a map of Colorado in her right hand, the keys to her rental car in the left—the last rental car, the chubby-cheeked chatterbox behind the counter had said after cheerfully informing her they’d lost her reservation.
She marched out into the vast open that surrounded the Denver airport, determined to be undaunted by a few early bumps, and above all, to not freak out.
And she was not going to mope because the car was only a little larger than a circus clown car.
With her jaw clenched, Madeline wedged her carry-on into the backseat, then spread the map of Colorado on the hood. She reached into her handbag and pulled out a yellow highlighter—not to be confused with the pink highlighter, which she kept for work-related documents—and traced it along the route she would take to Pine River. She folded the map so that she could see the entire route at a glance, opened the passenger door, and arranged the map on the passenger seat. She put herself in the driver seat, put her phone in the seat console for easy reach, and dug out a bottle of water from her bag, loosened the top, and set it into the cup holder.
She was ready.
Madeline put her foot to the gas and pointed south. Or maybe west. Her sense of direction was not great.
THREE