Read Online Northward to the Moon by Polly Horvath - Free Book Online Page B

here.”
    “I’ve got a better idea,” says Ned, suddenly brightening. “Who wants to go to Elko?”

    We collect our things and head out into the night. Then we start driving north.
    “Where are we going
now?”
asks Maya.
    “We’re going to visit my mother,” says Ned. “She has a horse ranch up in cowboy country.”
    “Cool,” says Max.
    “Cool,” says Hershel.
    “I can’t believe I am finally going to meet your mother,” says my mother.
    “Yeah,” says Ned unenthusiastically.
    “Where’s your mother been?” asks Maya.
    “Well, that
is
the question,” says Ned. “Not that I was looking real hard.”
    “Ned …,” says my mother.
    “All right, aterlay,” says Ned.
    “That’s ‘later’ in Pig Latin,” says Maya.
    “Who taught you Pig Latin?” asks Ned. “Not Mrs. Gunderson?”
    “Mrs. Gunderson speaks five languages,” says Maya enigmatically.
    “There’s the moon!” screams Hershel, pointing out the window.
    Tonight it is a luminous cream-colored orb. Why does the moon always look different? Always different, always personal.
    “Listen, you kids may as well go to sleep. It’s a long, long drive ahead of us.”
    “How are you going to find your mom’s ranch?” I ask.
    “I’ll stop in at the sheriff’s. Sheriffs at these sparsely populated places know everyone. Especially the ranch owners. I think.”
    “Jane, can you get some blankets out of the box by your feet? Max and Hershel, why don’t you take a blanket and curl up?” says my mother.
    I pass out blankets to all. Ned has the heater on but it doesn’t work very well. The car was old when Ned bought it two years ago and things keep going wrong that we can’t afford to fix. I like being a little chilly with a blanket wrapped around me likea tent. It is also a place to escape from Maya. My mother wears a blanket as well. Only Ned has to be blanketless and cold but he says he doesn’t mind. He seems distracted and angry when we mention his mother. Angry is a new mode to observe him in. In the past two years I have barely ever seen him so.
    All is quiet in the car. Maya falls asleep quickly. I had expected more pressing questions from her, her voice had that tone, but I guess she is too tired. Max and Hershel are completely worn out. I would like to sleep but I know that my mother and Ned are just waiting for us all to drift off so they can discuss this new turn of events. I pretend to doze. I let my head roll from side to side in case they are sneaking peeks at me through the rearview mirror. Then I start to breathe deeply and rhythmically. This is harder than you’d think. Finally, when they still do not speak, I begin to give out a little snore now and then. I hope I am not overdoing it. I am almost asleep for real when my mother says in a quiet voice, “So, what happens next?”
    “We see if he’s at my mother’s ranch. If he is we give him the money.”
    “What if he isn’t?”
    “I don’t know. Maybe leave it in the desert and go back to Massachusetts. The whole thing has the feel of a wild-goose chase. I’ll tell you one thing, if she knows he’s in trouble, I’d be surprised if she takes him in. Self-sacrifice and maternal protectiveness have never been her strong suits.”
    “No, you always describe her as if, after your father left, she wasn’t quite there,” says my mother.
    Ned snorts. “No, she was thereabouts.”
    I stare out the back window at the stars. The whole back of the station wagon window shows a sky resplendent with constellations. The universe goes out forever. Night covers the desert like a blanket. There is nothing like a sky full of stars to make you lose track of your thoughts. For instance, at first, you realize that all those stars, all those pinpricks of light, are far away from each other but repeated all over the sky thousands of times. They are each glowing hugely alone but not, connected by the deep dark of the universe, part of a whole picture of what we see, thenight