There was the feeling that I had made this mistake before.  Was it happening again?  After losing my family, then my new friends, and then Mikey, I became convinced that everyone whom I ever loved was going to die if I stayed close to them.  It was a stupid thing to think, looking back at it, but all I knew at the time was that I couldn't bear to lose another friend.  If Liz had died, or Andrew, or one of the others, I didn't know what I'd do.  The very idea of it was more than I could stand to think about, and the longer I stayed there, the more certain I was that it would happen.  When I got depressed, they assumed it was because of Mikey, but in truth I couldn't look at them without thinking of a thousand terrible things that might happen to them, without seeing Liz raped and murdered, or Peach stabbed to death by a mugger.

The only reason I didn't leave sooner than I did was that I wanted to finish high school.  I didn't even stay to get my diploma.  I just wanted to finish.  The two weeks from Mikey's death till school's end were agony.  When it was over, I took my finals, did well enough to know that I'd passed, and then I left. 

I ditched the Honda that the Prices had bought for me in Toledo, because I didn't want them to find me, either.  Before I started hitching, I called Liz and told her where I was, that I was okay but I wasn't coming back.

She thought I was being an idiot, of course, and she told me so.  "If you can't stay with the Prices anymore, Cobweb, stay with me," she said.  "I've got room."

That was even worse, considering what I was really running away from.  "Thank you, Liz, but I can't.  I just can't."

"I don't understand." She sounded like she was going to cry.  That shocked me; she hadn't even cried at Mikey's funeral.  "This isn't fair, Nikki.  Is it about Mikey?  I loved him too, you know."

"I can't explain it," I said.

"They're going to ask me where you went."

"No, they won't.  The Prices hardly consider you a person.  They're not going to come looking for you."  I doubted they'd even consider Liz when looking for me.  They didn't like her; didn't even know where she lived.  She didn't fit into their world.  I didn't either, but they had a small degree of control over me, being my guardians.  I doubted they'd raise much fuss.  They'd been all but ignoring me since I had gotten out of the hospital after the accident.

"Where are you going to go?"  I could tell Liz was humoring me for the moment.

I started to cry.  "California," I said with as much confidence as I could put into my voice through tears.  "San Francisco."

"Good.  When you get there, call my mother.  Write down this phone number."  She gave me her mother's phone.  "You don't have to go live with her, just have her tell me you're okay.  And if you need anything, you have someone to go to."

"Thank you."

"I'm not done yet, Su-chan.  What are you going to do when you get there?" 'Su-chan' was 'cobweb' in Japanese.  Liz' mother was Japanese and she had grown up bilingual.

"I don't know," I admitted.  The tears started to come again.  "I just have to be away from there.  I can't stay there any more."

"Why not?  Are they doing something?  The Prices?"

"No.  I can't...I can't explain."

She lost patience again.  "This is stupid, goddammit!  Come back home.  We can make it better, but it has to be all of us.  You, and me, and Peach, and Andrew."

And I'd see them die, one by one.  "No, Liz, I can't.  You guys mean too much to me, I can't, I just can't..."

"Don't cry, Nikki.  Come on, center yourself.  I'm sorry.  I don't like what you're doing, and it's upsetting me too.  Don't shut me out, okay?  Mama owns a restaurant," she said patiently.  "I bet she can find something for you to do, if you need a job."

"Liz, no, I can't--"

"I want you to keep yourself healthy," she said sternly.  I suddenly thought that she was acting like more of a mother to me than Mrs. Price had.  "I don't want you to be like the ten thousand other kids who go to California and wind up squatting in wrecked apartment buildings and turning tricks to get heroin.  That means a plan.  Food.  Shelter.  I'll help you because you're my friend, even if I don't like what you're doing.  But I won't let you go off and destroy yourself, either.  For the same reason.  I'm your friend and I love you."

"Everyone who loves me dies," I said bitterly.

"Oh, really?  Is that why you have to leave? That's shitty logic, babe.  Just because you're gone doesn't mean we care about you any less."

"No, that's not...I didn't mean that."  I thought she'd ask what I did mean, then, but she didn't.

"Everyone has reasons," she said.  "They're not always for other people to understand.  So I don't like what you're doing, but I have to stop and think that maybe I just don't and can't understand it.  You're smart enough to know what you need--and I wouldn't say that about just anyone, either.  If you say you have to do this, I trust you.  But I still say it's just plain dumb, and I'm still gonna be overprotective on you.  It's the way I was raised, Su-chan, sorry."

I was crying again.  "Thank you.  Thank you so much."

"Don't thank me.  If I thought there was a chance you'd still be there, I'd drive to Toledo and drag you back home again."

"It's raining out, it's not worth it."

"Yeah, right.  If it's raining, get a hotel room.  It's getting dark out; you shouldn't drive in the dark."

She didn't know I'd ditched my car already.  "I'll do that.  I'll lock myself in my room all safe and sound.  No sharp objects or toxins at hand."

"I'm not afraid of you killing yourself.  If anything, I'm afraid you'll kill someone else.  You're like me--the bad stuff is directed out, not in."

I thought about the time I'd lost my temper and slapped Mrs.  Price.  Liz knew about it, too.  "I won't kill anyone.  Not today," I joked.  "It's too rainy to dig graves."

She laughed.  We talked about nothing for a while--Liz was more comfortable about my running away when I wasn't hysterical.  "Sososo," she finally muttered, coming back to my leaving.  "I could get you a plane ticket, you know.  To California, so you don't have to drive all the way."

"No, you can't.  You work in a bookstore and all you ever talk about is how you don't have any money even though you quit buying alcohol all the time.  I'll be okay, Liz.  Once I turn eighteen I can control my own money, the estate, and I'll be fine.  Maybe Charles will be back by then."

"When do you turn eighteen?"

"December."

"You don't want to just hold out until then?  Stay with me for six months," she urged again.

"It's not the Prices I'm running from!" I yelled.  "I can't stay there another half a year or I'll lose everything!" I realized I was shouting.  "I'm sorry..."

"Sorry, Nikki.  I'm just trying to help in my own misguided way."  I made a sound of gratitude.  I really was happy for Liz, who never substituted what I wanted to hear in place of what she thought.  "My instinct is to grab you and make you stay, but I'm being selfish.  I don't know the whole story."

"No.  No, you don't," I sighed.

"Make me a promise, then."

"What?"

"Promise to tell me the story some day.  The whole thing."

Stop,  Wait.  There's a strange jog in my memory here, a detail that I don't remember noticing at the time.  I am at a pay phone, an outdoor one, turned into the little glass half-booth because it's at a gas station and the cars roaring past make it hard to hear.  I am looking through the crazy-cracked glass, and there is a woman standing across the street.  Just standing there.  She has straight blond hair and slightly dusky skin, which from a distance looks like a tan.  And sunglasses.  And her face...her face is shaped like Taiisha's.  Is she...was she really there?  Or am I imagining that she was, inserting her into my memory?