They're all alone on this road.

The last car to pass them, headlights shining and reflecting against the wet pavement with high beams on and uncaring, had been about an hour ago. It's dark out here. They're all alone and the thought is almost reassuring. Alone is safe. There's nobody to hurt them. It's dark, but every little while there's a tall street light that stretches a pool of light that shines on guard rails and liter, before it's all hidden back into darkness again.

Norman's crying in the backseat. His quiet little sniffles and small hiccuping wear on her nerves. Norma glances at him through the rear view mirror as one of the streetlights of this old highway illuminates her pale little boy. The light glistens against the tears on his round cheeks before they're swallowed in darkness again. Norma's eyes flick back to the road as her lips press together softly.

He's just tired. He's hungry. He's cold. He'll fall asleep soon. Norma refuses to feel guilty; this is for his own good. This is for him just as much as it's for her.

She grips the steering wheel tighter for a moment, just a moment. The plastic creaks under her grip before she swallows thickly and reaches to idly play with the radio instead. There isn't a single station without some static. She skips over the talk radio she encounters.

Norman can't be too cold. He's wrapped up in several layers of blankets. Norman has more blankets then Dylan has and Dylan is silent as he stares out his window.

Norma's eyes flick back up towards the mirror to look at Dylan, her handsome boy. His blonde hair is illuminated as if from some inner source, a bright shining mop of hair crowning a serious little face. His hair is getting darker and darker every day though and he won't be blonde when he's all grown; Norma hopes he won't be blonde at least. Dylan stares out his window with hard set blue eyes and a too serious and heavy gaze for someone so young. He glares out into the darkness. His face is swollen and his nose a mess, most likely broken, but he hasn't complained about it. He hasn't said a thing, actually, since they'd packed their bags in the trunk and ran.

Norman can't be too hungry either; they'd stopped at a gas station while the sun was still up and had sat in the parking lot away from the pumps as the boys had a sandwich each. She'd watched her boys eat and tucked one of Norman's brown curls behind his ear as she shook her head when he'd offered her a bite of his sandwich. Norma hadn't felt hungry then and she still isn't. Her body hurts too much to eat.

"We're going to stop soon," Norma says. She speaks barely louder than the radio that croons out Frank Sinatra now. His voice is a familiar and comforting thing in the air around them as her hand goes back to the steering wheel. The swish-clunk of the windshield wipers is the only response to her words. She ignores Norman's sniffling and hiccuping.

Stopping means pulling off to a rest stop and locking the doors. Stopping means all cuddling together in the backseat as they shiver with teeth chattering before body heat warms them. She tried to sing to Norman as they went to sleep the first night on the road, as if it was business as usual, but her voice had broken and she'd nearly cried. Tears had flooded her eyes without warning and emotion had tightened her throat until no sound at all could escape. Singing her children to sleep in the backseat of her car only served to make her sad and very, very angry.

"I want to go home," Norman whimpers as his breath fogs against the glass of his window. "Mother, I want to go home."

Norma's headlights shine against a sign up ahead. She squints to make it out, but for a hazy and scary moment her eyes refuse to focus. She blinks rapidly and finally makes out the important bits, parking area in ten miles. Her eyes are itching and her eyelids drooping. Exhaustion is settling deep in her bones. Her face hurts; her split lip, her black eye, and the chunk of hair missing from her scalp all hurt. She is just so tired. Her mouth runs ahead of her. A person can't think straight when they're so tired.

"Home?" she spits as she glances again into the rear view. "What the hell do you think is waiting for us there, Norman?" She snaps. She regrets her caustic tone immediately.

His little face crumples. He's only a little boy, a confused little boy wanting the warm bed he's known all his life. Norma feels regret instantly. "I'm sorry," she offers after a moment. "Baby, I'm sorry. Momma's tired." She regrets the way she'd said it, but it is the truth. They can't go home, because there is no home. Sam would kill them all, she's sure of that. He'd always said he would. There is no home. Norma shakes her head softly as she amends that thought- home is right here. Home is right here with her boys, but the thought is strangely lacking and makes her want to cry. She'll give Norman a new home, a better home.

Frank Sinatra fades and leaves only the static for a moment. Norma turns the radio off when ads begin to play. The tires under them drone out a sound against the road and water splashes as they pass. The windshield wipers swish-clunk as the rain patters and Norma's eyes droop once, twice, a third time. With that third droopy eyed moment the car drifts to the right and nearly skids against the guard rails before she snap her eyes open and corrects their path sharply. She lets out a breath and when she looks back into the rear view to check on the boys Dylan is staring right at her through the mirror. They make eye contact and it's her that looks away first.

"We're stopping really soon," she says again and feels silly for feeling judged.

She's so tired. But each day the further they get the safer they are; she'll wake up with dawn light shining on her tomorrow and be driving again. She's not sure where they're going, but they're going. They're already running out of money and she doesn't know what to do besides keep going.

"We'll find a new home," she says after another mile and doesn't dare turn her eyes to the rear view to glance at Dylan and his bruised little face.

By the time Norma pulls into the rest stop Norman has cried himself to sleep; his head is dangling forward as he breathes out gentle snores. Dylan's bright eyes watch her as she locks her door and as she glances to see that the other doors are locked too. He watches her as she crawls between the front seats to crumple her way between her two boys. She'd left her sandals in the front footwell; she wiggles her toes and tries to get blood flow to her legs. She'll stretch in the morning.

"Do you need to use the bathroom?" she asks Dylan and together they look out at the sad port-o-potty at the other end of the parking area that shines blue under a flickering street light. She'd parked far from it so as to keep them out of sight; to keep them hidden in the dark. But she'd walk with him there if he needs-

He shakes his head.

The rain patters down on the roof softly, pluck pluck clittering against the metal, and runs in rivulets down the windows. She wonders if the rain will sweep them away. What a wistful thought. She closes her eyes and lets the rain sound envelop her.

Dylan unbuckles, the snap of it is loud to her ears and it startles her. She hopes he didn't see her jump. She opens her arms to him and he leans his way towards her waiting arms. He'd outgrown cuddling a few years ago, but this body warmth and desperation. Norma rubs her nose along his bright hair and smells the scent of him, imagining the smell of babyhood; she remembers how beautiful he was when they placed him on her chest, she remembers how she'd sobbed and ached and thanked god that he didn't look like his father, but every day that passes he does look like- like his father. The older he gets the more he looks like his father, the closer he gets to being a man, tall and broad and strong and she hates it. She's remembering the smell of baby shampoo as the stale scent of unwashed almost teenager enters her nose. The whole car has an unwashed sort of funk to it, she'll have to open the windows a bit in the morning, get some fresh air in. She lets out a wobbling breath as she thinks of how at the next gas station the three of them will have to take turns taking a whores bath in the bathroom sink.

"Where are we going?" Dylan asks.

These are the first words Dylan has said since they left Arizona. These are the first words he's said since Sam smacked him across the face and left him bleeding and crying on the floor right next to Norma. It had been the first time, and it would be the only time, that Sam laid a hand on one of her children. It would never had happened if Dylan had just been at home the first time she'd tried to run... If she'd been able to find him that first time before Sam had found her first-

"Mom?"

"I don't know," Norma admits to him. "We couldn't stay there?" she says like it's a question, and is she really seeking validation from an eleven year old? From her son? She doesn't know, but she knows she feels relief deep in her gut when he nods softly. "No one hurts my kids," she says. She kisses his forehead softly and pats down his hair. "We couldn't stay there."

"He hurt you a lot this time," Dylan breathes.

Norma swallows thickly. "He was real mad."

"Why?" he asks. He asks such a simple question.

Tears start to gather in Norma's eyes and so she slams them shut. "I-" she hesitates. It's stupid. Her whole fucking life has been so stupid. "I bought more than a quarter tank of gas."

Dylan pulls away to look up at her, but Norma can't open her eyes to look at him.

"It was one of his rules," Norma continues. "Only a quarter tank goes in my car, ever. He would check every night."

"Why did you do that?"

Norma's strong resolve breaks then and a shuddering breath gets pulled in before she whimpers it back out. Tears, hot and humiliated tears blubber down her cheeks. It's sudden and raw and ugly. There's nowhere to turn to hide it from Dylan. She covers her face in her hands and sobs. "Please go to sleep, Dylan, please," she begs him after a few minutes of trying and failing to calm down.

"I'm sorry, Mom," he says, "I'm sorry, please don't cry."

"I said go to sleep," she snaps and turns away. She turns towards Norman.

She feels exhaustion in every part of her body, but sleep doesn't come easy. Her boys sleep on either side of her, her brave Dylan and her beautiful Norman as she sits awake and thinks of Sam. She thinks of the spit he lobbed at her before he stormed out of their house. He was so sure that she'd still be there when he came back. She feels the spit, phantom like, against her cheek, and she cringes. Tears leak out her eyes, but no sound escapes her.

She thinks of another rainy night, the first time she tried to run, when Sam had held a gun to her head and told her that he'd kill her before he'd let her leave, that he'd kill them all, before he let them live without him. If Dylan had just been at home, they would have gotten away then-

She falls asleep crying, just like Norman.

It's a gentle knocking that wakes her a few hours later, the rap-rap-rap of a knuckle against glass, a gentle sound that has her blinking fuzzy eyes and rolling her stiff and aching neck as she looks out into the pre-dawn day and sees the policeman outside her car.

"Shit," she breathes as she looks out at a stoic face and dark eyes.