“I was surprised, as always, by how easy the act of leaving was, and how good it felt. The world was suddenly rich with possibility.”

― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

When I was six years old, my father ran away from home.

            Mom never asked why and never tried to find him, either.  Luckily for both of them, they had never gotten married.  To be honest, I’m sure that’s why he did it.  He was afraid of commitment and a six year old daughter and an eight year old relationship was definitely something he couldn’t commit to.

            Mom didn’t waste a single minute—she dated a guy named Erick, and he soon became my step dad.  They had a daughter, Hailey, but Hailey went with Erick when mom and he divorced, and we rarely ever hear from them.  Mom’s dated a few other guys, but Erick was the only guy she married, and she always said that she would never get married again.

            When I was ten, I found an old atlas in my mom’s room.  She smiled when I showed it to her, and took it gently from my hands, saying, “Why don’t I get a marker and we can flip through pages and draw x’s on places we want to go?”  We then sat at the kitchen table all night long, flipping through the old atlas, both of us with different colored pens.  Even now, that old atlas is sitting on my shelf, untouched in the last few years.  When I used to flip through it, I smiled as I remembered mom and I teasing each other about the places the other marked.

            My best friend, Zeke, always said I got my wanderlust from my father.  He left behind pretty much everything of his when he left—clothes (donated to the local Salvation Army), books (mostly poetry, but a worn out copy of On The Road by Jack Kerouac that had taken up a permanent residence on my nightstand), and tons of old photo albums.

            When mom and Erick divorced, she went through our basement and found a bunch of dad’s old stuff.  She brought it all upstairs, and we went through it.  We got rid of the clothes without even looking at them (except for this huge sweater that my dad used to wear that said ‘UCLA’ on it; my mom kept it and wears it for a pajama top).  My mom kept a few of the poetry books, and I took his copy of On The Road before she even saw it.  She would have probably burned it if she had seen it first.

            The photo albums…they were harder.

            Mom flipped through each one (like six in all), and told me the story behind every photograph.  Every picture was taken after they got together.  Mostly, they were all before I was conceived, but when we got to the sixth one, it was filled with pictures of me.  Playing in the tub when I was two or three, drawing with crayon all over my bedroom walls, holding up one of my mother’s bra’s and looking at it with a very confused look on my face.  There was tons of photos of our happy family.

            “Why did dad leave these behind?” I asked.  I was in the awkward I kinda wanna be a scene kid, but I hate the scene music phase.  I was way into acoustic indie music—I hated the heavy stuff, and I still do.

            Mom smiled at me in a non-condescending way and said, “I don’t know, Lindsay.  I think he knew that someday, we would need all of this stuff to remember him.”

            “Where did he go?” I asked.  Mom never really talked about dad, and so when she told me we were going to take all of his stuff out of the basement and go through it, I was beyond excited.  I mean, I didn’t really like my dad.  I actually had grown to hate him—but that didn’t change the fact that I missed him.  I thought about him every day, and wondered how my life would be different if he had stayed.

            “I don’t know sweetie,” mom said.  “I just wish he would never have left.”

            “Me too,” I said.

            After that, the conversation about my missing father ended, and the things we were donating were put into a box, and the things we were keeping were put away.  We haven’t talked about dad since, and every time mom comes into my room, I tuck the copy of On The Road underneath my pillow.  She still doesn’t know I have it.

            When I was sixteen, I figured out that I was too much like my father; I looked like him, with my curly blonde hair, brown eyes, and slightly crooked nose; I was afraid of commitment, and I wanted to run away.

            I don’t know what sparked it.  Maybe it was the fact that I was halfway through reading On The Road for about the sixteenth time, or that my mom refused to talk about him.  Perhaps it was the fact that when I looked in the mirror, all I saw was my father and the person he had become.

            When I got my first job, I began saving my money immediately.  I refused to spend it on anything that wasn’t absolutely important (gas, food, phone bill), and I saved.  When I turned eighteen, I had about two thousand dollars in savings, and I continued adding to it as money rolled in from grandparents and aunts and uncles, all congratulating me for graduating high school.  I was set.

It was just about seven-oh-eight at night on September fourteenth when I announced my grand plan.

            Zeke had been French braiding my hair, which was something he liked to practice on me on account of my ratty dread locks.  Practice for what?  Who knows.  What I know is that he enjoyed doing it, and I looked pretty awesome with my dreads in a French braid.

            I wasn’t too worried about what I was gonna say.  Short, sweet, blunt.  That was my style.

            “I’m gonna run away,” I stated, “and there’s nothing you can do to stop me from doing it.”

            Zeke didn’t say anything, although he stopped braiding my hair for a moment, before continuing.  He continued to not say anything (which is what he usually did whenever I announced one of my classic crazy plans), and we sat in silence until he finished the braid.

            “Hair tie,” he said, putting his hand palm-up on my shoulder.  I took the yellow rubber band off my wrist and gave it to him.  I scratched the spot where the rubber band had rested on my wrist, making my skin glow red.

            He cleared his throat as he finished tying off my braid.  I spun to face him, and put my hands on his shoulders.  “Zeke.”

            He put his hands on my shoulders and said “Lindsay.”

            “No thoughts?”

            He sighed and rolled his eyes.  “You know what my first question is.”

            “I’m not preggo, Zeke.  Not in the slightest bit.”

            “Alright,” he said, putting his hands down in his lap.  “Why, then?”

            “I’m too much like my father,” I explained.  “I don’t like my mom all that much, and I sure as hell don’t like living in Utah.  I want to explore, see the world, live fast while I still can.”

            “The wanderlust is too much for you, eh?”

            “I just feel like I’m suffocating, Zeke,” I said, lying back on my bed.  I folded my hands over my stomach and said, “You know what it’s like.  Control freak parents who don’t really care what your true opinion is.  My mom wants me to become an accountant.  A fucking accountant!”

            “My dad wants me to follow in his footsteps and become the next pastor when he retires.  And until then, he wants me to travel around the world, spreading God’s word,” Zeke said, shuddering.

            I shuddered along with him.  Zeke’s dad was the pastor of the local church, and a total jackass.  He was leader of the local Republican committee (which was also known as the anti-gay committee, which didn’t help Zeke’s situation at all).  Zeke’s father refused to acknowledge Zeke’s sexuality, and so also refused to let him go on any dates that weren’t with a girl (hence why he was constantly at my house).  His father was kind of nutty, and I guess I shouldn’t really have been complaining about suffocating given Zeke’s circumstances.

            “Suffocation is a serious thing,” Zeke said, wiggling his eyebrows at me.  “I’ve heard people have died from it before, scary thing.”

            I giggled and smacked his upper arm.  “Dumb ass.  I’m trying to be serious.”

            “I know,” he said.  He stared at me, and then shook his shaggy black hair out of his eyes.  “I’m going with you, Lin.”

            I sighed, but not in actual annoyance.  Mostly in the sarcastic annoyance I used whenever talking to Zeke.  “Zeke, I’m not just some tiny innocent girl that needs a man to protect her.  I’m plenty capable of taking care of myself, and-“

            Zeke interrupted me.  “Now now Lindsay, you and I both know that you are more capable of taking care of yourself than anyone in this house at this moment.  That, and you can kick some serious ass, and I’m only going because my tiny guardian would be leaving and I would have no means of defending myself, and no way to get away from my dad.”

            “That is true,” I said, smiling.  “When are we leaving?”

            “Whenever you want to.  Preferably soon, but not too soon that I can’t pack the essential items and tell my dad to fuck off one last time.”

            I laughed.  “Okay.  How about tomorrow night?”

            “Sure,” he said, shrugging.  “Also, where do you plan on going?”

            “I’ve got tons of maps in my closet, with directions printed out that tell me how to get places that I’ve always been interested in seeing.  I mean, who doesn’t want to see the world’s biggest potato?” I asked, suddenly remembering an old joke Zeke and I used to have.

            When we were in sixth grade, our band class (yeah, our first and last years of taking band) went on a field trip to Idaho (God knows why—probably because our school had gotten a whole bunch of funding from some rich old man who had donated a whole bundle of money to the fine arts program) and Zeke and I were devastated to learn that we would not be able to see the “world’s largest potato” and I think that ultimately led up to the decision that we would quit band.

            Zeke giggled like a little girl and said, “Oh man.  I forgot about that, Lin.  God.  I’m fucking stoked for this trip.”

            I smiled.

            “Wait,” he said, lifting one of his eyebrows.  “What about your mom?  What are you going to tell her?”

            “Absolutely-fucking-nothing,” I said, my smile growing wider.  “That was the point of the suffocation speech.  I’m done with her acting like I’m her, when really, I’m my father.  I’m so much like him, it’s unbelievable.”

            “What about my dad?”

            “What you tell him is none of my business, but I suggest that you just split.  Pack what you need, have one of your famous yelling arguments, tell him you’re staying the night over here, and then we’ll sneak back in the morning when he’s gone and get the things you need.”

            He nodded, and I could tell that the whole idea of this trip was sounding better and better as I continued.

            “Meanwhile, I’ll pack what I need, and load up my car.  I’ll also go shopping for some food, cause I definitely do not plan on living on fast food this whole trip.  That is a promise.”

            Zeke laughed.  “I know.  Just make sure to get some caffeinated beverages.”

            I nodded.  “Of course.”

            Zeke stretched his arms and looked at the clock on the wall behind me.  “It’s already seven.  He’ll be getting home soon.  I guess I’ll go and at start packing.”