The Late Child by Larry McMurtry

rationally or not. Harmony told them she was fine. Neither of them believed it but there wasn’t a great deal they could do about it, so they finally drifted back to the apartment.
    For about five minutes Harmony considered the notion of stealing Gary’s car and just driving away. Gary was a very understanding man; probably he would think it over and forgive her for stealing his car. Meanwhile Pat and Neddie could take Eddie home with them and raise him in a healthy rural place; he would grow up and be happy and maybe avoid the fate of his big sister: the fate of dying young. She knew she could count on her sisters to do a good job with Eddie. Even if Pat was troubled with sex addiction Neddie said she did a good job with children.
    While daydreaming about stealing Gary’s car and taking off, Harmony didn’t develop much of a sense of what her own future might be. She thought she might just leave it to luck, her future. She would drive around America in Gary’s car until the car suffered a final breakdown. Wherever that occurred, west, east, north, or south, Harmony would then live for the rest of her life. Fate would have decided the location for her. Perhaps it would be Biloxi, Mississippi, or somewhere, she had no idea how far Gary’s car would make it, but at least it would make it to a place where no one knew her, a place where she would not have to conceal how guilty she felt about failing her children. Maybe some of the people she got to know would suspect that she had had a tragedy, but they would have no way of finding out what it was.
    About noon, when Harmony was thinking she had better either steal the car or go inside and cool off, Neddie came out to check on her again.
    â€œAre you ever coming in? It’s hot in that car,” Neddie said.
    Harmony didn’t answer. It
was
hot in the car, but she still felt reluctant to get out of it. As long as she was in the car she felt that she had options.
    â€œYou wasn’t thinking of running away, was you?” Neddieasked. “That little boy would never get over it, if his Momma did something like that.”
    Harmony knew then that she had waited too long to steal the car.
    â€œYou can’t run away and leave that little boy,” Neddie repeated. “That would be the worst possible thing you could do.”
    Harmony didn’t answer. How did Neddie know what the worst possible thing she could do might be? Even though Neddie was older, she couldn’t know everything.
    â€œWorse than if I became a drug addict?” she asked, in a voice that was almost a whisper.
    â€œYes, worse,” Neddie said, without hesitation. “I was a dope addict myself, but I didn’t go off and desert my kids.”
    â€œYou were a dope addict?” Harmony said. “Neddie, I didn’t know that.”
    â€œAfter Davie was born I got on them pain pills,” Neddie said. “I stayed on them three years. Dick could never figure out where the egg money was going. That’s where it was going, to pay for my dope.”
    â€œOh, Neddie, was it a hard birth?” Harmony asked.
    â€œIt was hard enough, but that wasn’t why I stayed on the pills,” Neddie said. “I was sick of my life, so I doped out.”
    â€œHere,” Harmony said, handing Neddie the letter.
    Neddie got in the front seat of the hot car and unfolded the yellow sheets of paper. Neddie still moved her lips when she read; Harmony thought that was interesting. When Neddie finished the letter she folded it and handed it back to Harmony. When she did Harmony took the keys out of the ignition and gave them to Neddie.
    â€œWhat do I want with these keys?” Neddie asked.
    â€œJust give them to Gary when he comes to get his car,” Harmony said. She didn’t want to tell her sister that she didn’t trust herself not to desert Eddie.
    â€œWell, that’s a decent letter,” Neddie said. “It sounds like Pepper