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“Madness,” she said. “Sheer madness.”
    â€œDid she hang up on you?”
    â€œAs always.”
    He reached over and touched her cheek. “It’s technology,” he said. “It’s made assholes out of all of us.”
    They were passing the final few rows of turbines. Maggie looked out the window again. No matter how often they made this drive, no matter how many times she scanned the tops of the towers, she’d never—not once—seen a person up there. She could make out the little doorways; identify the safety fences wrapped like toothpicks around the gearboxes. But she’d never seen a person, and it never failed to disappoint her.
    To her right was the exit for Purdue University, where Mark had interviewed just after finishing his dissertation. He’d been offered the job and the school had flown them both out from DC for a weekend visit, an unsuccessful attempt to woo Mark away from the Chicago offer he already planned to accept. Maggie remembered little of Lafayette itself. Of the hotel, on the other hand . . . They’d stopped after the faculty dinner to buy beer at a nearby gas station, and Maggie, when Mark wasn’t looking, sneaked a travel-pack of condoms into her purse. When Mark went to pay for the six-pack, the man behind the counter asked if he was also planning to pay for the condoms his girlfriend had stolen. Poor Mark had been caught completely off guard. Maggie, near the exit, shook her head and blushed.
    The cashier held out his hand. “Either way, ma’am,” he said. “Leave ’em or pay for ’em. But you can’t just have ’em.”
    Maggie approached the cash register—she couldn’t look at Mark—then removed the travel-pack and slid it across the counter.
    â€œLooks like you were fixing to get lucky,” the cashier said to Mark.
    Maggie wanted to vomit she was so embarrassed.
    Mark picked up the condoms, studied them, then put them squarely on top of the beer. “Looks like maybe I still am.”
    The cashier shrugged. “At least she knows to wrap it every time.” He winked at Mark. “Good for you and for her.”
    Mark picked up the beer and shoved the condoms into his pocket. “She’s my wife,” he said.
    â€œSure she is.” The man nodded, looked at Maggie, then grinned. “My wife’s always buying condoms. Always.”
    Back at the hotel, they’d howled with laughter.
    â€œHe thought you were a prostitute,” Mark said.
    â€œImpossible,” she said. “Look at me.”
    They’d rolled around on the bed a little. But out of nowhere, Mark had paused, his hand behind Maggie’s ear, and said, so seriously she could’ve died, “Do you steal things often? Is this something we need to talk about?”
    She’d nuzzled her mouth against his neck. She was mortified and yet, at the same time, found she was also overcome with lust, with love, with an exact and perfect balance of the two. “Never,” she said. “Never.” They’d fallen asleep on the covers that night, both condoms in the travel-pack successfully and happily put to use.
    Maggie turned in her seat and watched the last of the turbines disappear from view.
    â€œAll gone,” said Mark. “Only five hundred seventy-seven miles to go.”
    Somehow it was already three o’clock.

4
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â After the Indianapolis beltway, they stopped at the first gas station with green space. Mark had done as instructed and tuned in to the AM weather station. His father was right: there were alerts and advisories and warnings for everything east of Cincinnati. Blackouts had started. Towns off 64 were already being declared disaster zones. The storms had originated in the east and now were headed west. They were headed directly toward Mark and Maggie—that’s how she’d put it anyway, Mark wouldn’t