Li Jie hadn't insisted that Cliff come along. He had only offered an option; he couldn't solve Cliff's problems for him. People trapped in manipulative relationships had to discover the truth and wake up on their own. Otherwise, even if you helped them, they'd blame you for ruining their family ties, friendships, home life, or romance.
As the car started in the Missouri dawn, he tossed his half-eaten gas station sandwich into a paper bag and wedged his coffee cup beside the gearshift. Endless cornfields swept past the windows, irrigation sprinklers turning in circles and casting rainbows of mist into the morning sunlight. A local radio station delivered the weather forecast in a cheerful voice:
"...Another sunny day ahead. Hope you're in good spirits!"
"Well said. Good spirits!"
Li Jie stepped on the gas, and the car sped east. Farms, barns, church steeples, Walmart distribution centers, and the occasional harvester crawling through the fields like a lumbering iron beetle passed by.
He watched the Illinois state marker flash past, then missed an exit on the Indianapolis outer loop, adding twenty minutes to his trip. As he crossed the mountains of West Virginia, mist rose from the valleys and curled around the tops of fir trees. He deliberately spent a night in a shabby trailer tucked into a mountain hollow, hoping to stumble into some eerie local legend. Nothing happened.
When he drove beneath the arch of a New Jersey toll plaza, the lights shone a glaring, cold white. Overpasses stacked over one another, and the signs were crowded with directions: I-95 north, Lincoln Tunnel, Holland Tunnel, George Washington Bridge.
In the distance, a carpet of gold and silver light glowed with artificial warmth beneath low clouds. Those were the lights of Metropolis.
He stopped at a twenty-four-hour gas station near