Edward Adrift

break.
    “I’m so happy,” she says.
    I begin walking back to the car, which sits alone in the rest area parking lot.
    Sheila talks excitedly into my ear.
    “Now, Edward,” she says, “from now on, when I put my hand on your knee, I want you to put your arm around me. That’s how you make a girl feel good.”
    “I will,” I say. “And I want cable or satellite television at the motel.”
    “OK, but you have to kiss me sometimes, especially when I don’t expect it.”
    “I will.”
    “And please don’t always tell me about how mouths are gross, OK? Because I know that and will try to keep mine clean.”
    “Yes, dear.”
    She gasps again.
    “You called me dear!”
    “I thought I’d try it out. Do you like it?”
    “I like it. I like it very much, Edward.”
    And that’s how it goes for the next four minutes and thirty-seven seconds. Sheila instructs me on how to love her and make her happy, and I circle the parking lot and wait for her to finish so I can get there, only I don’t want her to ever hang up, but I know that she must if I am to reach her in approximately nine hours.
    She asks me why I changed my mind, and I say, “Because I asserted my sovereignty.”
    She laughs and says, “I don’t know what that means, exactly, but promise me that you’ll call every time you stop.”
    “I promise.”
    “I don’t want to hang up.”
    “I know. But we have to.”
    “Hurry here to me.”
    “I will.”
    “I’ll see you soon, Edward.”
    “Yes, you will, dear.”
    She giggles and then she hangs up, and I leave the parking lot and head for the interstate. I know exactly where I am going. As I guide the car onto the ramp and hit cruising speed, Michael Stipe is telling me that she is beautiful and she is the everything.
    I know she is.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
    So many to thank, so little space.
    The “beta” readers: Jim Thomsen, Celeste Cornish, Jessica Park, Jill Rupert, Amy Pizarro, and R. J. Keller. Your earnest and eagerly offered feedback made this an immeasurably better book. I am indebted.
    Elizabeth Holleran, you’re funny as hell and you provided one key line of dialogue I could have never conjured on my own. You know the one. Thank you.
    Alex Carr, Jessica Poore, and the team at Amazon Publishing: Thank you for believing in Edward and giving him a home. It’s good to be with you again. And Charlotte Herscher, my developmental editor, you made this book so much better than it would have been otherwise. Thank you.
    Chris Cauble, Linda Cauble, Janet Spencer, the team at Riverbend Publishing: It would have never happened in the first place if not for your hard work. I’m so thankful.
    Mollie Glick and Foundry Literary + Media, the finest agent and agency in the land: It all comes back around. Thank you for your tireless work, your wisdom, and your cheer.
    And, finally, to the readers and those who put the books in their hands: Thank you, thank you, thank you. I could never possibly say it enough.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

    Craig Lancaster is a journalist who has worked at newspapers all over the country, including the
San Jose Mercury News
, where he served as lead editor for the paper’s coverage of the BALCO steroids scandal. He wrote
600 Hours of Edward
—winner of a Montana Book Award honorable mention and a High Plains Book Award—in less than 600 hours during National Novel Writing Month in 2008. His other books include the novel
The Summer Son
and the short story collection
Quantum Physics and the Art of Departure
. Lancaster lives in Billings, Montana, with his wife.