The Road to Tender Hearts

They arrive in Hellsgate, Kentucky, and get a room at the Days Inn. Though it’s nighttime, Sophie goes for a run through the town. While she runs, Sophie thinks about Ollie and Luna returning to school after the summer. After Kate’s death, Sophie struggled to reintegrate at school, and she worries the children will have a similar experience. She stops by a pet store and has a strange conversation with a parrot whom she wishes she could set free. She asks the bird, “Are you happy?” (171), and the bird parrots the question back to her.

She ends her run by taking marijuana gummies and gets hungry, so she walks to the Waffle House, where two drunk men slide into her booth and begin to intimidate her and say inappropriate things. Just as Sophie is about to pull her pepper spray, the cook, Brandon, intervenes and says she is his “girlfriend.” Brandon allows Sophie to eat her food in peace behind the counter, then offers to take her back to her hotel. Brandon is attractive, and Sophie appreciates his help and likes his attention. Brandon is currently living out of his van because his wife kicked him out of the house. He has three children. Brandon offers Sophie more weed, and they kiss and are intimate. Brandon drives Sophie back to the hotel. She had felt safe with him, but he makes a joke about being a serial killer, which unsettles her, and she is glad when she is safely behind the locked hotel room door.

“Day 3: Thursday”

Sophie wakes up the next morning, grateful to be alive and regretful of her risky behavior the previous night. She doesn’t tell her dad about any of it. PJ stayed in the room all night and told the kids the story of how he and Ivy met. They eat breakfast and load into the car to continue their journey to Texas. Luna pores over the Soap Opera Digest, which features an article about Mark Stackpole, his wife, and their five children. Mark is religious, and Luna wonders what it would be like to have half-siblings and believe in Jesus.

PJ wants to enjoy more attractions on their way to Texas. Luna and Sophie disagree, saying they barely have enough time to travel to the convention. Ollie doesn’t want to go live with Mark Stackpole, so he agrees with PJ and asks to stop. The drive to Big Kevin’s Alpaca Farm, which is touted as the largest in Kentucky. Big Kevin introduces them to the alpacas, and the children fall in love with them. Ollie secretly wishes that PJ would take them back to Pondville and buy them an alpaca as a pet.

Big Kevin, a former corrections officer at the nearby prison where all his children now work, shows them a 19th-century electric chair he received as a gift. Pancakes runs away at the sight, but the kids are curious and want to sit in it. Kevin explains it’s wired to still work, but with mild shocks. Sophie refuses, so PJ sits in it and gets shocked, which is startling and painful. Just before PJ gets out, Sophie shocks him again in revenge. Ollie finds it funny and tells Sophie he loves her. They later find a dead bird and see Pancakes sitting in Big Kevin’s wife’s lap on the porch.

Luna wants to learn about God before meeting Mark. She peppers Sophie and PJ with questions about God and the afterlife. Luna asks if murderers and thieves go to hell and if her parents are in hell, and Sophie says no to both questions. PJ thinks he believes in past lives and jokes that he and Pancakes knew each other in their past life. Truthfully, PJ wrestles with faith, especially since Kate’s death. Though he resists a belief in God, he thinks, “There had to be some answer for where all that life went” (192). Luna decides that her parents have been reincarnated as worms. She both loves and hates them and doesn’t want them damned to eternal flames.

After passing through Nashville, they decide to stop for the night in Somewhere, Tennessee. There’s a newly married biker couple in the lobby, and Pancakes nuzzles their legs. The attendant gives them the last double room, leaving only one room available, which has two queen beds. PJ knows Sophie will refuse to share a bed with him, so he asks to borrow a sleeping bag. PJ is annoyed to learn that Somewhere is a “dry town” with no hotel bar.

The kids ask for another bedtime story about Michelle Cobb, but PJ lost touch with her after high school, so he offers to tell them a story about his kids and “the first time Kate died” (200). Sophie wants to hear the story because Ivy never talks about Kate. Sophie’s memories of Kate are hazy, though she does remember the time she caught Kate smoking weed in their treehouse and Kate let her try it.

PJ tells the story about the time Kate was struck by a car while riding her bike. PJ thought Kate was dead and begged God to spare her and kill him instead. PJ had his first heart attack that day, but Kate survived, though she had a traumatic brain injury, which affected her speech. Ivy blamed PJ for the accident because he was supposed to be watching her. Kate’s speech therapist prescribed sucking on lollipops to help Kate strengthen her speech, but the kids at the middle school teased her. PJ used his connections as the mailman and secretly placed lollipops in every middle school kid’s trees overnight, making Kate a hero. Afterwards, Ivy forgave PJ, but they later got divorced. Ollie asks PJ to make them a lollipop tree in Pondville, but Luna says she’s not returning there. Sophie likes hearing the story but also thinks about the tragedy of her sister’s death on prom night.

Telling the story about Kate makes PJ sad, and he wants to talk to someone about his grief. Sophie and the kids are asleep, so he uses Sophie’s phone to search “Prolonged grief after losing a child” (205). The Google search suggests he “Talk to someone,” but PJ has no one. He uses Sophie’s phone to text Ivy, but Fred responds, asking that he respect their time away. PJ wakes Sophie and tells her that Fred was unkind, but Sophie doesn’t want to deal with it. PJ feels like a failure at everything in life, including losing the lottery money. He resolves to get drunk. Pancakes jumps out the window, so PJ must search for him. On his way outside, PJ stops by the front desk to see if Gregor, the attendant, knows where to find alcohol in the dry town.