Sarah stopped for food in Abilene. While she waited for her take-out order, she made a call and confirmed that registration for the summer semesters would begin on Thursday morning. She made an appointment with an academic advisor for Wednesday morning, then ate her lunch at a picnic table just outside the restaurant before getting back in her car.
That gives me a few days to find a place to live and get settled in, she told herself. Better get going.
Almost three hours later, once she’d passed the Arlington city limits sign and taken the exit she needed, she pulled into a strip mall parking lot and called her parents’ house.
“Sarah!” Bethany exclaimed, and burst into tears. “Sarah, where are you? What’s going on?”
“Mom, I just...,” Sarah took a breath to compose herself. “I had to get
