Eileen abandons Mrs. Polk and flees X-ville

Eileen abandons Mrs. Polk and flees X-ville in a departure that begins as an imagined escape for two and ends as a solitary journey. Rebecca Saint John does not come with her; Rita Polk, whom Eileen has brought along, is left asleep in a running Dodge car beside the road. The planned route to Rutland gives way to an unplanned ride south, as Eileen leaves behind both the town and her former home.

A proposed escape that becomes solitary

As Rebecca turns back toward the house, Eileen calls after her and asks her to join her. She offers a shared future beyond X-ville, saying that they could go anywhere, that she has money, and that nobody would find them. She gives Rebecca her address near the elementary school and asks whether Rebecca can find it. Rebecca hushes Eileen rather than answering the proposal in that moment. Her sudden promise to see Eileen again leaves open the possibility of a meeting, but the invitation does not become a shared departure.

Later, Eileen concludes that Rebecca is not coming and that she has already gone. The retrospective account is frank about the hurt and disappointment of that recognition, but also refuses to make Rebecca the center of the story. Eileen considers Rebecca’s idealism inadequate when it has no consequences, yet says she does not hold a grudge. The contrast is decisive: Eileen had imagined escape as something the two of them would choose together, but she must act without Rebecca.

Leaving the family home

Before leaving, Eileen runs hot water over her frozen fingers and studies her face in the bathroom mirror. She sees herself as changed and describes a new certainty in her expression. The moment is also a farewell to the house. She thinks through its rooms and familiar furnishings—the chairs, shelves, lamps, walls, creaking floorboards, and worn banister—and acknowledges that leaving hurts because it is home. Although she expects to grieve for it in the weeks and months ahead, she is calm as she says goodbye. The mirror marks a change in self-perception; the house’s ordinary objects make clear what that change costs.

Her departure is materially spare. She carries a gun and money in her purse and a map in her pocket. The route from X-ville to Rutland has been plotted repeatedly, and she has considered leaving on New Year’s Eve, when the old year gives way to the new. Instead, Christmas proves an equally workable day to disappear. The plan remains provisional: in hindsight, she wonders whether trains were running, but says she never made it to Rutland. Before sunrise, she takes one last ride through X-ville in the Dodge car, moving from careful preparation toward an outcome she has not fully mapped.

Rita Polk in the car

Eileen is not alone as she leaves town: Rita sits limp beside her in the Dodge car, silent. Eileen notices Rita’s hands lying on the seat between them and places them in her lap. The gesture is small and careful, set against the larger fact that Rita is being taken away with Eileen. The account does not present the journey as the escape Eileen had proposed to Rebecca. Its other passenger is Rita, and their silence offers no sign of a shared plan or companionship.

On a northbound stretch of highway, Eileen experiences a brief sense of peace, with her mind empty as she watches forests and snow-filled pastures pass. Sunlight briefly blinds her at a bend; when her sight clears, a deer stands in the road. She slows, pulls over, and leaves Rita asleep in the car, which is still running. Eileen notes that there is enough gas for it to run for hours. She does not bring Rita along when she walks toward the deer. Instead, she leaves her there and turns away from the car, making this roadside stop the point at which Rita is abandoned and Eileen’s planned escape becomes a departure on foot.

The road out of X-ville

The deer remains still as Eileen approaches, then trots down the embankment and into the woods. Its appearance interrupts the onward drive and the brief peace of the highway; after it disappears, Eileen cries and continues through the snow. She later catches a ride at a crossroads a few miles farther on, this time heading south. When the driver asks what has happened, she says she has had a fight with her mother, presenting a private family quarrel rather than explaining the departure or Rita’s presence. The driver passes her a thermos of whiskey, which she drinks before crying again.

In the final image of the journey, Eileen sits in the passenger seat, drinking and watching through a fogged-up window as the world she has left recedes. The movement is away from X-ville, but not toward the destination she had planned: Rutland remains unreached, and the southbound ride replaces the mapped route. Her departure therefore achieves separation without completing the original itinerary. The old life passes out of view, while the account withholds a precise destination and makes disappearance, rather than arrival, the defining outcome.