In Chap­ter 226 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” Patch finds him­self a hun­dred miles south, posi­tioned by a bluff that over­looks the wind­ing Mis­sis­sip­pi Riv­er as it cre­ates an oxbow. He has care­ful­ly cropped his hair and main­tained a clean-shaven face. Beside him rests a blue leather satchel con­tain­ing clothes, mon­ey, and oth­er essentials—items he had dis­cov­ered in Cooper’s car before dis­pos­ing of it in a remote loca­tion.

Patch is dressed in a ball cap that shields his face from the sun, and despite the dis­com­fort, he opts to leave his eye patch in his pock­et, choos­ing instead to wear dark sun­glass­es. As he strolls along the river­bank, he is cap­ti­vat­ed by the trans­for­ma­tion of the sky at sun­set, where the iron water shifts from bold hues to abstract pat­terns. The moment when land and sky seem to merge inspires him—the scene is so beau­ti­ful that he wish­es he had the skill to paint it.

Seek­ing cov­er, he finds a seclud­ed copse where he can lie low among the sedges, using his satchel as a makeshift pil­low as he awaits the arrival of night. His thoughts are focused on the impend­ing jour­ney ahead; he knows that with the dawn, the check­points will shift, and he will final­ly cross into Ten­nessee. This tran­si­tion rep­re­sents more than just a geo­graph­i­cal shift for Patch—it brings him one step clos­er to her, the indi­vid­ual he longs to reunite with. The antic­i­pa­tion and urgency of his jour­ney reflect his emo­tion­al state, where the land­scape serves as both a phys­i­cal and metaphor­i­cal jour­ney toward hope and con­nec­tion.