Page 16 of Don't Tell Me How It Ends
“Oh! Myboyfriend.” I enunciate it, as if it’s my first time hearing the word in my life.
6:12p.m.Shit. If I don’t get to Liv soon, I’ll miss her completely.
“Actually, is there any way you could take me to the Speckled Pig and I’ll grab the car tomorrow? We’re so close, and that’s where I’m supposed to meet…him…my boyfriend.”
“Yeah,” he says, eyeing me. “Sure.”
“He’s already there,” I continue. “So…”
“Got it,” he says, pulling onto the road with Mom’s car trailing pathetically behind. “Speckled Pig it is.”
The silence between us stretches so thick, I’d swear I couldreach out and touch it. When thepingof my phone echoes off the hard lines of the cab, it might as well be on surround sound. His eyes follow the noise down to the phone in my lap. I flip it over, as if he might be able to read Zola’s message through the lock screen. X-ray vision doesn’t feel like an entirely implausible feature of eyes as dark as his.
When another message pings, he says, “Feel free to do what you need to do. Make a call or whatever.”
Since I can’t call my nonexistent boyfriend to let him know I’m running late, I opt for the next best plan: sitting in total silence until, with any luck, I cease to exist.
But another shrillpingfrom my phone sends me over the edge. A little yelp slipping through my lips. Now I have no choice but to make literally any other sound to cover up whatever that was.
Unfortunately, the first sound that comes to mind is words. And not just any words.
“No wonder you know so much about parking lots.”
I would’ve fared better with the axe murderer.
“I actually consider myself a sort of plainclothes parking attendant,” he says, mocking my words from earlier.
When he turns to smile at me, I’m hit by the direct force of it for the first time, and goddamn. A little warning would’ve been nice.
He’s got one of those smiles you don’t justsee,youfeel.Deep and dimpled, with so much genuine emotion behind it that it’s impossible not to smile back. This is also the first time I’m actually seeing his face without my vision being clouded by rage and shame. It’s a good face, if you’re into thatyacht on the South of Francecologne ad sort of thing.
“So, what’s at Speckled Pig?” he asks, letting me off the hook from further talk of our earlier run-in. “Besides your boyfriend.”
I try to avoid his accompanying smile and the clear confirmation he knows I’m full of shit, but my very specific brand of awkwardness won’t allow it.
“Okay, maybeboyfriendwasn’t the right word. They’re a friend. Well,she.She’sa friend.”
He nods in assumed understanding, and for some reason unbeknownst to me, I’m suddenly desperate to clarify the exceedinglyheteronature of my sexuality to this complete stranger.
“No! Not like that,” I yell, with more urgency than necessary. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”Nice.“But she’s really a friend. My best friend. And she’s heading out soon, which is why I need to get there. I was just trying to throw you off earlier with the boyfriend thing in case you were planning to…”
He raises an eyebrow for me to continue.
“…kill me?” That horrified look on his face might actually be even better than his smile. “It’s been suggested that I watch too much true crime.”
His laugh comes on slow and easy. “Man, what is it with women and those shows? My ex used to watch all that stuff on repeat. She’d be all excited like ‘Ohhh, I bet he cheats,’ as if that’s a good enough reason to put rat poison in the guy’s burger and bury him under a rosebush. I never knew if she had me watch it as entertainment or a warning.”
“Maybe a little bit of both,” I say with a shrug.
“Damn. That’s exactly what she used to say.”
“Well, she sounds lovely. You were a fool to let her go.”
There’s another lull in the conversation, but this time, silence doesn’t accompany it. I hadn’t even noticed he’d turned the radio on in the background until he starts humming along. Effortlessly alternating between the harmony and melody of the music floating through the speakers.
“You sing?” I ask, before I can stop myself.
His eyes go wide, like a deer in the headlights of a freight train. It’s a welcome change to seehimsquirm for once.
