Page 49 of Come Find Me Tonight

“I’ve trusted you to do a lot.” She drapes her arms over my shoulders, and I eagerly kiss her, tasting coffee and feeling her lipstick smear.

And I don’t mind.

It’s Fourth of July weekend, and we’re Napa-bound. It’s at least six hours from LA, and she volunteered her car. I was relieved because I wasn’t sure if she’d be up for that long of a drive in a nearly thirty-year-old Jeep, and my Tesla would’ve needed to get charged midway.

“I hope you brought whatever that red lipstick stuff is,” I murmur against her lips.

She laughs against mine. “I did. I got coffee, too,” she says.

“I could taste it.” I peck her lips quickly. “Let’s go. I hope we can beat some traffic.” I pop the trunk, tossing my duffel next to hers and slamming it closed. She opens the passenger-side door, and I plop down in the driver’s seat next to her. My legs are squished from how close her seat is to the steering wheel. “Jeez,” I groan, trying to find the button or lever to adjust it.

Appa looks over and laughs under her breath. “There’s a driver memory setting.”

My fingers find the buttons to adjust the seat. “I’m going to use it,” I breathe as my legs get freed.

We could have flown up to Napa, and I’ve done that flight before, especially during the holidays. But Appa hasn’t seen much of California outside of LA and San Diego, so it was time to get her exposed to NorCal and let her watch the vegetation change as we go north. Plus, drive a Mercedes for six hours? Fuck yeah. Her car is sweet. The engine purrs as I accelerate, and the RPMs spike.

Fuck, I miss my Beemer.

Her Mercedes reminds me a bit of the early two-thousands era BMW I had in college. When we’re stopped at a light and about to get onto the interstate, I switch to manual using the paddle shifters behind the steering wheel.

Appa looks up from her phone. “What are you doing?”

“Manual.”

“Oh! That’s what those are for.”

Come on, Appa.

I laugh, but for a girl coming from a family full of guys, they seem to have failed her.

Once outside of LA, Appa keeps to herself, sucked into a book. She’s quiet as she sips her iced coffee, and I’m too busy playing with the paddle shifters. It’s a sunny day, and I wish we could have the top down the entire way. But it would be way too loud with the wind whipping at the speeds I push the Mercedes to.

We make it all the way to Modesto before needing to stop and grab lunch. “Home stretch. Two hours to go,” I tell her when she walks out of the gas station with drinks for us. The smell of gas pollutes the station as the gas pump ticks up and fills the car. While I still have to fill the Jeep occasionally, plugging in to charge a car makes me feel better about my eco-footprint.

She hands me a chilled water bottle with condensation pooling around the plastic. “This state is way too long,” she says.

“That’s what she said,” I joke.

She rolls her eyes but smirks. “Nope, that didn’t work,” she teases.

Almost home.

North of Modesto, I turn off the interstate. It’s smaller highways from here on out. I finally turn off the last highway and press the button to put the top down again. The motor whirs as the roof lifts to reveal the blue sky.

“Welcome to Napa, baby.”

Appa smiles wide and reaches over to run her fingers through the curls on top of my head. “Welcome home. How much further?” Her voice is sweet as candy and genuine.

Maybe she feels a sense of home, too.

“Not far. Just have to take this road into the mountains, and we’ll be there,” I answer.

This was the best part of the drive. I always loved whipping around the tree-lined, curvy roads of Napa Valley, but I was more careful than my cousins, who rolled their car in high school.

To my surprise, Appa was quiet during the drive, keeping herself entertained with reading or her phone. I thought she’d be chattier, but driving for me is therapeutic and turns my mind off from overthinking. She wasn’t a backseat driver at all and didn’t lift an eyebrow at my driving.

Absolute wife material.