Page 14 of Hairpin Curves

“No.” Megan pulled it out of her hands, more violently than she’d intended, and Scarlett’s eyes widened. “Maybe some other time. I just...want to focus right now. On the map.”

She added a few easy ones first. Washington, DC, which was a place everybody should visit. Tybee Island in Georgia was the closest one to home that she could circle, followed by Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. That was where Scarlett stopped her.

“Okay, wait a minute.” Scarlett held out another hand. “It is February. And you have not one but two beaches on this sheet. Are you unfamiliar with the fact that winter is occurring, right now, in our lives?”

“I know. But I want to go there.” Stubbornly, Megan flipped the pages of her scrapbook until she found the page she’d made for Tybee Island. “It’s supposed to have the most beautiful sunrises on the east coast.”

“So you want to get there for a sunrise?” Scarlett frowned. “That’s a far drive, Meg. That’s got to be what, four hours?” She pulled out her phone and started typing in something. “Five hours! It’s a five-hour drive. Do you have any idea what time we would have to leave in order to watch the sun come up on Tybee Island?”

“Okay! Fine. It was dumb.” Megan’s skin felt hot, and she quickly drew an X through her previous circle. She should have known this wouldn’t be a good idea. It was only five hours away; maybe she could go there on her own. She drew another X over the Myrtle Beach circle. “And we can skip Myrtle Beach, too. I just heard it was pretty.” It was easier to give in. Did any of it matter that much, anyway?

Scarlett looked at her. Really looked at her, close enough that Megan couldn’t escape that gaze. She was never comfortable with the intensity of Scarlett’s full attention.

“Sorry,” Scarlett eventually muttered. “Show me your Tybee Island page.”

So Megan slid the scrapbook over to her, and Scarlett looked at the magazine picture of grasses blowing against white beach sand, the reddening sky promising daylight. “Fine. We’ll go to your beach.” Scarlett leaned over and re-circled Tybee Island. “And the other one, too.” She added Myrtle Beach to the list with another circle. “I’ll freeze my damn ass off, but you can get your scrapbook pictures. Okay?”

“I can go on my own, if you’re gonna be a bitch about it.”

Scarlett smiled. “Very funny. No, I’ll go with you. I’m not swimming or some ridiculous shit like that, though, capisce?”

Scarlett left that night more exhausted than she’d been in a while. Dealing with Megan was exhausting. Had it always been so difficult? Of course not. Not when they were friends. But whatever they were now, it certainly wasn’t friends, and the tension between them was enough to wear her out and leave her emotionally drained. She had to walk on eggshells around Megan. Megan was so touchy, ready to get defensive about everything, even when Scarlett was totally only teasing.

They’d ended up with a route, though. Scarlett hadn’t computed the days of travel, but she was going to have to. The trip had gotten quite lengthy once Megan started opening up about things she wanted to see. Scarlett hadn’t added any destinations of her own—this was Megan’s trip, after all, and she was just along to do some of the driving.

The worst part of all of this was how much she wanted Megan to have a good trip. She’d let that friendship go, and now she was getting sucked right back into it again. Back when they stopped talking to each other, it had seemed a necessary evil. Now, though, Scarlett missed her, and she missed the friendship they had.

She hadn’t missed the fact that Megan was really cute.

She wasn’t hot. Megan wasn’t a “hot” type of girl. Maybe with a haircut and the right makeup, and a really slutty dress, sure, but Megan as-is had this fresh-faced beauty that Scarlett had quietly mooned over back in high school, and then ignored, because Megan didn’t swing that way and Scarlett was terrified of being rejected.

Whatever. The damage was done. She was going on a road trip with Megan Harris in only a few short days, from the looks of things, and she hadn’t packed or, hell, even bought that gray velvet suit she’d been eyeing in the mall.

She had a lot to get done. And that wasn’t counting all the ways she was going to have to distract herself from her frustrating—and frustratingly cute—road trip buddy.

She pulled into her driveway. Jacen had gone to bed already, or was out with his boyfriend. Good thing she had the place to herself; she needed some alone time to think.

And, as embarrassing as it was, maybe a cold shower.

Megan spent the next day in a flurry of disbelief and worry, vacillating so quickly between the two sometimes that she could barely tell them apart. One minute, this was the best idea she’d ever had, and the next, she was being reckless and irresponsible. There was no middle ground in her mind, not when she was doing something so far outside her comfort zone. But her comfort zone had gotten way too limited, and it was time to shake it up.

Now, with the two of them leaving in just a few days, Megan was in focused efficiency mode. She had tacked a to-do list onto the fridge and checked it again, for the third time today, to make sure she was on schedule. She’d blasted through almost everything on it, but a few annoying items still lingered, and she was going to get them done today.

The next item on her list was cleaning out the fridge, and that was where Matt found her an hour later, down on her hands and knees scrubbing the glass shelving.

“You still going through with this?”

This question again, like he hadn’t brought it up a dozen times in the last weeks, either directly or obliquely. Megan rubbed her forehead with the back of her hand, not bothering to look up from her task. “Yes.”

“You don’t have to do this to prove something to me, you know.”

Like she would actually do that. She laughed. “Sure. Shouldn’t you be at work?”

“Eh, I don’t know if I want to keep that job. They booked me two Saturdays in a row, and there’s a concert I want to go see next weekend.”

Megan sat back on her heels, pausing, the cold air of the fridge on one side of her face as she looked up at her younger brother. The mixture of annoyance, anger, and disgust rolling in her stomach was making her feel sick, and it wasn’t anxiety about the trip. “What the hell are you doing with yourself, Matt?”

“What?” He shifted back, frowning. “You’re asking me that? You, who don’t know what the fuck you’re doing with yourself without the diner?”