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His black hair is shaggier than when I first met him, and he doesn’t brush it out of his eyes as I stare him down. “Walk me to my car?”
He starts without me, and now I’m totally unsure of what to do. I want to rush up, grab his arm and demand that he talk to me, but that kind of thing never works. I don’t know what it takes to piss him off. Or lose his trust.
“If we can’t talk tonight, then when can we talk?” I reach up and adjust my Jasmine wig and realize how stupid we look, two troubled teens cosplaying as a couple in love.
Elijah leans against the hood of the car. “Tomorrow? I’m sorry, Raquel. I do want to talk. I just —” He runs both hands through his hair. “I need more time.”
I am trying very hard not to freak out. This thing between us, it was starting to feel solid. Now it’s back to being a cloud of fog.
Anthony’s car is filthy. Blankets and clothes in the back seat, a backpack and shopping bags in the front. I heave a sigh and change the subject. “Anthony should really clean out his car.”
“It’s not his car anymore,” Elijah says. “I traded him for the motorcycle.”
“So … you’re the one who needs to clean out your car?” I survey the contents through the windows. This is not just some
guy’s dirty vehicle. It looks like a bedroom in there. “Elijah, what is going on?”
“Tomorrow,” he says, taking my face in his hands. His lip trembles just a bit and I realize he’s nervous.
“You work tomorrow.” I remember his usual schedule. “You work in the day and I work in the evening. We never see each other on Tuesdays.”
“I don’t work tomorrow, Raquel.” He lets go of my face and his whole body seems to slump. “I don’t work at all. I quit.”
“But … you don’t have a new job yet.” How will he support himself? How will he save for his future?
He shakes his head. “I’ll get a new job. I’ve been wanting to quit that place forever and you gave me the push I needed.” He meets my gaze. “This is a good thing.”
The lump in my throat tells me everything. Elijah kept his job as long as he did because it came with an apartment. Quitting it would mean …
“Are you living in this car?”
His lack of an answer is all the answer I need. “Elijah! You can’t do this. You have to go back.”
He shakes his head. “Raquel, that place was toxic. You said it yourself — I need to do something better. That’s what I’m doing, starting now. I’ll find a job soon and it’ll be fine.”
“No. Living on the streets is not better.” I can’t erase the mental image of Elijah sleeping in the back seat of this old car, freezing in some abandoned parking lot just waiting to get mugged. “You can’t do this. Sasha wanted you to fix your life.” Or she wanted me to fix your life, I suddenly think. “This is just ruining it. What about college?”
“I don’t care about Sasha’s plan!” Elijah growls. “I care about you! You helped me see that living in Austin was a bad idea. You made me realize I could do better. That’s exactly what I’m doing. This is my life, and these are my choices.”
Tears spring up in my eyes. “No, Elijah. You can’t live in your car. It’s dangerous. It doesn’t help you get ahead, either. You have to go home.”
He throws his head back and exhales. “I didn’t want you to find out this way. I wanted to tell you at the right time. Dammit, Raquel, I thought you would want this.”
I shake my head. “Not this way. Go home, Elijah.”
“I don’t have a home,” he says, his voice like rocks clashing together. Those blue eyes pierce into mine, and there’s a fire inside him that’s trying to burst out. “I’ve never had a home.”
“Go back to the apartment with Anthony,” I say, as much as it hurts me to send him back there. “You can’t live on the streets.”
“Fine,” he says. In one movement, he slips into the driver’s seat of his new car. The engine starts and he doesn’t look back at me. He just drives away.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I don’t sleep at all that night. I split my time between wishing I’d said things differently to Elijah and checking my emails hoping to hear from him. Yes, I want him to quit his job, but not like that. He needs stability. And I need Sasha. If she were here, she’d leap into action and help me figure this out.
But Sasha’s help won’t come to me in the form of a pre-recorded video. It won’t show up on my doorstep in an envelope with my name written in pink Sharpie. This is up to me.
It’s the end of the school day, and I’m stuck in traffic, ready for another day of work. I definitely miss the animal clinic, but working at Izzy’s feels like where I need to be right now. Flowers can die just like the animals at the clinic, but at least I don’t mourn a few wilted petals.
