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“It’s about six hours away,” she said. “So I’ll do the first three hours, and you can do the second.”
“The person not driving is in charge of music,” I mentioned as I slid into the passenger seat.
“Deal. But please don’t have crappy music taste.”
“This could make or break our connection, now that I think about it, Teach.”
“We don’t have a connection,” she corrected.
I smirked.
We had a connection. Even if both of us denied it.
Something about us pulled us closer to one another. And I didn’t even think it was the dead mothers aspect. I sensed it the night at the party. Something about her felt so familiar to me—a stranger who felt sort of like home. I didn’t know that was a thing until I met Starlet.
Since her, I haven’t hooked up with anyone else. I didn’t want to. I didn’t reach out to anyone I knew, looking to roll around in the sheets to help me forget about my life. I was living instead of being the walking dead I’d been over the past few years. I was working hard on assignments, listening to audiobooks—for fun—and finding reasons to talk to Starlet any chance I could get. Meaningless sex or blacking out no longer had any appeal to me. I didn’t want to hide from the world anymore. I wanted to feel again. And Starlet Evans? She was a mastermind at making me feel again.
I hooked my phone up to Bluetooth and put on my favorite playlist.
Starlet instantly cocked an eyebrow as she began to drive. “Bullcrap. This isn’t your music.”
“Why not?”
“It’s smooth jazz.”
“Yeah, it is.”
“You like smooth jazz?” she asked, stunned.
“I do. I like all music like this. Along with folk and slow acoustic.”
“Wow. That surprises me.”
I arched my eyebrow. “What music did you think I’d be into?”
“I don’t know…heavy metal?”
I chuckled. “All that angst in me, huh?”
She giggled and shrugged. “I sometimes struggle with judging a book by its cover. That’s on me.”
I kicked off my shoes because I hated to wear shoes during long car rides, and then I got as comfortable as I could in her car, which was pretty easy with her heated seats and extra legroom. “I also play the saxophone.”
Her eyes widened as she kept her stare on the road. “Bull!”
“I’ve played since I was a kid.”
“Oh my goodness. Well, you must play for me at some point.”
“I don’t really do it anymore. Not since…” My words faded off. Not since my mom.
She nodded in understanding. “I get it.”
“I’d like to play for you,” I blurted out. I didn’t even know where that came from. What the hell, Milo? I really didn’t play music for anyone, yet I felt the pull to play for her. I wondered what she’d think of it. If she’d be impressed. If she’d like it. If she’d like me.
Why did I want this woman to like me so damn much? Why did she live in my mind more than most things?
It was as if Starlet was a drug to my mind, yet instead of making me dazed and foggy-brained, she cleared up my thoughts. She made the sad parts of me easier to bear. They weren’t completely gone. I knew that wasn’t how depression worked. But I felt less alone when I was struggling through them with her around. She saw the heavy load of my pain and offered to carry it with me in the most subtle ways. Plus, she’d do things that temporarily hit me with so much peace, like her smiles.
Starlet and her fucking smiles.
A big part of me was shocked that she agreed to drive up north with me and stay the weekend for this photo shoot. I thought she would’ve shut the idea down quickly and suggested we do a local hiking area or something.
Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t complaining. Being stuck in a car for six hours with Starlet Evans wasn’t my idea of torture.
Conversations between the two of us came easy. The first two hours of our drive flew by. I’d learned more about her mind and her humor in that timespan than I had over our few weeks in the library together.
At one point, I asked if we could stop to watch the sunrise. She did it without any question. She exited the highway and pulled over to the side of the road that overlooked the wooded areas below. The trees were all naked of their leaves, covered in the dusting of the latest snowfall. The wind pushed through, shaking said branches, scattering the snow gently to the ground.
We climbed on top of her Jeep and bent our knees into our chests. Her leg brushed against mine, and I hesitated to inch closer to her to feel her more. It only took a small touch to be filled with her warm energy.
