I tapped the trash button. Deleted.
That’s when we noticed the diner was playing Brody’s latest single, “Two Hearts Beating.”
“Time to leave,” I announced.
I was still hungry.
* * *
INT. LION’S DEN—DAY
(DIEGO)
Diego does a cartwheel onto the set.
DIEGO
It’s time for some fun facts! In captivity, panda bears live to be 30 years old. They have BIG appetites. Every day they fill up their bellies with 27 pounds of bamboo.
(grabs his stomach, moans)
That’s a lotta ’boo. I’d rather eat apples and bananas, wouldn’t you?
Music cue: Apples and Bananas song.
DIEGO (cont’d)
I like to eat, eat, eat apples and bananas
I like to eat, eat, eat apples and bananas
(Change vowel sound to A)
I like to ate, ate, ate ay-ples and ba-nay-nays
I like to ate, ate, ate ay-ples and ba-nay-nays
(Change vowel sound to E)
I like to eat, eat, eat ee-ples and bee-nee-nees
I like to eat, eat, eat ee-ples and bee-nee-nees
(Change vowel sound to I)
I like to ite, ite, ite i-ples and bi-ni-nis
I like to ite, ite, ite i-ples and bi-ni-nis
4
After Thom filled up the Passat, I approached the driver’s side with trepidation.
“How are you at driving stick?” Thom asked. “I probably should’ve asked you that earlier.”
“A bit rusty, but I can do it.” Somehow, I didn’t think the death trap he called a car was unaccustomed to a dragging clutch, or the exquisite grinding noise that came with it.
“Well, heads up, it doesn’t like to shift beyond third gear.”
Alarm gripped my body. “It doesn’t ‘like’ to?”
“It’s okay, all that means is we can’t back up.”
“We can’t back up,” I repeated in a daze.
“I don’t see why we’d need to, though.”
“What about when we park?”
“We’ll park on the side of the road and make sure no one parks in front of us. Don’t worry about it. Let’s focus on getting to Pennsylvania.”
When I fastened my seat belt, the click was ominous. “I genuinely think I would be safer without this,” I told him, tugging on the wide belt. I’d already conjured up visions of us submerged underwater with no escape, or helplessly waiting to be consumed by a fireball.
To my surprise, he agreed. “I know what you mean, but we can’t risk a cop seeing us.”
It took two tries to start the car without stalling. The clutch pushed back—the biting point—and I winced with the effort to find the sweet spot. I practiced shifting gears in the gas station / Cracker Barrel lot for another ten minutes until I felt moderately capable.
“You’re doing great,” Thom encouraged me. “Do you feel okay about this? I can drive a couple more hours if you need me to, or we can find a bigger parking lot and practice more.”
“Thanks. I’m okay. I feel like I’m driving a boat.”
“You’re overlooking its strengths, though.”
“It has strengths?”
“The rub strip. The plastic rim around the car. It’s held up well.”
“You mean the crazy-looking double bumper?”
“Impervious to shopping carts.”
I laughed. “You’re right, that adds at least twenty cents to the Blue Book value.”
We exited the lot and tentatively merged onto the freeway, staying to the right until I felt comfortable changing lanes. Which, based on my clenched butt and tense shoulders, might not be for years. It didn’t help that the car constantly urged me to drift left; its bias took concentration to deflect, along with everything else I had to think about.
“What car do you drive in San Diego?” Thom asked, settling in and adjusting his seat to give himself more leg room.
“A Camry hybrid.”
“Fancy.”
“That’s me. Total baller.”
We passed a billboard advertising Ethan’s new film, a remake of The Thin Man. He’d be Nick Charles, naturally.
“That was creepy,” Thom remarked. “First the TV ad, then the song, then the billboard? It’s like they’re watching us.” In a quieter voice: “No wonder you needed rehab.”
I didn’t reply, because I was too busy trying to shift into third. Did it have problems getting there? Or just going higher? “When do I switch? Now? Now?”
“Wait till it hits three thousand RPMs,” Thom advised.
I slowly released the clutch while tapping the gas. We jolted violently forward, but it worked.
“Yeah, baby,” I shouted. “How about I drive us all the way to New York? Because I don’t actually know how to stop.”
Three hours later, my adrenaline-fear took its toll. My muscles were stiff and sore but I refused to call it a day considering Thom drove a five-hour shift.
“Can I ask you something personal?” Thom said.
“As opposed to the polite small talk we usually engage in?”
“When guys find out you dated J. J. Randall, do they look at you differently?”
I was pretty sure I knew what he meant, but it was worth verifying. “In what way?”
“Do they become more interested, or less? Like, do they get off on the idea of dating a J. J.–caliber girl? Or does it intimidate them?”
I couldn’t shrug because my shoulders were already bunched up around my ears. “I don’t know if they ‘get off,’ but I don’t go around telling people.”
“Why’d you tell me?”
“At the time? To get you to shut up. I thought you’d be stunned silent, and I could eat dinner in peace.”
He chuckled. “That backfired.”
“Tell me about it. You kept on talking and talking until it turned out you were funny and nice and…” I trailed off, embarrassed. Stop it, Holly. For God’s sake, he’s not interested.
“But for real, how’s a standard human male supposed to compete with ‘People’s Sexiest Moron’?” Thom asked.
“Oddly enough, I don’t make them.” I pretended to remember something. “Although, there was that one time when I made, like, four different guys compete in a marathon and a few other categories: Flowers, Chocolates, the Presentation of the Pecs…Winner got to date me.”
“No cage fights?”
“My insurance wouldn’t cover it.”
“Bastards.”
“Is that why you didn’t sleep with me?” There had been something between us; at least, I’d believed there was. “You thought I’d be comparing you with J. J.?”
“No. It was because you looked like you’d been crying.”
My breath caught. “Oh.”
“Had you been?”
“A little bit, yeah. I’d had an upsetting phone call.”
He cleared his throat. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
It was a relief to clear the air, but also painful; a sharp ache in my chest I decided to ignore. And if I couldn’t ignore it yet, I would learn how.
Thom reached across the armrest and placed his hand on mine. His hand was warm and dry, his fingers long and artistic looking. Something inside me settled, like autumn leaves fluttering into a pile. He radiated calm. I wanted to absorb it via skin-to-skin contact.
Then he lifted my hand and placed it on the gearshift.
“Hit the clutch,” he said, and when I did, he moved my hand with his and shifted down to second gear. “Our exit’s coming up.”
The tension rolled off me in waves once I heard the word exit. But I hadn’t driven nearly as much as he had.
“Are you sure? I can keep going,” I offered.
“I think that’s enough for today, don’t you?”
He kept our hands together, his larger fingers curled over mine.
Without a word, he continued to guide my
movements until we’d somehow slowed down and pulled over to the side of the road across from a Motel 6 in Elyria, Ohio. I’d told him I was worried about getting the car into park, and without drawing attention to my fears, or making fun of me for them, he’d helped me accomplish it.
“I know you were hoping to get to Pennsylvania,” I said. “Sorry I—”
“I’m exhausted,” he deflected smoothly. “It’s good we’re stopping.”
I nodded. I’d clearly reached my limit with the stick and he was letting me off the hook. I remained quiet as the engine shook and gradually fell silent.
Thom asked me to stay in the car while he scoped the place out. Was he looking for prowlers?
When he returned from the front desk he held a set of keys in his hand.
“Wanted to make sure they had rooms on the second floor,” he explained. “Most break-ins happen on the first.”
Okay, he was looking for prowlers.
We hauled our bags out of the trunk and walked up the moderately clean staircase.
The sky had gone pink, but it wasn’t late. A cricket orchestra filled the air, backed up by the thrum of passing trucks out on the road.
“You mind if I lie down for a second?” I asked.
“Sure, no problem.”
We stowed our bags and I flopped onto the bed closer to the window. I drifted off immediately, my “second” of shut-eye turning into several hours. The last thing I saw was Thom settling into a chair, his long legs crossed at the ankle. He closed his eyes as well, but the fact that he’d chosen the chair instead of the other bed made me feel protected, as though he were keeping watch while I rested.
* * *
INT. LION’S DEN
(TARA, J. J., KELLY)
TARA, dressed as Mary Poppins, tucks the injured bird she rescued into the nest they constructed in the previous scene.
TARA
Good night, my little Chirpy. Sleep tight and feel better in the morning.
Music cue: “Stay Awake,” from Mary Poppins.
TARA
Stay awake, don’t rest your head…
While Tara sings the lullaby (and/or “our” version), J. J. and KELLY tidy up the den in the background, dancing gently with their brooms (if this mimics the chimney sweeps from Mary Poppins, all the better), pushing the bits of nest that didn’t make it into a pile.
* * *
When I jolted awake, it was dark outside. I groaned. “How long was I out?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Thom said. “If you’re hungry, I saw a Chili’s across the street.”
“I’m ravenous.”
“We’ll have to choose between appetizers and drinks, or a main meal.”
“Drinks,” we said simultaneously, and grinned at each other.
I’d vowed to ignore the way I felt when he was near me. But the way he smiled at me was making that difficult.
5
Expenses for Wednesday, April 22
(starting at $420)
gas fill up ($55.50 x 2) = $111.00
drinks (2 “premium ritas” at 6.99 each = $13.98)
appetizer (1 “triple dipper” to split = $12.99)
tax and tip (because we’re not monsters) = $7.44
1 night at Motel 6 ($59.99)
I’d miscalculated by twenty bucks on the motel, but that was okay because we still had:
Money remaining = $214.60
6
As I watched Thom devour the sliders from our Triple Dipper and wipe the mystery sauce off his mouth, it occurred to me that if we lived in Elyria, if this were a normal night in the lives of two Midwesterners after a long day, this dinner would likely be considered a date. I wished, not for the first time, that I’d taken him up on his Mall of America offer. Imagine how much fun we would have had, considering we had managed to have fun in a hospital cafeteria. We’d had fun hanging out at a vending machine at three a.m.
At least things between us were back to normal, or what passed for normal considering how and where we’d met. Somehow after the day’s driving and conversation, we weren’t defensive or snappish anymore; the awkward phase seemed to have passed.
So why did I want more? Why did I think it was even possible? Come Friday, we’d go our separate ways forever. I should’ve been content with repairing our friendship.
The trouble was, I had the distinct feeling he knew me. That I was known to him in a way I hadn’t been known to anyone in a long time. I didn’t want to let it go. It was rare and special.
He claimed never to have flirted with me. But what about the casual compliments he inserted throughout our interactions? How certain he was that I was Somebody. How certain he was that I was worth more than a $150 e-book. How certain he was that my days on Diego were not, in fact, the most interesting thing about me.
How he refused to haul my “ass” across the country while I looked down at a phone. Was there meaning to be gleaned from his choice of word? Did that suggest he’d noticed it? (Of course, I’d noticed his ass, too. I just hadn’t brought it up, yet.)
My inventory of his possible flirting did not provide anything conclusive. He was, apparently, the king of mixed signals.
Or maybe my receiver was broken.
Maybe J. J. had smashed it to bits.
The object of my fascination raised his margarita: “To being halfway home.”
We clinked our glasses together.
“I hate to say it, but I’m still hungry,” I said, once we’d polished off the Triple Dipper. “I know we prioritized drinks, and I’m not questioning that, but there has to be a way to…”
Our waiter popped over to check on us, so I swiveled in his direction. “Anyone send back their food, and it would otherwise go to waste? Maybe someone had the wrong order, or…?”
“She’s joking,” Thom interjected quickly.
“No, I’m not. What happens to incorrect orders that don’t have anything wrong with them? Are they thrown out? Could we meet you around back later, and…”
“Holly.” Thom shot me a look.
“Or pie. Do you give away the day-old pies?”
Thom threw his hands up, defeated. The waiter glanced between us, confused as to whether he’d been given an official request or not. “I could, uh, go check. It’s my first week here.”
“Thanks,” I said sweetly.
A text arrived on Thom’s phone.
“Shit,” he muttered after silencing it. “Sammy tried to do a FaceTime call an hour ago. I didn’t hear it ring.”
“Is it too late to call back?”
“Big time, it’s almost eleven. It might make me feel less guilty, but it won’t do anything for him if I called right now.”
He tapped his photo album and turned the screen toward me: a school photo of Sammy, who was tall and thin with twig arms, little cowlicks in his hair, Thom’s bright-blue eyes, and a teeth-clenched grimace on his face. Despite the forced expression, my heart melted at the sight of him. It felt as though I was seeing Thom as a child. I wondered if Sammy liked to skateboard, too, and if Thom constructed ramps for him in the backyard. The kid was missing one of his baby teeth, the spot where the little fang would be. Why did I find that tooth so endearing in the grown-up version?
The answer came to me fast. Because it’s not picture-perfect. Because it’s not ready for its close-up. Because it would never be allowed on TV.
Thom mistook my staring for judgment.
“He doesn’t smile on command,” he explained rapidly. “He doesn’t see why he should have to, and of course photographers don’t get that, so they try to make him, which makes everything worse, so…”
“Thom, he’s adorable,” I assured him.
“He told me once, ‘I save my smiles for when I’m really happy or really excited.’”
My heart clenched. He saved them. “As a grown woman, I certainly don’t know what it’s like for strangers to order me to smile.”
He chuckled ruefully. “Right. You get it.”
; “I’ll have to remember that line, though, about saving them up. And hey, when he does smile, at least you know it’s real.”
He cleared his throat. “Yeah.”
“Got any videos?” I asked.
A grin leapt onto his face as he scrolled through his options. Once he found the one he was looking for, he pumped the volume and handed me the phone. It was a small thing, him passing it to me, but it meant a lot. About trust. About sharing part of his life with me that he’d been afraid to before. I was touched.
I tapped the play button.
Onscreen, Sammy picked his nose. A hand (Thom’s, I assumed) reached into frame and pulled his hand away from his nose.
“Say it again,” Thom’s voice, amused and eager. “Say what you just said.”
Sammy’s big blue eyes sparkled. “I shi—I shit a fan.” He giggled uncontrollably. “I shit a fan!”
“He heard one of my clients, on speakerphone, say ‘the shit’s about to hit the fan.’ I couldn’t turn off the speaker in time, and for a week I couldn’t get him to stop saying ‘I’m going to shit a fan’ because that’s what he thought he said.”
“If I could shit any appliance, it would be a microwave,” I said. “No, a blender.”
“Air conditioner. For the car.”
“Radio.”
“I think you’re missing the bigger picture. I’d be filthy rich. No overhead, no storage. Just Sammy shitting out household goods.”
“He’s ridiculously cute.”
A cloud passed over Thom’s face. “Sometimes. How old’s your niece, again? Lacey, right?”
“Close. Lainey. She’s ten—about to turn eleven. It’s probably good I’m not watching her anymore. That’s when girls ‘turn.’” I pretended to wipe my brow with relief. “Got out just in time.”
The TV above the bar, which I faced from our booth, was turned to the nightly news. The local anchor bantered with his co-host in a way I’d describe as “nearly human” about tonight’s Jerry Levine Show, which started in ten minutes.
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