by Raen Smith
“I don’t like cats.”
“Good because -”
“So, did you ever live in California?” I cut her off.
“No.”
The hum of the road slices through me, splitting me open right down the middle. It’s raw and ugly and it stings, just like I expected it to. I knew this ride would hurt, both good and bad, and I hope like hell it’s just a matter of getting all this bad stuff out of the way to get to the good. To get to the real Piper Sullivan.
“Where were you?”
“Madison. I spent the summer before college in Chicago, but other than that, I’ve been in Madison this whole time.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me. You’re telling me that this whole time you’ve only been two hours away?” My voice is louder than it should be.
“Yes.”
“Piper…”
“I know,” she whispers and pulls her knees into her chest.
She looks innocent in the seat with her chin resting on her bony knees and the slightest pout on her lower lip. I’m furious yet I don’t feel it for long because she looks so …oh yeah, I was going to stop saying that word.
“Why did you lie to me?” My voice is softer now, more controlled.
“I thought it would be easier that way. I figured you wouldn’t look for me if I was all the way on the other side of the world,” she says.
“California isn’t the other side of the world, and of course I looked for you. I went to Princeton for Christ’s sake, and I’m still paying off the debt. I went to your dad’s office and made a fool out of myself. I spent countless hours trying to find you on the internet. Called every Belinda I could find online.”
“Her real name is Melinda, but everyone calls her Belinda because she likes the sound of it better. She thinks it sounds sophisticated, but I think it makes her sound like an idiot,” she replies quietly.
“Her name is Melinda?” I white knuckle the wheel. This is getting better and better. “Did you ever come back to Appleton?”
“Yes, a few times.”
The dagger she’s already sank into my heart twists. Hard.
“Why did you lie? Why did you tell Hudson that you had a boyfriend?”
She shrugs her shoulders. “It’s easier to lie than deal with the truth. I thought it would be easier for us to be apart. I thought if we didn’t see each other, that you would let it go. That I would let it go. We were just a couple of kids when we kissed, that one time, in that one closet. I thought maybe it was just infatuation and that it would fade into a distant memory. I didn’t want to deal with everything,” she says. “The wrath of my dad, the wrath of the universe.”
“Oh God, there’s the universe again. You sound like Big Dave. To hell with the universe and the powers that be. I’m making my own life whether the universe likes it or not.” I slam my hand on the wheel for emphasis.
“So, you’re going all existential on me here. You’re the master of your fate, the captain of the ship, huh?”
“Hell, yes I am and that’s why I came to get you. I know we belong together and there’s nothing that’s going to stop us from being together.”
She’s silent as she moves her thin legs back to the ground gently like a ballerina, and I’m waiting for her to say something like, I hope you’re right or There’s nowhere else I want to be or Screw the universe, I love you. But she doesn’t say anything.
And another granule of dust, a piece of my heart that is, just flew past your head.
Chapter 8
It’s 5:30 now, and we haven’t stopped once as we near the border to Kentucky, but my stomach is rumbling, and there’s a truck stop just a few miles ahead. The stops in Illinois are usually nicer than the stops in Kentucky, if you consider “nicer” to be toilets cleaned once a week by a sixteen-year-old kid who wipes the bowls with water before taking a dump in them.
“There’s a truck stop ahead that’s not too bad. I think we should stop, grab something to eat and then hit it for about four more hours so we can get to Tennessee.”
“It’s your rig. I’m just riding in it.”
“Are you sure you’re up for this? Truck stops can be…” I don’t finish because I’m sure she already has an idea of what a truck stop entails. I think of driving a bit further into Kentucky so I can brighten that image for her. Make it real nice and shiny.
“Filled with ball-busting, blue-collar workers who spend their lives on the road providing for their families,” she says with a grin.
“Yeah, that.”
My phone rings as we pull into the stop. “It’s Hudson. Hang on a sec.”
I hit the button to answer the call, and Hudson’s voice booms over the radio.
“You get her naked yet, you dirty dog?”
Piper busts out laughing as I fumble for the phone. “Not yet,” she calls before she unbuckles her seat belt and shoots a coy look at me.
“Hudson, you ass,” I say into the phone.
“Hey, she said ‘not yet,’” he replies. “That’s huge. That means she intends to. I honestly didn’t think she’d even get in the truck with you.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence. I appreciate that my best friend believes in me. I should really reconsider this friendship. What the hell do you want anyway?”
“I just called to check in on you. I thought maybe you would drive off a cliff or something if she wasn’t with you,” he laughs.
“Are you serious?”
“Sorta.”
“Screw off.” I roll my eyes and look over to see Piper’s butt in my face. She’s digging through her bag in the backseat, and I could stay on this phone forever, watching those fine curves wiggle.
“What are you doing?” Hudson says. “You’re breathing a little louder.”
“Oh God, I’m going to hang up.”
“No, no, don’t,” he pleads. “I want to hear how this ends.”
“That’s sick. Bye, Hudson.”
“But –”
I cut Hudson off and set the phone back on the dash as Piper settles back into her seat with a wallet in her hand.
“You’re not paying for anything,” I say. “It’s my treat.”
“I didn’t plan on paying for anything. I need my ID for the bottle of wine you’re buying me,” she replies as she swings the door open and hops out of the truck.
That’s my girl.
The flash of her camera reflects in Cash Money’s windshield like a million stars before she turns her phone to the truck stop. She snaps another photo. Big Dave will be thrilled to see these pictures.
We hit the bathrooms first and Piper confirms afterward that she hovered. I give a half-shoulder shrug while we meander through the dismal offerings of plastic-wrapped food and Styrofoam containers.
“Maybe we should stop at a restaurant. We have enough time,” I say as I examine the orange expiration date stickers on a sandwich in the deli cooler. The date stamped is three days ago.
“No, let’s do this. I want the full experience.” She pulls a mystery sandwich with today’s expiration date, April 13. An easy date to remember. I could tell our kids it was the day I convinced their mom to spend the rest of her life with me.
Okay, I agree, I’m getting a little ahead of myself.
“My obituary reads, ‘On April 13, Cash Rowland ate a mystery sandwich from a more than questionable truck stop by the insistence of Piper Sullivan. It resulted in e-coli poisoning and subsequent hospitalization and death four days later.’”
“A little dramatic, don’t you think?” she asks as she grabs a second sandwich. “Plus, if you got e-coli, I could save you.”
“Great. At least one of us received a good education,” I tell her.
“Hey, I told you to go to college.” She steps back and raises the sandwiches in the air with a smile. A strand of hair falls in her face as she shakes her head. I reach out to brush it away from her eyes when a man clears his throat behind us.
“Excuse me.” A man with a thick blonde
mustache and bald head appears between us, making me drop my hand. His massive body cuts off my view of her. I want to punch this guy in the teeth, his undoubtedly yellow, rotting teeth beneath his mustache, but I wait instead, hoping he picks a sandwich any second. I notice his eyebrows have completely gone awry and need a serious hedge trimming to get them back in shape. He’s wearing an orange jumpsuit like a pumpkin or an escaped convict, except it’s not Halloween. It’s April for Christ’s sake.
I look down at the sheet of paper he’s holding. The thing is a grid filled with names. It looks like a roster of some sort and I squint, trying to read the names on it. I swear for a second I see Piper’s name scribbled on the list. I blink rapidly and glance again to see “replaced pipe” written on a log sheet that looks similar to my own with hours, dates, and miles recorded. There are no names on the list, just logged truck driving tabulations. It looks like V&S Carriers isn’t the only antiquated trucking company still ticking.
This guy is taking longer than I could ever imagine to make a decision. The choices are e-coli or salmonella. Pick your poison. I’m about to say something when he turns toward me and winks, making his unruly blonde unibrow twitch. His complexion is smooth and creamy like the white chocolate bars Hudson’s mom buys in thick slabs for making Christmas candy every year. Two eyes as clear as glass dance beneath his brows. His lips curl up into a smile to reveal a straight and white row of teeth.
He says in a low voice, only for me to hear, “It’s all about what’s inside, son. You’ve picked the right girl.” He taps his heart near a pocket stashed with a row of pens.
Then he turns around and walks away with a mystery sandwich of his own before I can reply. I’m standing frozen with my mouth in the shape of an O when I turn back to Piper.
She’s holding her index finger across her upper lip like a mustache. “You see that thing?”
“Yeah, he looked like…” My voice trails off as I watch him saunter toward the cashier and throw down his sandwich on the counter.
“The Lorax,” she finishes.
“Yeah, the Lorax. You know who else I think looks like the Lorax?”
“No, who?”
“Go back to the last time we saw each other,” I say. “Back to the whole closet debacle.”
“OH! The principal from Xavier. What was his name?”
“Watkins.”
“Yeah, Watkins. We sure pissed him off that day,” she says.
“Yeah, we did,” I laugh before I take the sandwiches, “Maybe we should put these back.”
“No, way. You’ve got to live a little.” She snags the sandwiches back. “Step out on that ledge, feel the cool breeze in your hair and …”
“Get food poisoning?” I grab the sandwiches back and take another look at the cashier, but the Lorax is already gone. “God, that was weird.”
“I know, right? I was waiting for him to spout off how we could save the purple puff trees out back,” she says moving down the aisle.
“Weird,” I whisper, shaking my head.
We choose two apples that look edible before checking out the fluorescent lit wine selection that boasts price tags all the way up to $11.99. She grabs a bottle of cabernet for $5.99 and presses it into my chest. The frigid bottle sweats into my chest, clinging moisture onto my t-shirt.
“I’m an expensive date,” she sings.
“This is a date?” I grab the neck of the bottle and my hand grazes over hers, our fingers almost interlocking. My pulse races.
“Well, to make it official we need to meet some requirements. She heads toward the cashier. “There’s a boy.”
“Guy,” I correct.
“There’s a guy,” she repeats and then points to herself with an apple, “A girl. Then there’s usually a meal of some sort.”
I hold up the sandwiches before putting them on the counter, “‘Of some sort’ is really accurate.”
“Usually drinks.” She sets the apples on the counter.
I glance at the cashier who looks at me through the scratched lenses of her plastic eye frames. She’s annoyed, confused, or amused. I can’t tell which one because the thick crayon make-up doesn’t move.
“Got it.” I slide the wine across the counter and pull out my ID.
“And then there’s usually a movie or something. Hand holding and maybe a kiss at the door, if the guy’s lucky and plays his cards right, before the girl goes in for the night.”
“Sounds cliché,” I say, trying to ignore that she mentioned a kiss. I want a kiss and a whole lot more from her. “What happens when the guy doesn’t have a place to drop off the girl? What if they’re technically sleeping together in the same space?”
“Cliché, huh?” She ignores my question. “So what do you call a guy who shows up at some girl’s door and asks her to go on a ride of a lifetime to prove once and for all that he loves her and that they should be together forever and ever?” She leans up against the counter cute as hell and if it isn’t for the lady and the crayon make-up breathing between us, I would kiss her right here.
“That’ll be eighteen dollars and twenty-four cents.”
“Make that twenty.” Piper throws a box of M&Ms on the counter. “Every date has to have a little bit of chocolate.”
***
“Turn here,” Piper points to a country road on our right, off the beaten path of the highway and the truck stop. Muddy fields line the road on either side, marking the clear stamp of a receding winter. She rolls down her window a few inches and lets the mild breeze circulate through the cab. Her hair whips behind her like a flag, and the crude smell of diesel fills the space between us.
I navigate the truck up a small hill and around a bend that leads to a patch of happy little trees with a marshmallow happy little cloud. Big Dave used to love Bob Ross, and his painting show was about the only thing he would watch with me on TV when I was real little. I think he secretly wanted me to be a painter, or maybe he wanted to be a painter. I wasn’t sure, but either way, neither of us had a lick of creative juice in our blood. I pull into an old, vacant parking lot and kill the engine.
“This good?” I ask.
“Looks like a really great place for you to murder me and dump my body. You even have a plastic bag to suffocate me.” She holds up our provisions.
“Or I could just stuff that sandwich down your throat. Death by poison. It would be more of a hands-off approach and less incriminating.”
We exchange laughs before we put on our jackets and hop out in the spring air on the verge of overcoming winter. The sun sparkles a glimmer of hope.
I grab her hand as we walk down and through a ditch of matted weeds. Her hand is delicate yet strong and fits in mine like it’s supposed to. We’re walking hand-in-hand, me with a blanket tucked under my other arm, and Piper swinging a plastic bag in her other hand. A stream of sun brushes against her face, making her skin glow.
“Ugh.” My feet sink into the mud, and we both stop. I throw the blanket over my shoulder and turn to her. “Hop on.”
“Wow, you aren’t holding out, are you?” she teases before she jumps on my back. She wraps her legs around my waist and rests her chin against my shoulder. I close my eyes, smelling the peach that I remember from the closet. Her body rocks against mine as I lift her higher and move out of the ditch. Her legs clench tighter as we go further, and I wrap my hands stronger around her thighs.
God, I never knew giving a girl a piggy back could be so hot.
She whispers in my ear, “You feeling this, Cash Rowland?”
“Don’t get me started,” I say.
A sweet laugh rolls in my ear, and I think about dropping her on the ground right here, but I stop instead, holding her for a second before she hops off. Piper deserves better than a muddy forest in the middle of Nowhere, Illinois. I flap the blanket open and spread it on the ground.
“Dinner, my fair lady,” I say with a sweep of my hand. She throws the bag down, kicks off her shoes, and climbs onto the blanket. Her hand, he
r beautiful hand, rubs the empty spot next to her while she leans back.
Resisting is going to be harder than I think.
She lifts the sandwiches in the air. “Mystery meat number one or number two on the menu tonight. The choice is yours. It’s a delicacy either way.”
“Surprise me.”
She throws a sandwich at me, and I sit down next to her to unwrap it. “Just try it and you will see, you may like it in a tree.”
“The sandwich or…” I raise my eyebrows and look at her slightly parted lips. If I concentrate hard enough, I think I can already taste them.
“The sandwich,” she says around a mouthful.
“You just dive right in, no hesitations,” I say before taking the plunge myself. I chew slowly. It’s not horrible, but it’s definitely not good. I would say it’s more tolerable until I hit something gritty. I look at her with wide eyes, and we simultaneously spit our sandwiches back in their wrappers.
“Oh my God, what was that?” she asks as she continues to spit.
“I don’t know, but mine had something gritty.” I dig through the bag and grab the plastic bottle. “Here’s a water.”
She gulps down several swallows before passing the bottle to me. I take my turn, swishing out the remnants of the sandwich.
“M&Ms?” she asks, wrapping the sandwiches back up and placing both of them back into the bag. She dumps a bunch into my hand, and I pour all of them into my mouth at once.
“Really? You should really take the time to savor each one. Make it worthwhile.” She pops them into her mouth one at a time, chewing deliberately before moving on to the next one.
I swallow my mouthful of M&Ms. “So, I know a couple of things more about you now. You’re going to be a doctor, you eat M&Ms one at a time, and you go full gusto at sandwiches that may or may not kill you. What were you like as a kid? What was it like growing up as Piper Sullivan, daughter of a renowned neurosurgeon?”
“Renowned is a bit of a stretch. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and say well-respected. Anyway, I grew up in Chicago, and my mom died when I was two, as you already know. I lived a pretty non-fantastical life if you ask me. I spent a lot of time with different nannies because my dad worked a lot and then I went to expensive schools that required me to wear knee-high socks and plaid skirts which I absolutely hated. I threw colossal fits. I feel bad for the nannies now looking back at it, but I just hated wearing skirts. That’s all I can remember,” she says with a smile.