Every chorus, every bridge. I listen on repeat for the rest of the night as Rico and I make drops, warehouse to warehouse, handing off packages under the dim flicker of streetlights. The smell of diesel, the cold bite of wind, the hum of the tires on the asphalt—it all fades behind the music.
Rico mutters something at one point, half awake. “Bro, you still got that touchy feely music crap on?”
I don’t even bother answering because all I can think about is her laugh.
The way she looked in that stupid oversized shirt that wasn’t hers.
The pills kick in eventually, dulling the pain in my head but not the one clawing at my chest.
I keep driving.
The city lights smear into color through the windshield. The night hums low and endless, and for a few seconds, between one drop and the next, I almost convince myself that I’m fine.
Almost.
Then the next track starts. And herfuckingvoice is right there again in my head, and I know sleep’s not coming for me anytime soon.
I’m not a stalker. That’s what I tell myself as I kill the engine and let the car sit heavy in the gutter, the tail lights glowing like two dumb, slow eyes in the dusk. It’s completely normal that I parked three cars down from hers. Totally normal.
She could walk past a dozen cars and not notice me.
I light a cigarette and hold the ember like it’s a compass, waiting. The smoke cuts the air and pulls my thoughts into sharper focus.
What is it with this girl and miniskirts, anyway?
She has the legs for it, I’ll give her that. Toned, dangerous, hot. The sight of her walking across the lot will make a man forget his own name, and I’m a man who never forgets.
She appears like she always does—blond light in the falling gray, laugh trailing behind her as if the previous hour of her life was a private joke she’s letting me listen to in bits. She’s with someone. A girl I don’t know, textbooks hugged to her chest.
When she sees my car she changes, just a flicker at first—eyes sharpen, the laugh tightens, the full-throated warmth closes up like a flower at dusk. She doesn’t hurry. She’s not about to run. She opens her car, slides into the passenger side, pulls out a stack of texts and a small makeup bag. Reapplies gloss. Locks the door. Perfect little ritual of a girl who knows how to look put together even when she’s a mess inside.
She turns, and for a heartbeat I want to tell her to run. From me. From this school. From all of it.
I don’t say any of it.
She looks at me like she’s seeing me for the first time, or like she’s just decided to stop making me invisible.
“Are you stalking me or something?” Her voice is flat, half accusation, half joke, and God, she looks too good saying it.
“Get over yourself,” I say. The truth that I’ve been following her all day with the subtlety of someone who doesn’t believe in subtlety makes me sound weak. Makes me admit she matters enough to track. Can’t do that. Can’t tell her that her laugh is the new rhythm in my chest and the smell of cherries haunts me.
She’s bundled in a tank top, coat slung over it, scarf looped once like a careless ribbon. Gum in her cheek. She chews it with a rhythm that makes me want to tell her to stop doing things that look so adorable.
She starts to walk away, and I do the stupidest thing possible. I step in front of her and take her hand like I own the right to block her path.
Her green eyes catch the light, and I don’t even get to enjoy the feel of her looking back at me because she glares at me.
“What do you want?” she asks. Annoyance hangs in each syllable.
I almost ask her how far she went with Jamie last night. The sentence sits like a stone on my tongue, and I chew it until it tastes like blood. I almost say I’m sorry for the commotion. I almost say a dozen things that might put the night back together in some twisted, rational way.
She cuts me off before I can find the words to make it not stupid. “I have classes,” she says, that small flinch in her voice the first crack in her armor.
“Yeah, I know. Media Studies and then Broadcast Journalism,” I parrot, stupidly, mocking my own tone, because I can’t seem to be anything but an asshole lately. It gets a reaction, a small flash of irritation edged with amusement.
She calls me a stalker again, but there’s something like a smile at the corner of her mouth this time. It twists, disappears.
“An asshole too, if I remember correctly.”
