“I wasn’t planning on it,” I say. My stomach twists, uneasy from not knowing how to hate him.
“Good,” he whispers.
Then it’s quiet again. Neither one of us knows what to say.
“So . . . what now?” he asks. “I mean, we’re almost to Lancaster. Didn’t you want to see your mom?”
I shake my head. “I just wanted to get you away from Mallory.”
Past Emma wanted to go so badly, I stepped in and used it as the perfect excuse. Mallory had just told Myles it was the reason I was acting weird. It made sense. I knew he wouldn’t question it.
He nods, staring out the window. “So this was just an excuse to get me to drive four hours in the opposite direction?”
“Yeah.” The word is thick and hard to push out because I don’t know how to talk to him anymore.
“Okay,” he says, tapping the steering wheel. “Well, maybe we should head home then.”
I want to believe that he’s telling me the truth, but there’s a tiny voice of doubt in the back of my mind. I have him hundreds of miles away right now, and even with how awkward it is, I’d like to keep him that way.
“Or not,” he says.
“I didn’t say anything.”
He raises an eyebrow as if he’s saying, “Really?”
“What?”
He shakes his head. “Nothing.”
“Tell me.” I cross my arms and scowl.
He sighs, putting the car into drive. “I haven’t totally forgotten how to read you.”
What did that mean? Did I make a silly face or is he pretending he can read my mind?
He shakes his head, looking out the window, still gathering his thoughts and sorting them like it’s his full-time job. Then his eyes widen and he looks back over at me.
“What about the other you? What is she doing over here?” He says it slowly, emphasizing every word.
My eyes dart out the window because I know he won’t like what I’m about to say. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does.”
“I ran away from home.”
“Why?”
I shrug. I don’t think I can tell him the truth because it still feels so raw. I can’t tell him about feeling so lonely and unwanted that I ran away to find my mom, hoping I would find some sense of belonging.
His brow knits together. “You can’t just run away like that. Do you realize how dangerous that is?”
“It was fine.”
His mouth hangs down and he looks at me like I’m losing it. “Nothing’s fine about that. What if you get hurt?”
“I didn’t.”
The truth is I knew exactly how unsafe it all was, but I didn’t care.
