She stares up at me, her pale grey eyes looking like my whole future. “You gonna catch me if I fall, Johnny-Boy?”
“Johnny-Boy?” I snort.
That devilish grin curves her lips, but she doesn’t elaborate, and when she turns towards my car, I know she’s fighting. Because that’s what Sasha Price is. She’s a fighter.
We are all, in our own way, fighting a battle that most people don’t see.
I learned that today.
I learned that my friends are still working towards being the best version of themselves. They revealed things about themselves that I didn’t know, and accepted my secret with open arms.
There will be a bigger conversation later, they’ll want to know more, hear my story, but for now… we help Sasha.
The open road ahead of us sits empty.
The sun is nowhere to be seen.
It’s pitch black, aside from the headlights beaming from the three cars lined up side by side on the country road that leads to the lake.
Lucas, Claire, and Miller sit to my left.
August, Steph, and Blair sit to my right.
Sasha stares straight ahead, forcing herself to confront her worst fear, and I am so fucking proud of her for it.
She reaches over, grabbing something out of her purse. It takes her a second, but eventually she pulls out an oldiPod. The blue metal is faded, scratches and dents cover the damn thing, and the headphones that are wrapped around it look just as old.
“It was my brother’s” she whispers, running her thumb over the edges of it. “He would kill me if he knew I was showing you this, but it feels right.”
She’s sharing a part of herself with me right now…
“He didn’t like people thinking he was soft, and for whatever reason, he thought that his favourite music would change the way people see him.” There’s something special about whatever’s on that thing, but like always, I’m giving her the choice in sharing what she wants.
I’ll take whatever parts of herself that she’ll give.
I’m a starved man, and Sasha Price feeds my soul.
“We used to drive around and sing until we couldn’t anymore, this music, this part of him was for me and me alone.” She doesn’t look up, but she does grab my hand, “and now it’s for us. I think it’ll help bring back some of those good memories, maybe help outweigh the bad.”
“Say the word and we stop.”
She nods, plugging in the iPod and closing her eyes. “Go.”
I start off slow, the others letting me pull ahead of them. The car vibrates beneath me, the engine revving as I push the pedal down. Every second that this car moves is another second I know Sasha is getting closer to beating this.
What happened wasn’t her fault. I read the article they wrote about the accident, a semi-truck ran a red light, the driver wasn’t paying attention and rammed into the passenger side of their car. Jurian Price and Ian Henderson died on impact. It was tragic, but it sure as shit wasn’t her fault.
But I know there’s nothing I can say to convince her otherwise, this is something she has to overcome herself. She has to realize it for herself.
The headlights of my friends’ cars blind me, but I don’t let it take away from my focus. The second I take my eyes off the road, I will lose every ounce of trust that she has in me right now. I can’t afford to lose it.
“Faster,” she breathes.
“Are you-“
“Yes.”
I watch my speedometer climb. Twenty, thirty, forty… I don’t stop until I hit sixty.
