Facing forward, I stared at the road, at the lowering sun and cracked asphalt. “Only stuff that really sticks with me.”
The wind brushed my hair, sending it flying. Heathcliff’s hand shot out, his fingers tangling in the strands before releasing it. “God, it’s like it has a life of its own.” He exhaled. “You want to know what my favorite marked quote was in the book? It was highlighted in neon orange, and said, Honest people don’t hide their deeds. For that to have struck a cord in you, then you must believe it.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked.
He reached for me, his arm falling across the seat as if he wanted me to move closer. I did, but probably not as close as he wished. “That’s why I asked you to come tonight,” he said. “When I saw that quote, I knew I needed you there.”
Startled, I breathed, “Needed?”
He shrugged. “Remember the paper? My family often uses dinners like this to talk about the future. I’m going to be frank here. I’m not good at being honest with my family, my father especially. I don’t want to work here when I finish school. I don’t want to stay here.”
My heart broke. Just like that it shattered. Before I’d even had a chance to explore the idea of a relationship, it was gone. My uncle’s words circled my brain, but the teenage drama queen I liked to pretend didn’t exist in my heart rebelled. She rebelled, she screamed, she punched the insides of my guts, and then she became quiet. She simply quit being anything. My uncle was right. At least I knew before it started that my heart was going to be broken. I either needed to decide that was okay or I needed to walk away.
“You want me there to make it easier for you to tell them you want to leave,” I said.
“Yeah,” he responded. “I do. Do you hate me for that?”
I laughed, the sound harsher than I intended. “I don’t really know you enough to hate you.” A shuddering breath escaped, and with it the rushed words, “Actually, I admire you.” There it was. I was deciding that his leaving was okay, that I could do this even knowing it was going to end. “If you can’t be honest with yourself, then there’s no point, right?”
The arm on the back of the seat was heavy against my shoulders, his fingers suddenly gripping my arm through the jacket. “What I want to do one day doesn’t change this, you know. It doesn’t change the fact that I really do want to know you. That I want to be your friend, maybe even more than that.”
There was a sudden lump in my throat, but I swallowed it away. “We still have time before school ends.”
“You mean that?” he asked, surprised.
My words were more than words, and we both knew it.
Glancing out the window, I replied, “That party Friday … I think I might want to try it.”
Another brief pause. “Hold that thought,” he said. Braking on the side of the road, he stuck his head out of the window and hollered. Startled laughter bubbled up through my chest as he ducked back inside, his feet hitting the gas. “You don’t need a story, Hawthorne!” he cried. “We’re going to make one for you.”
Despite knowing that whatever story he wrote was going to end, I felt light. Like a feather floating on the breeze, wild and free. Maybe Gregor was right. Maybe love could just be a moment, the kind that teaches rather than robs.
Heathcliff pulled the truck into a driveway lined in solar torches, each one placed before a row of azalea bushes. When the season changed, the lane would be aflame with color. The narrow avenue ended in a circle drive, a two-level log cabin resting before it. It wasn’t a huge home, but it wasn’t small either. It was nice, sprawling in places, landscaped yet homey. A barn sat in the back, a wood shop visible from the road.
“From our work on the paper, I know you don’t really know what you want to do …” I said, my words trailing off.
Heathcliff parked and turned the key in the ignition. “Yeah, but that’s the thrill of it. The unknown is exciting. Not knowing what you really want to do is an adventure. It’s a chance to go out there and find out what you want, to learn about yourself. Not everyone has it figured out, you know. The opportunities here are kind of limited.”
My gaze traveled to the house, to the lit windows and shadowy figures moving within. I couldn’t help but wonder what I would have wanted if my life had been different, if my parents had stayed.
“What’s it like?” I asked. “Being a part of a big family?”
Heathcliff stilled, his arm suddenly tugging me to his side of the truck. “There’s nothing else like it. There’s love, and then there’s more. I wouldn’t ask to be a part of any other family. Mine’s amazing. It’s because they’re so wonderful that I’m having such a hard time telling them I want out of this town.”
His embrace felt way better than it should, and my voice lowered. “It wouldn’t be forever though. You’d visit.”
His chin fell near my shoulder, and my breathing hitched. “That’s not the way they’ll see it. You know better than anyone what they’ll think, Hawthorne.”