Chapter 18: : Chapter 18

car and I light up a cigarette, handing it off to her.

“My lips were on it first.”

She sits there still. Watching me with a glint of humor in her mischievous eyes as she bites down on the corner of her lip again. She loves that I said that, but doesn’t want to make it obvious that she’s smiling.

Finally taking the cigarette, I light up my own as I put the car in drive, following the old lady mobile before us.

“So, what’s new in the land of Han?” I begin casual conversation, loving that we have this small amount of time alone together, yet feeling the weight of the tension between us lingering in the air. “Where have you been?”

“Not much,” she says simply, taking a quick puff, then blowing it out the side of her red-lipped mouth and out of the cracked window.

“Not much.” I reiterate blandly under my breath. “That’s all I get.”

“What’s new in the world of Kai?”

I roll my head over to face her, then peer back to the road through the windshield, somewhat annoyed by her inability to answer a simple question.

“You start those drunk classes yet?”

I turn to her, knowing she’s teasing me as she smirks in my direction. What she doesn’t realize is I know what she’s doing. She’s misdirecting. I’m onto her shit.

“Stop doing that,” I say with a straight face. “I know what you’re doing.”

“What?” She chuckles, scratching the side of her head with her middle finger. Must be a nervous twitch. I like it. I like that I notice it. “What do you mean, you know what I’m doing? What am I doing?” she continues, smiling.

“Where did you go? You ghosted me after your birthday, after I begged you not to.” I reply bluntly. “Where do you go when you feel the need to disappear?”

I’m over procrastinating the inevitable. I need to know. The cryptic shit is done. I’ve figured out what she’s doing, how she’s negating the emotions she’s feeling, and I want to know the answer. Where does she go?

Her smile is gone. Sweet, fun, playful, perky Han is gone. The real, raw woman is before me now, scowling as she stares through the windshield.

“Why do you do this?” she asks softly.

“Do what?”

“Push. You push and you push.”

“I’m a pushy guy.”

“You’re annoying.” She smirks.

“You’re lying. You love it.”

“I truly don’t.”

I sigh. “You liked that I came over for your birthday. You liked that I brought you that dead plant. You like that I don’t give up. You like that I’m getting under your skin even if you can’t admit it yet.”

She licks her lips while thinking. I want to lick that lip.

“You intrigue me. Unlike anyone else, that much is certain. And the sex…Lord, the sex.” She rolls her eyes to the back of her head, moaning, and I fucking love it. I want her thinking about us together more than she breathes. “I’ll let you under my skin if you keep fucking me like that.”

Dick twitch.

“See, so we should probably just be together already. Let’s date so we can fuck on the regular. Be my girlfriend Han. Love me forever,” I joke, kinda, pushing the limits like I do. “Have my babies. I’ll make you a hot mom.”

I get her laughing again. Her adorable snorts filling the previous silence in the car. I love making her smile and I can’t believe the shot of adrenaline it gives me.

“Kids with Kid. Living the dream.” She laughs, not knowing what it does to me.

“Don’t joke about it sweetheart, I’ma give you that dream.”

“That or an STD, for sure.”

“Hey now! We don’t do venereal diseases over here. Besides, some are curable, or so I’ve heard.”

“Only if you stick the tip in, right?” She smirks.

I make a pained face before biting my bottom lip as I try to contain my grin. I don’t want to cheese like an idiot, but I fucking love bantering back and forth with her more than almost everything. Our little inside jokes make me feel like I actually matter to her, more than most. That’s all I seem to want.

“Truthfully, I just love your energy, Kai. You’re exciting to be around, you make me laugh.”

I suck in a breath, loving the use of my name rolling off her beautiful lips. She smiles at me, resting her head casually in her hand as her elbow braces against the door.

“I love spending time with you too,” I say, turning my eyes from the road to connect with hers. “Which is new for me.”

There’s a silent moment of connection and I feel another block of ice break free from the iceberg into the water.

“Oh shit, I almost forgot.” She pops up in her seat, turning to her side to pull her canvas backpack she’s always carrying onto her lap. “I got you something the other day.”

She opens the bag and pulls out a tin vintage lunch box that looks to be from the 70s. She hands it over to me and I take it from her, our fingers brushing together for a moment.

She sucks in a breath at the contact, then watches as I examine it. I like that our touch seems to affect her the way it affects me. Makes me feel less alone in this.

The vintage lunch box is sun bleached, yellow, donning rusted corners, with none other than Big Bird from Sesame Street on the face.

“Han. No, you didn’t,” I say, smiling at the awesome gift.

“I saw it at this old shop and knew I had to get it for ya. You can take it to work with Hawke, put your little sandwich in there, or fill it with whatever, your paraphernalia if you’d like.”

My smile drops some as I feel the weight of my appreciation towards her. She may have ghosted me, but I was still on her mind. That has got to mean something.

“Thank you. I love it,” I say truthfully, holding it on my lap, my hand clutching around the metal edge. It’s clearly a collectible.

She waves her hand in front of her as if telling me it’s not a big deal. But it’s a big deal to me.

“I did some research, professor,” she adds, propping up, placing her hand before her face and admiring her dark purple nail polish as she talks.

“You did, huh? And what did my student find?”

I remember our previous conversation about sea creatures and the specific one I chose for her. It appears she actually looked it up. The fact that she was actively thinking about me sometime during our time apart gives me a glimmer of hope in this weak heart of mine.

Her eyes dart over to mine, her hand still in the air. She curls her hand up into a soft fist, almost appearing to drive her nails into her palm before tucking a few strands of stray hair behind her ear. “You’re a real sneaky little fucker, you know that?” she says, pursing her lips together.

I laugh immediately, throwing my hands in the air in defense, knowing exactly what she’s referring to.

The sea creature. The jellyfish. But not any jellyfish. A very unique one that has the ability to live forever. The . An organism that can regenerate into a polyp as it ages or experiences trauma, essentially living forever if given the perfect environment. No death.

She sits there in her seat, eyes all over me, almost contemplating if she’s choosing to be upset by it or let it slide. Yes, I chose that sea creature for a reason. I want her to embrace life, not consistently live surrounded by death or her fear of it.

I turn my eyes towards her, giving her a half grin when I see that look in her eyes again. The one that wants to open up to me, the one that wants some relief, needs to be held, cared for, loved. But as soon as I see it, she blinks it away, changing the conversation again.

“Thanks for taking away the opportunity for me to choose my own sea creature. I love having a man make my choices for me,” she says sarcastically.

I love playing the idiot, so I run with it.

“Yes. See? You get it. We fit. Let me take charge, baby. Make the decisions for you. Be the rock that you need. You sit on back and keep looking pretty, Han,” I exclaim in an exaggerated tone, clearly joking.

“I do like how you fit,” she says in a seductive tone, leaning across the shifting gear to run a finger down my arm, leaning closer so she can whisper the words into my ear with her warm breath. “I want you to fit again and again and again.”

I swallow suddenly, adjusting my hips and sitting lower in my seat as I clear my throat and focus on the road. Yep, I can’t handle flirting with Han.

“Um, also, what’s this I hear about you being a scuba instructor? Is that where you go? Diving deep down away from the surface where death is a distant thought? I’d love to go with you, but I’d probably drown.”

She pauses briefly as the words seem to hit her, then touches her finger to my lip, making it spring as the finger trails down my chin, down my neck.

“I’ll drown you in other ways,” she whispers, grabbing my hand from my lap and placing it between her thighs over her tight little shorts.

I continue driving as she presses my fingers against her sex, feeling the edges of her lips as the warmth pools. My mouth drops open as I feel myself getting hard, imagining and remembering how good it feels to plunge myself deep into her wet walls, until I realize she did it again.

“You did it again!” I say abruptly, pulling my hand away to grab the steering wheel as I signal to pull the car over.

Her panicked eyes look from me to the road and back again, pointing at the road over the dash.

“Kai, what are you doing? Follow Sid!”

“Nope.”

Her brows lower as I slow down, her eyes following the cars passing by us. It’s then that I can tell she’s piecing together what I’m doing.

“Kai, drive the fucking car,” she growls.

“Nah,” I respond, all cool, pursing my lips as I scrunch my nose and shake my head.

I love her anger, her attitude, her passion. This is the side of her I’m prepared to handle because I can relate to it. It’s real, it’s raw, it’s necessary.

I pull the car to the side of the road, putting it in park before turning to face her in the seat.

“Where do you go?”

She adjusts in her seat, rolling her eyes before attempting to crack her neck, looking out of the passenger window. She sighs, the frown set on her face before her head snaps back at me.

“Where do you go when you disappear? You keep doing this. You keep avoiding it. You’re avoiding all of my questions and redirecting the conversation away from it. Why?”

“It’s none of your fucking business, really.”

I sigh, resting my head back against the seat, looking at her with sympathetic eyes. I want her to know she can trust me, even if I’m pushing her. I’m the one who can understand. She must know this.

“Jo,” I say softly, grabbing her hand. She flinches and pulls it away from me, setting her hand on her lap. “It’s just me. Me and you. I can handle this shit better than any of these other jokers out here. I know pain. I’ve been through lots. I understand what it feels like to want to shell up and pretend it all away, to feel like no one wants to fight for you. Trust me, I do.”

She narrows her eyes, her little forehead wrinkle making its appearance.

“I would never be able to explain it to you. Nor would I want to.”

“Why not?” I ask, grabbing for her hand again.

She winces, like my touch pains her now, but she doesn’t pull away.

I hear her mumble something under her breath as she looks away from me. Something that sounds like ‘I’m not even sure I understand it.’

Her words confuse me, but I keep trying. Does she teleport somewhere? Skip dimensions? Slide through wormholes? Visit her friends in hell? What’s really going on here?

“Okay.” I nod my head a few times, realizing I’m pushing my limits. “Okay. You don’t need to explain it. But just tell me this,” I say, my brows furrowing while I look down at our connected hands, our hands that slide together with such ease. The warmth of mine, reaching her tiny cold bones. It assimilates into something deeper. “What’s making you leave?”

She sighs, turning her head to face the window again. She sits like that for what feels like an eternity before finally facing me again. She’s broken. Her eyes hold anger, loads of anger, pain, and something else I can’t quite pick up on yet. Longing maybe? She’s still such a mystery to me and every time I feel like I’ve got her figured out, she switches it all up, leaving me with the shattered pieces I thought fit like glue.

“Babe, I’m just trying to figure you out. I want to know you. Want you to know you can—”

Just as I’m trying to break through to her, she sits up in her seat. Her head tilts to the side as she looks at something or someone behind me. Hope resurfaces in her eyes and I turn to face whatever she’s looking at.

There’s that damn station wagon again.

Sid pops his head out of the driver’s side window, his long locks blowing into his face as he brakes in the middle of the road in traffic.

“What’s up, bruh? You having, like, car problems?!”

“Nah—” I start, before getting interrupted again.

“Yes! Thank God you came back. Kid was just waiting for a tow. I’ll hitch a ride with you guys.” She yells over my lap before flicking her cigarette and jumping out of the car like a fish caught in a net, slipping through the holes, finding her freedom again.

The relief in her voice to get away from me sucks. It fucking sucks. It cuts me. Sears through my chest like a fiery blade and I fucking hate that I feel things. Her people who don’t question her, don’t push her to know herself, don’t care to know what truly makes her come alive, return and she jets. Her safety net is in the form of a wood-paneled station wagon.

“Alright man, we’ll do it again sometime?” Sid shrugs, giving me a weak smile that tells me he understands my night just got ruined.

I nod my head with a sigh, placing my elbow against the steering wheel. I wrap my palm around my forehead, weaving my fingers into my overgrown hair, holding my head up as I watch Han jump into the back seat of their car.

“Look at me. Just fucking look at me,” I beg, whispering to myself as I gaze at her, tightening my jaw.

When our eyes connect, I can reach her. I can feel her when our gazes penetrate each other’s souls.

But she doesn’t. Not once. She doesn’t look back at all. Just leaves me on the side of the road, alone with my new vintage lunch box in this new and uncomfortable space.

A territory entirely foreign to me.