FIFTEEN | DRIVE

I’d half expected the house to be in darkness when I got home, but the downstairs lights were on, and it looked as warm and inviting as ever.  I pulled up next to Harper’s battered old car, some vintage Chevy that he was equal parts proud of and fed up with, and then I killed the engine.

It was easier to face myself, sat alone in the liminal space that my car provided. It had always felt like a limbo to me: you were either getting in, getting out, or actively driving. To sit in it, especially in the driveway, or a car park, at night, made the very air feel hazy and dizzying. 

The orange streetlight glowed against the windows, catching on the water droplets from the earlier rainfall. They were stark against the dark, glum sky, and I pressed the pads of my fingertips against the cool glass, tracing the pattern of them.

I was only prolonging the inevitable. But his face – I’d never seen Har