cVV
The first thing Lexi does once we’re on the road is ask if she can go to sleep.
It comes from the backseat in a tiny, tired voice, soft enough that I almost miss it over the hum of the tires and the steady growl of the truck engine beneath us.
“Mommy?”
I twist in the passenger seat and look back at her.
She’s already half-curled against the seat, little sneakers kicked forward, bunny tucked tight beneath one arm like she thinks somebody might steal it if she loosens her grip.
The overhead glow from the dash and the passing wash of distant streetlights catch on her face in flashes, enough to show me the smudged exhaustion under her eyes and the way she’s fighting it because she doesn’t want to miss anything.
My heart squeezes. “Yeah, baby?”
Her fingers stroke one of Bunny’s floppy ears. “Can I go sleep?”
I smile before I can stop myself, the expression small but real. “You can sleep whenever you want.”
She nods solemnly like I’ve given her formal permission for something very serious, then looks toward the front of the truck instead of settling down right away.
At first, I think she’s just checking to make sure we’re still moving.
Then she says, “What’s your name?”
For half a second, I don’t realize she’s talking to him.
Then Joker glances into the rearview mirror, and his eyes meet Lexi’s there.
Something about that image catches me unexpectedly.
Him up front, all rough edges and heavy shoulders and rings wrapped around the steering wheel.
Lexi in the back, small and watchful and wrapped around Bunny like she’s made of nerves and stubbornness.
The two of them look so completely mismatched that the scene almost doesn’t make sense.
Still, he answers her. “Joker.”
Lexi blinks once. Then she says, with all the solemn curiosity in the world, “Does that mean you’re funny?”
For the first time since I’ve met him, he looks completely dumbfounded. Not thrown in a dangerous way. Not irritated. Just…caught off guard.
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from smiling, because I’m not sure whether laughing would make things worse or better.
Joker glances at me for a second, then back to the road. “That depends.”
“On what?” Lexi asks.
“On whether or not you’re hard to impress.”
She thinks about that for a beat. “Can you tell me a joke?”
That one almost does me in. Because of all the possible directions this interaction could’ve gone in, Lexi immediately deciding his road name means he owes her entertainment was not on my list.
I shift in the seat and risk a look at him.
His hands stay steady on the wheel, but there’s a split second where I can practically see him trying to process how exactly he ended up in a truck in the middle of the night being asked for child-appropriate stand-up material by a three-year-old with a death grip on a stuffed rabbit.
Then, to my absolute shock, he says, “Alright.”
Lexi perks up in the backseat.
Joker clears his throat like he’s about to address a room full of shareholders instead of a toddler. “What kind of bear has no teeth?”
There’s a pause.
Lexi’s brow furrows so hard it nearly disappears beneath her bangs. She looks at me like maybe I know the answer, then back at him. “What?”
“A gummy bear.”
There’s one long second of silence.
Then Lexi giggles. The sound is bright and sleepy and so achingly normal that it catches somewhere low in my chest and twists.
“Oh,” she says, delighted. “That funny.”
I look out the windshield before either of them can see my expression, because for some reason that stupid little joke feels like more than it should.
Maybe because Lexi laughed. Maybe because Joker, who looks like he could break a man’s jaw without getting winded, actually paused long enough to think of a joke clean enough for a three-year-old. Maybe because that tiny moment of softness feels absurdly out of place in the middle of all this fear.
Whatever the reason, it settles into me quietly and stays there.
Lexi lets out one more sleepy little laugh, then says, “I’m gonna sleep now.”
Joker nods once. “Probably a good idea.”
She shifts in the back, dragging Bunny up beneath her chin, and within five minutes she’s out.
Actually out.
No tossing. No asking questions. No waking every few seconds to make sure I’m still there.
Just asleep.
It should probably worry me how quickly she goes down, but I know exactly why it happens.
She’s exhausted in the way only kids can be when life has wrung too much out of them too fast. Stress sits differently in children.
They don’t always cry when they’re carrying too much.
Sometimes they just get quiet. Sometimes they fall asleep in car rides and on couches and in strange rooms because their little bodies are trying to catch up with fear they shouldn’t even understand yet.
That realization sits heavy enough that I have to look away.
Outside the windows, the world is mostly dark.
Louisiana has already started fading behind us, the roads stretching longer and emptier the farther we get from the chapter.
The sky is deep and moonless, the kind of black that swallows shape and detail whole.
Every now and then headlights pass in the opposite direction, streaking white across the windshield before disappearing into the rearview mirror behind us.
Beyond that, it’s mostly just tree lines, open stretches of road, and the occasional glow of gas stations or roadside signs flashing by.
The truck itself is warmer than I expected, though not uncomfortably so. It smells faintly like leather, clean laundry, motor oil, and something darker beneath it that I can’t quite place. Not cologne exactly. Just…him. The scent of a man who spends a lot of time in engines, smoke, and worn cotton.
That thought is inappropriate enough that I shove it away immediately.
The first stretch of the drive after Lexi falls asleep is painfully awkward. Not because Joker is making it awkward. That would almost be easier.
No, the problem is that he isn’t doing anything wrong.
He isn’t talking too much. He isn’t asking invasive questions.
He isn’t trying to fill the silence because he’s uncomfortable with it.
He’s just driving, one forearm braced loosely against the wheel, the other hand shifting when needed, his attention split between the road and the mirrors with a kind of calm focus that somehow makes me more nervous than if he’d been chatty.
I don’t know what to do with a man who doesn’t demand anything from me.
That thought lands harder than I want it to.
I turn my face toward the passenger window and stare into the dark, watching the reflection of the dashboard lights skim over the glass every time we pass something with enough shape to catch it.
My purse sits in my lap, my fingers still curled around the strap like I’m afraid if I let go, I’ll lose the few things inside that still feel like mine.
Beside me, Joker says nothing. And somehow that’s worse for my nerves. Because silence with Cal was always dangerous.
Silence meant he was angry. Silence meant he was thinking. Silence meant he’d already decided how the next hour was going to go and I just hadn’t figured it out yet.
I know, logically, that this is different. I know the man beside me is not my husband.
I know he hasn’t done a single thing to suggest he’s going to turn this drive into another version of something I need to survive. And still, every quiet stretch makes my shoulders tighten on instinct.
I hate that.
I hate that I’ve become this woman, measuring silence like it’s a weapon.
I shift in the seat and tuck a strand of fake blonde hair back beneath the baseball cap, the cheap wig itching against my scalp in a way that makes me want to claw it off.
The oversized shirt doesn’t help. Because apparently nothing says forgettable quite like a terrible disguise and the kind of outfit I’d never wear if I had any say in the matter.
Humiliating. That’s the word for it.
Humiliating and exhausting and so far beneath the life I used to think I was building that it would almost be funny if it didn’t feel so awful.
I’m still staring out the window when Joker finally speaks. “Lexi get carsick?”
The question is so practical and so startlingly normal that it takes me a second to realize I’m supposed to answer.
I turn my head and blink at him. “What?”
His eyes stay on the road. “Carsick.”
“Oh.” I clear my throat. “No. Usually not.”
He nods once, absorbing the information like it matters. There’s no follow-up.
No why. No what else does she do when she’s nervous? No invitation to explain myself or my daughter or my life.
Just a question, answered, and filed away.
A few miles later he asks, “Need to stop soon?”
I glance at the dark highway stretching ahead of us. “No. I’m okay.”
Again, just a nod.
And then, a little while after that, “Want coffee?”
I almost laugh at the random practicality of it.
Not because it’s funny, exactly. More because I’m realizing, piece by piece, that this man’s version of concern appears to come in the form of logistics instead of pity, and for some reason that makes it easier to breathe.
“Maybe later,” I say.
“Alright.”
That’s it.
Nothing invasive. Nothing probing. Nothing that feels like he’s trying to pull information out of me under the guise of concern.
He asks what matters for the drive and leaves the rest alone.
It should probably feel impersonal. Instead, it feels strangely respectful.
I shift again and shiver realizing that I’m cold.
Not deeply. Not enough to shiver from the temperature inside the truck, because the cab is warm enough.
But there’s a chill under my skin that has nothing to do with air conditioning and everything to do with adrenaline slowly wearing off while my body tries to decide whether it’s allowed to unclench yet.
Still, the shiver catches me by surprise.