Chapter 4 #2
Akilah snorts; the sound rattles around the car, and Tanner tries to hold onto it.
“It’s a decent chat-up line. Straight to the point.” She taps the steering wheel. “I didn’t want to die. That’s just what my face looks like around new people.”
“It’s pretty,” Tanner says because the thought floats around her mind every time the streetlights bathe her in a yellow glow. “Your face.”
Akilah flicks her gaze at her just once. “So you’ve said.” She hums, then clears her throat. “You think I’m hot. Right?”
Tanner laughs at the uncertainty in her voice. “Yeah. I think you’re stupid hot.”
“How are you comfortable answering that so fast, yet if I ask if you’re alright, you won’t tell me?”
Tanner screws up her nose. “I did tell you. I even got this t-shirt, that’s going to make me think of you every time I look at oranges, as a prize.”
Akilah taps the steering wheel again. A glance in her direction. “Do you think you could tell me the first time I asked?”
“If I try, would that work?”
Akilah looks over. “That works.”
The streets are light, as they usually are, when the moon is too bright, and it’s almost three a.m..
Something about the way she can only see Akilah’s fingers against the steering wheel, the light from the dashboard, the glint of the streetlight against her cheekbones.
God, she’s so pretty. “Would the chat-up line work on you?”
Akilah’s knuckles tighten against the steering wheel. “That depends on who says it.”
Tanner doesn’t know if she should feel safe enough to be this bold, but she’s said it before, and she can realise she’s in a car with an almost strange woman. Besides, she really does want to fuck her.
“Me.”
Akilah lets out a slow breath, her fingers sliding down to the bottom of the wheel. Tanner thinks about reaching out for one, but ultimately keeps her hands laced on her lap.
“Yeah, depending on the time.”
“Like, if it’s a Monday? Or like, it has to be nighttime?”
Akilah makes a sound that teeters on a laugh. Like someone laughing for the first time without knowing what they’re doing. “I don’t have sex.”
Tanner frowns. “So, why would it matter who said it?”
“I have had sex,” Akilah says, then, “I don’t have it often… It’s not something I enjoy most of the time. I know I started the conversation, but now I think maybe I don’t know you well enough to finish it.”
Huh. No sex. The image of Akilah’s white knuckles against her bedsheets drifts out the crack of the window.
“Okay,” Tanner replies. She wants to talk to her anyway. “What’s your favourite colour?”
“Green.”
“Olive green, or grape green?”
“Both with a preference for olive.”
Tanner hums, far too many ridiculous questions floating around her mind. None of them mean anything, but she has the urge to ask them anyway. She doesn’t.
Instead, she texts Darcy to let her know she’s in the car and Akilah’s number plate. Akilah is cool, and way too hot, but she’s still a relative stranger. Nice smelling top or not, Tanner does want to be found if she’s kidnapped, please and thank you.
“You can ask something else,” Akilah says. “If you want.”
“What season are you?” Tanner asks, spinning to look at her.
“How would I be a season?”
“I’m a spring,” she replies, pushing her hair over her shoulder.
“I like the bright mornings, I get low seasonal depression, but it’s over the moment I can hang washing outside, and I dream about having a garden to tend to the second the sun comes out.
Even if I have to wear a bodywarmer, but that’s okay because I have a cute woollen red one. ”
Akilah’s hands tighten on the steering wheel again.
Then they slide down as she takes a deep breath.
There’s a period of silence, the only noise the creek of Betty as they cruise around a corner.
Akilah might want to be her friend if she doesn’t have sex.
She might just want to drop a loser girl off safely.
“Autumn.”
Tanner gasps, looking at her again. “Do you wear hats? You’d look so good in a hat.”
Akilah raises an eyebrow but keeps her face straight. “Am I not allowed to give you my spiel?”
She laughs. “So sorry, go ahead.”
“I like autumn.”
“Akilah.”
She rolls her lips as she looks at her, then back to the street. “Orange leaves are pretty; the air isn’t humid but not cold, and I like wearing boots.”
“Are they your favourites?” Tanner asks. “You were wearing them the other day, too.”
“Yes,” she replies, as it cost her something, as if she’s told her the code to her safe, not that the shoes she clearly wears daily are something she enjoys.
Tanner wouldn’t mind getting to know her for real.
She wants Akilah to want that too. Tanner has already turned up in her world twice.
Thrice without Akilah asking for her is borderline harassment.
When they pull up outside her flat, Akilah’s lips downturn, her entire body tense, like the silence is offending her. Tanner sits in it for a moment, tries to tell Akilah to ask for her number via osmosis.
“Thank you.” She’s never been good at science. “For making sure I was safe.”
Akilah taps on the steering wheel.
“Anytime.”