46-Zach #2
In the rearview mirror, a pair of headlights flick on. Yensil waits until I pull out, then follows at a polite distance. Always close enough to intervene, but far enough not to intrude.
The speakers crackle as the first notes of Somnium’s latest single play. Kit reaches for the stereo, but I smack his hand away.
“Don’t you dare.”
“Zach—”
“Nope.”
I turn the volume up, drowning out his protests, and begin to shout the lyrics like I’m front row at one of their concerts.
Pink flush spreads across his blanched cheeks as he slinks into the seat.
By the time the chorus hits I’m lost in the melody and lyrics, watching the dashed highway stretch endlessly ahead.
The wind whips through the cracked window, brushing my hair across my cheek.
Autumn announces its arrival with streaks of red, orange, and gold bursting through the blur of canopies.
Leaves flash past like sparks. Each is a tiny flare of life ending and beginning in the same breath, the dying ones blazing bright on their way out.
Trees let go of what they’ve held on to all year, and somehow it’s beautiful instead of tragic.
Not a surrender of defeat, but a simple inevitability.
Maybe that’s why coming home scares me; in order to grow back anew, it’ll force me to shed things I’ve held too tightly.
Endings aren’t always failures. Letting go can be its own kind of faith. The leaves fall, branches go bare, and nature freezes. Still, we know spring will come back. It’s a death we trust because we know what comes after. We believe in the cycle, even when we don’t believe in much else.
There’s comfort in the idea that some things return, no matter how many times they break.
Kit joins, harmonizing quietly with me and himself. His wrenching tone wraps around mine like smoke, then sinks through the threads of my long-sleeve shirt. I hold out the last note, letting the piano, guitar, and drums fade into the hum of the road.
“You know,” I say, giving him a sideways glance, “if your career doesn’t work out, you’d be a hell of a singer for a Somnium cover band.”
His lips press into a thin line. Chin trembling, his eyes glisten. I force my fingers into a fist and set it in my lap to keep from reaching for him.
“What’s wrong?” The shift is so sudden it knocks the wind out of me.
“What happens when this is all over?” He sniffles, dragging his black sleeve across his nose. “Realistically. I can’t be in my eighties performing and touring.”
“Tell that to the Stones,” I say, but Kit frowns.
“Don’t be cheeky. Seriously, I don’t know how many years I got left in me. But I have absolutely no idea what to do after. My entire life’s led to this. I’ll be lost without Judas, not that I ever deserved him.”
The confession hangs between us, tender enough to sting.
“You know, my dad played guitar,” I say, my leg bouncing a hole through the car’s floor.
“One of the best I’ve ever heard. He was a founding member of this band in the late eighties, and he had to turn down their first cross-country tour because my mom got pregnant with me.
They replaced him before signing with Jugstuck records. He couldn’t let it go.”
The memory opens like a wound whose sutures never held.
“What band?” Kit turns fully toward me.
“The Holy Holler Boys.”
“Shit,” he says, stroking his shadow of blond stubble as he no doubt thinks of their multiple accolades. He shaves every night before a show, and I hate it because the blanket of hair really defines his high cheeks.
“Yeah.” I shrug, but my stomach knots, tears trying to force their way out. “He missed his shot at the Hall of Fame, and it destroyed him.”
“No offense,” Kit says, chuckling as he shakes out his tousled hair, “but that didn’t make me feel better in the slightest.”
“Well, all I’m saying is yes, nothing lasts forever, but at least you get to experience it.
” I flip on the blinker and merge onto our exit, sparing him a glance as I peer behind us.
“No what ifs or shoulda-coulda-wouldas. That’s something to hold on to long after it’s gone.
Guitar was the one thing that brought my dad joy. ”
My mouth goes traitorously dry, as if it remembers before my mind does. I focus on the road ahead as the words try to crawl back down my tongue. I swallow, and it only drags the ache to the pit of my gut, where it sits like a boulder.
“When the cancer took my mom, he lost himself. He still played, but it was sloppy. One day at work, hung over, or probably still drunk, he crushed his hand. When he lost that—”
A little hitch catches my words. Jaw locking, my teeth press together until my temples throb. My hands go cold, like my body’s trying to draw the blood inward to protect the vital parts, leaving the rest numb. The road blurs for a second, forcing me to blink hard.
Trauma lives inside you. It hides in muscles and catches on its way out. I’m right back there.
“I met Nicole in fifth grade. Nicole found out what my home life was like, and she took me in. At thirteen, her dad, Steve, got me a used keyboard for Christmas because I played the crap out of the piano at their place. My dad was encouraging at first. But one night, I was too loud when he was too drunk, so he came in and smashed it with a hammer.”
“I’m sorry.” Kit’s knuckles whiten as he picks at his thumbnail.
“You know the worst part?” I wipe a stray tear and grip the wheel, using all of my energy to keep my sight clear. “I nearly broke his nose for it, and my dad didn’t even remember. Never apologized either.”
I let out a shaky breath. “Anyway, those next few years were hell. By fifteen, I had a stable job at the golf club with Nicole. She saved every penny she made, and when it came time for tuition, she gave me all of it. Steve insisted I take either hers or his money, but no matter what, I was going to college. They knew that house wasn’t safe.
From my dad or his shitty friends’ wandering hands. ”
I grip my necklace, stroking the trinket.
“Nicole saved me. And now she’s just…gone.
” The loss hits fresh every time I say it out loud.
“She used to drive me everywhere because I was too chicken shit to get my license. I remember her mentioning being late to the party because she had to go out of her way to pick me up that night. She shouldn’t have even been driving down Sunset!
“The doctor said I must’ve had a guardian angel, considering my injuries should’ve been more substantial.
I know that she’s my angel, both in life and after.
” Kit’s eyes are glassy pools as I look at him.
“So, yeah, I understand what it feels like to question whether you deserve to be happy for still being here, living out your dream.”
“And?” he asks, sniffling as he jerks his hood up, turning his face away.
Sun hits the window, and his face dissolves into streaks of yellow and green, reforming as a shadow passes. The glass catches his profile, outlining his defining features as the rest of him blends into the cornfields rushing past.
“I’m not sure.” I stare into the horizon. “But either way, I’m here. I got more than I could’ve asked for, and I’d like to think deserving or not, after it’s over and done, me still being here, right now, serves a purpose, even if it won’t last forever.”
“I can assure you, it serves a purpose.” Kit reaches over, his hand swallowing my lower thigh. Heat shoots up my leg, and the comfort of it stings. “I’m sorry for being such an arse these last weeks. I just, I didn’t know—”
“It’s okay.” I cut him off, shaking my leg loose from his searing touch. “I get it.”
He drags his hand back to his lap. His gaze slips to the window, dashboard, then down to his sneakers. His spine loses that careful straightness he holds himself with, and he sinks back into the seat. The silence between us feels heavier than anything we’ve said.
When he finally exhales, it deflates him, and me along with it.