Chapter Forty-Four
Forty-Four
PETER FINALLY GETS OFF THE HIGHWAY. And then keeps driving for another twenty minutes. By the time he says, “We’re almost there,” I’m starving, I have a cramp in my leg, and half my ass is asleep.
He pulls into a rundown gas station lot and parks the car.
“This is lovely, Peter. Thank you for taking me here. You’re right, I do feel more alive. Is that urine I smell? Wait, no! I think it’s a raccoon carcass. Beautiful.”
“It’s a pee break. There aren’t toilets where we’re going.”
“Well. You certainly weren’t lying about making a mistake.” Peter laughs. “Just trust me. Or don’t. You’re kind of stuck at this point.” And then he winks and gets out of the car. “You coming?”
His phone buzzes again.
“You should probably answer that now, don’t you think?” I say, grabbing it from the cup holder and holding it out to him.
Peter stares at the phone for a second before taking it from me. “Yeah,” he says, “it’s probably just my mom. No worries.”
“Okay …” There’s something weird about his smile, but before I can say anything to him, he turns around and swipes up on his phone.
I get out and go to the bathroom, which is only marginally nicer than the one in the bar we were in Tuesday night. Apparently it’s Kylie and Fran who are the dirty whores around these stalls. I wish I had a Sharpie to scribble over their names. But I don’t.
When I get out, Peter is leaning against the car, his head tipped back, with his eyes closed, the sun on his face, and a crisp breeze blowing his hair just slightly.
The windows are rolled down and the music is still playing.
He’s not smiling, but he looks so relaxed and cool and peaceful.
Like all he needs in this world is to be at this shitty gas station with the sun warming his cheeks.
There’s this little space at the base of his neck, right above his collarbone, that is just …
I kind of can’t believe that I kissed him. And that I could again.
Peter blinks his green eyes open when he hears me coming. “Look what I scored from the vending machine.” He holds out a pack of Reese’s Cups.
I take it from him. “If Kit Kats are the friendliest candy bars, what’s a Reese’s?”
“The most romantic. Because there’re two of them.” The tips of Peter’s ears turn pink. “Wow, yeah. Okay. I heard the words as they were leaving my mouth, but it was too late to get them back.”
I laugh. “God, I don’t even want to know what Skittles are.”
“The horniest. Okay, I think something might be wrong with me today. Can we just eat these, please?”
We each grab a cup and then sort of cheers them together and it’s awkward as hell but I’m also kind of enjoying seeing this slightly unhinged side of Peter.
And then he slides a pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket and hits them on his hand. I …
“What the fuck is that?”
“Cigarettes.” He says this casually, as if it makes any sense at all. As if he’s some grifter from the ’90s and not a morally pure book nerd who reads Tolstoy for fun. This cannot actually be what’s happening. He can’t be smoking.
“Oh. Wait. Is it like … a metaphor?”
Peter pauses his tapping. “Is a cigarette a metaphor?”
“Yeah, you know, like in The Fault in Our Stars.”
“I’ve never read it.”
“You’ve never read it? How is that possible? John Green? It’s like hugely famous.”
“Oh, I’ve heard of it,” Peter says. “I’ve just never read it. I prefer his brother’s books. Sick lit isn’t really for me.”
“Okay, well, the character, Gus, in the book, he puts a cigarette in his mouth but never lights it. Like … a metaphor. For being in charge of his life or something?” I’m explaining this for shit, and I’m rambling like a fucking idiot, but I just cannot process the scene in front of me right now.
“Well, this is not a metaphor or a simile or a tobacco-infused metonymic device. This is a cigarette, and I intend on smoking it.” He slides one out of the packet and holds it between his fingers.
“But. You don’t smoke.”
“Today I do,” he says. He places the cigarette between his lips, and the absolute wrongness of it makes me want to throw up.
“What the hell are you talking about? No one smokes. It’s disgusting. That shit kills you.” No. Just … no.
Peter shrugs (fucking shrugs!) and slips a lighter out of his front pocket.
God, his mom’s texts must’ve really sucked because who even is this? His face is all hard and stony. And I get that this day is apparently going sideways for him, but I always assumed he’d make up for a bad day by like, blowing cash on a Barnes & Noble binge.
Even unlit, just seeing that death stick between his lips is so … What the actual fuck is he thinking?
I cross my arms. “You cannot do this.”
Peter shrugs again.
“Okay, fine, then,” I say. “Give me one.”
Peter pauses and lowers the lighter. “No, Sydney, this isn’t …”
“Come on,” I say. “If you’re so dead set on being bad, then me too. Give me one.” I put out my hand.
Peter hesitates. I push my hand out farther. “Come on.” My fingers shake just the tiniest bit, but I keep my eyes steady.
Finally, he takes the cigarette out of his mouth and I feel like I can almost breathe again.
“Is this about your mom?”
Peter pauses. “My mom?”
“Yes. You were weird about that appointment or whatever with her the other day. And you’re being weird today.
And you’re avoiding her texts like they’re radioactive and you said she used to be a doctor but isn’t anymore and like …
I don’t know. Is that what this sudden Look at me, I’m an iconoclast cigarette thing is about? ”
“It’s not about my mom. She has her own shit going on. That’s not my stuff.”
“Then what is your stuff? What are you doing?”
“I told you. I’m smoking a cigarette. It’s not that big of a deal.” He throws his hands in the air. “Jesus, don’t you ever just want to … do something?”
“I thought we were doing something.” Against my will my voice cracks a tiny mortifying bit, and I can feel angry tears starting to prick at my eyes. Fuck. I blink and cross my arms.
The silence lasts for way too long, and then Peter slips the cigarette back into its container. “You’re right, Sydney. I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
He walks over to the trash and tosses the pack into the garbage. He comes back but I just keep my arms crossed, holding them against myself, staring into the sky until the blue turns white, the breeze making me colder than I already am.
“I really am sorry,” he says, softly. “This was so stupid. I just … Sometimes life feels really big and really small at the same time, you know?”
Shit. Yeah. I know. I uncross my arms.
I turn to face him. He looks desperate for me to let this go, and really, after everything he’s done in the face of all my baggage, after everything we’ve done together, I think I should just give it to him.
I mean, we’ve both seen so many Clockers in the last couple of weeks that of course it’s getting to him.
“It’s okay,” I say. “Just … don’t ever pull that shit again. Okay?”
His shoulders relax and he reaches for my hand. “Okay.”