Chapter 5 #2
The rest stop is empty when I park up just after sunset. There are a few picnic tables, a bathroom building, and a stretch of cracked pavement overlooking a valley painted in shades of orange and red.
I park my van and get out, stretching muscles that ache from way too many hours behind the wheel. The air is starting to cool, with the heat of the day finally breaking and somewhere in the distance, I can hear a coyote howl.
I hear the engine of his car before I see it.
That low rumble cutting through the evening’s quiet.
He pulls in beside my van and turns it off.
He gets out and stretches his arms above his head as he walks toward me, revealing a small glimpse of his toned stomach, and I know that this is it.
This is going to be the moment we stop pretending this is anything other than what it is.
"We need to talk," he says.
"Yeah, we do."
I lead him to one of the picnic tables, and we sit across from each other, the last light of day casting long shadows across his face.
"This is wild," I say.
"That’s one way to put it."
"You've been following me for two days now."
"I have."
"I should be terrified."
"Are you?"
I briefly turn to the side and look out at the view, taking in a deep breath before I answer. When I turn back I watch the intensity in his eyes, the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands rest on the table like he is forcing himself not to reach for me.
"No," I said honestly. "I'm not."
"Why not?"
"Because you're not trying to hurt me, you're trying to understand me."
"It’s more than that. I can’t stop this obsession with you. I crave you, Roxy. I need to know everything about you."
My breath catches at his response as butterflies fill my tummy.
"You feel it too."
“I do,” I say, leaning forward across the table.
We stare at one another, communicating with only our eyes, leaving ourselves bare to show the want and desire between us. The need to be close getting only more intense with each passing day.
"What do you want from me?" I ask.
"I don't know,” he says, running a hand through his hair, frustrated. "I just know that when I saw you on that roadside, something inside me joined itself to you, and I can't let that go. I can't let you go."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have."
This is fucked up as I understand what he’s trying to say, but it makes no sense to feel this way. We’re strangers. This is a shitload of red flags on both sides, but my need to stay is far more extreme than a need to run.
"I'm going to keep driving, West. Toward California, probably," I say.
"Sounds good."
"And you're going to keep following me."
"Always."
"And eventually, we will stop running from whatever this is."
His eyes lock on mine and his nostrils flare. "Yeah, and it will happen soon, Roxy. I won’t be able to wait much longer."
Dom’s calm yet demanding manner is so fucking swoonworthy, I’m almost tempted to throw all caution to the wind and grab him over this bench right now. He is a walking fucking dream.
"But what happens after?" I ask, deciding to remain composed.
"I don't know,” he says, reaching across the table, his hand hovering over mine but not touching. Not yet. "But I think we both want to find out."
I look down at his hand, at the tattoos covering his forearms, the scars on his knuckles. Evidence of violence, of a life lived in the shadows where the monsters live. Just like mine.
Slowly, I turn my hand over, palm up as an offering. His fingers brush mine with the lightest touch, and it sends electricity racing up my arm. If this is what a whisper of a touch feels like, I can’t fucking imagine how it will feel to have his whole body pressed against mine.
"There's a bar about a hundred miles west in a small town, the middle of nowhere."
"I'll find it."
"I know you will."
We sit there as the last light fades, our hands barely touching with the promise of something special forging between us. Eventually, I pull away and stand up to leave.
"I should go."
"Yeah," he says as he stands too, but neither of us move.
"Dom?"
"Roxy."
"I'm glad you're following me," I say, and his face changes to a mixture of relief and hunger with a hint of darkness that covers my skin in goosebumps. This is like the world’s longest foreplay session.
"I’m glad too."
I smile and walk back to my van, feeling his eyes burn into my back the whole way. I start the engine and I look in the rearview mirror and see him still sitting at the picnic table, watching. Five minutes into my journey I look back and see his headlights appear behind me.
I smile. I’m finally not alone in this world.
The highway stretches out ahead of me, empty and dark where the white lines disappear into the distance like a path to nowhere.
Or maybe to everywhere. I've been driving for an hour, and I can sense him behind me.
Two miles behind, like always. Close enough to keep me in sight, but far enough to maintain the illusion that this is still a choice. But it isn't a choice anymore.
Maybe it never has been.
I think about the diner, the way he looked at me with those dark, honest eyes.
The gas station, standing too close, the air between us charged with a toxic spark.
The rest stop, his fingers brushing mine, the promise of what is to come.
I then think about the bar I’m driving toward, the one I'd told him about, where we'd finally stop circling each other and collide.
My hands grasp at the steering wheel with anticipation of the fact that I’m not running anymore, I’m leading him exactly where I want him to go.
The realization should have scared me, forcing me to wake up and vanish into some small town where he'd never find me. But I don't want to.
I want to be found.
I want him to catch me.
The truth of it washes over me like a weight of comfort. I've been alone for so long, surrounded by people who don't understand, who look at my art and see something disturbing instead of something true and beautiful. People who turn away from me as the weird creepy girl who doesn’t belong.
But not Dom. He likes me and doesn’t want to leave or look away, and I know it’s the same for him too.
I can see the madness in him, the hermit who struggles with society daily.
The way he doesn’t fit the mold like me.
We were the same two people who'd been walking through the world alone, pretending to be normal, until we found each other on a roadside in the middle of nowhere. And now we can't let go.
I glance again in the rearview mirror, and his headlight is still there, steady and constant. But soon, he won't have to follow anymore, because he will be here with me.
The bar appears in the distance, a low building with a flickering neon sign, exactly the kind of place where people go to hide from the world, from the everyday mundane shit.
I pull into the parking lot and wait with the only thing keeping me company, which is the pounding of my heart, knowing he is about to turn up and that this will be the beginning. I grab my bag with my sketchbook and hop out of the van.
The night air is cool against my skin, so I grab my denim jacket from the passenger seat to wear over my sundress, before walking over to the bar entrance.
As I walk over I can smell cigarette smoke and stale beer drifting from the building, with the muffled sound of a jukebox playing something country and sad.
I don’t look back as I put my hand on the door, as I know he is behind me. My pulse races, every nerve ending alive with anticipation. I push open the door and step inside.