“David!” I sprung upright in my seat, eyes wide. “Watch the road!”
“It’s okay, Ara. You are more than safe in the car with me.” He reached across and pried my fingers from their grip on the leather seat. “My uncle forced me to take one of those stunt-driving courses once. I know how to handle myself on the road.”
“That doesn’t mean you’re incapable of having an accident,” I scolded. “Besides, it’s not just your driving I’m worried about.”
“Would it make you feel better if I told you I’ve never had an accident?”
“No.” I stole my hand back.
“Okay. I’ll keep that in mind. No more eye contact when driving. Deal?” he said with a breathy laugh, shaking his head.
“Deal.”
“Now, what were you about to say, before?”
I wasn’t sure if I should say it, since the moment had passed.
“Just say it.”
My uncertainty lingered in the silence.
“Ara, say it.”
“I’m happy, is all.” I shrugged and looked away. “I’m happy that we said we love each other, even if people say there’s no such thing as love at first sight.”
We both stared forward, silence the only common ground. I kind of wished I hadn’t said it. One thing I’d learned about life was that happiness is subject to ignorance; as soon as you acknowledged it, it’d disappear—like everything else you care about.
David smiled; his own private joke again. “It really bothers you, doesn’t it?”
“What?”
“Being in love with me.”
“I’m just at odds with how I feel and what common sense says—you know, what I should feel.”
David watched the road carefully, his easy smile making me feel silly for having doubts. “You can’t make rules for your heart, Ara. And…if you berate yourself for what you feel, you’ll eventually convince yourself not to feel that anymore. So—” He studied my face for a quick second, then turned his eyes back to the road. “Please just let yourself love me. I love you, and I don’t want to lose your heart to some silly laws made up by man.”
“But people just don’t understand it.”
“Then stop trying to make them. If they’ve ever loved before, then they’ll understand and, if not, just let it go. They’ll get it one day.”
I took a long, slow breath. “You’re right, you know, about being aged beyond your years.”
He laughed. “Do you think you can still love me, even if I’m an old man, deep down inside?”
“Maybe. How old are you, anyway? Emily said you’re older than us.”
“Emily should mind her business.”
I smirked. “Feisty, aren’t we?”
“No. I just despise gossip.”
“Well, we wouldn’t need to gossip if you ever told me anything about yourself.”
He exhaled. “She’s right. Emily. I am older. I’ll be nineteen in November.”
“Are you repeating a year?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I uh—” He scratched the back of his head, resting his elbow on the door after, his fist in front of his lips. “I went through a rough patch a few years ago and…I kind of let my grades slip.”
“What happened?”
“That was when I left my uncle—to come here.”
“And…why did you leave your uncle?”
“I lost someone.” He swallowed, putting both hands on the steering wheel again. “I’ve been hiding from the world in a way, I guess, ever since. I wanted to pretend I was still seventeen—get back some of the time I lost.”
“I’m really sorry, David.” I wished I could just kiss all his pain away. But grief just didn’t work like that. “So, is that one of your secrets—your dark secrets?” I said playfully.
“No.”
“Will you tell me something else about you—something I don’t know?”
“Not today.”
“Why?”
“Because.”
“Not good enough. You know everything about me; I know nothing about you.”
“And it will stay that way.”
My eyes narrowed and I bit my teeth together, folding my arms again. “Fine. Don’t tell me. But I won’t stop bugging you until you do.”
“Fine,” he scoffed out a chuckling breath, “but I don’t give in easily.”
“Yeah? Well, I’m very stubborn. I don’t give up easily.” There was so much attitude in that delivery, I wondered if perhaps I was capable of normal teenage behaviour.
David’s head rocked from side to side, fluid with annoyance. “You are a wilful creature, Ara-Rose. I swear you will be the death of me.”
“I will if you don’t stop keeping secrets.”
“Ara, be nice,” he said.
I tilted my nose in the air and watched the trees outside, blurring in hues of green and brown as we passed them.
The drive to the lake was relatively short, but the scenery changed so much, from closely gathered houses to a long stretch of highway and finally, a tunnel of trees around a hard-packed dirt road. As the tires crunched on the gravelly shoulder, my blue guitar, which hadn’t shifted the whole drive, clunked noisily—the vibrations drawing gentle hums of odd notes from the strings. I glanced over my shoulder to check on it; still upright, the strap looped safely over the headrest in the backseat.
As I turned back to face the front, David’s gaze quickly shifted from me to the road. “What?” I asked.
“You’re not mad at me, are you?” he asked cautiously.
When aren’t I? “No. But I do wish you’d trust me.”
“Believe me, I do trust you. But, to tell you more about myself means letting you into my world, Ara.”
“So?”
He shut the engine off, the sudden quiet making my ears ring. “My dark world.”
“Oh.” I looked to the front, folding my arms, and left it at that.
David glided along beside me, the guitar slung over his shoulder like a one-strapped backpack, and the picnic basket in hand. The sun filtered down through the tops of the trees in hazy lines of pale yellow and white, highlighting the golden tones in his hair. I just wanted to stop walking right then and run my fingers through it. But I wasn’t sure our relationship was quite on the unguarded-impulse-control level yet.