“Yeah,” I say, looking around the hotel room.
“Let’s go out.” He takes a few steps toward me, one arm wrapping my waist and tugging until I’m pressed to his front. His free hand moves up my side, grazing curves, as my hands move to the back of his neck, and then he brushes wild curls behind my shoulders.
I haven’t done anything with my hair since we left except let it dry with some curl cream and gel I bought at a pharmacy in North Carolina.
Each time I look in the mirror, I’m a bit shocked and confused to see the curls I’ve kept well-managed for years, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like the look of them, much less the ease.
I especially love the way Zander looks at them like he’s excited to see my curls again. Relieved, maybe.
“Go out?”
“Yeah. We should celebrate. One last hurrah until next time.”
“Next time?” I ask like a parrot, repeating his words back to him.
“You think this is gonna be our last road trip together, pip? I think every winter we’ll schedule a week, run from the cold.”
I stare at him completely unsure of what to say and how to respond.
I’m blown away by the openness with which he’s talking about the future. Our future.
“All good, baby. You keep living in the fairy tale. I’ve got my eyes on the future for both of us.”
I can’t breathe.
His words take over me, and all I can think about is a future with Zander Davidson and what that might mean for me.
For us.
For our friends, for our families.
Because if we do—if we do this and it doesn’t work out, it will—
“No. No more thinking about that. We’re still here, a million miles from home, and I have at least one more day of you living in pretend land with me.”
“Zander—” He quiets me with a kiss before stepping back and away from me, moving to where he tossed his wallet. Grabbing a credit card out, he hands it to me.
“Go. Go buy something pretty.” I stare at the blue card as if it will bite me.
“Something pretty?”
“We’ll go to a nice dinner. Last night of vacation and all.” My gut drops with the final understanding that this trip is actually ending.
The idea that this fantasy I’ve dreamed of since I was little will come to an end.
Reality will set in at midnight, like I’m Cinderella and Zee is Prince Charming, and I’ll go back to being the daughter with a plan and a goal, the one who has an interview tomorrow afternoon, the one who will always be Zander’s little sister’s best friend. The threat of ruining a lifelong friendship will again hover over us. It won’t just be about a man and a woman enjoying each other's time anymore. Real life will start to creep in and ruin everything.
“But this is not the end of this,” Zander says into my ear, countering my thoughts as an arm wraps my waist and pulls me into him again. “Not even close, Zoe. This trip ends, but we do not.”
I should remind him that this is pretend.
I should remind him that this is the equivalent of a vacation fling.
But I don’t.
I don’t respond at all, and his hands go to my face in a move I have grown to love in just a few days, forcing me to look at him and pulling our faces closer.
He does this when I get too far into my head, holding my face and grounding me, reminding me to live in the now when the panic starts to take over.
“Tell yourself whatever you have to in order to keep your sanity. That’s fine, baby. Tell yourself what you need to hear, but know that if this is us playing pretend, I plan to play with you for the rest of my damn life.”
“Zander—”
“Later.” He steps back and tries to hand me the credit card. “Go. Go buy a pretty dress. Something that I’ll want to take off you as soon as I see you in it, so when you sit across from me all night, it’s all I can think of.”
Ideas instantly start running through my mind, and he smiles upon seeing them.
“Yeah, I know you like that,” he says, then he presses his lips to mine. “Take my card, go shopping. Torture me.”
“I have money, Z—”
“I know you do. I want this. I wanna spoil you.” He presses the card into my hand, and involuntarily, my fingers wrap it. “Give me this. Let me spoil you, pip.”
And who am I to argue with a request like that.
So I say yes.
And the smile my man gives me when I do makes it all the better.
And I don’t even let my mind linger on the way it’s so damn comfortable calling Zander Davidson my man.
THIRTY-SEVEN
DRESS
-ZOE-
“Where are you?” I ask my phone, my voice brisk and almost business-like as I walk down the small Main Street toward the boutique I scouted in the hotel room.
“What?”
“Where are you? And can you get the crew together quick?”
“What are you talking about?” my best friend asks.
“Luna, I’m having a mental breakdown in small town USA, on a mission to buy a dress that your brother, and I quote, will think about taking off of me through our entire dinner. I need an emergency group meeting.”
Silence.
Silence hits my ears.
“I’m sorry, what?” Luna asks,
“Jesus, Luna, get your head in the game! I’m panicking!”
“Okay, okay, okay. Let’s rewind, okay? Where are you?”
“I’m in Maryland.”
“Okay, good,” she says, coaching me like I’m a child who lost her parents. “And what are you doing right now?”
“I’m walking down a road toward a boutique.”
“Great, Zo. And what are you doing there?” Her words are so patient, but I don’t have time for patience.
“Jesus, Luna, I’m not a moron. I’m walking to go buy a dress.” There’s a pause.
“Okay, I’m not gonna lie, I am so totally confused. Why are you freaking out?”
“Because this is all . . . chaos.”
“How’s your trip? I haven’t heard from you since you left. Zee’s texted me a few times to provide proof of life, but you’re not replying to any of my texts.”
“He’s texted you pictures?”
“Yeah. One in Disney, I guess? Another of you eating ice cream. One where it’s super dark.”
“Oh,” I say, shocked that Zander’s been documenting this trip so intensely. I sigh. “Your brother stole my phone. I haven’t seen your texts.”
“He what?”
“He stole my phone so I couldn’t text you and call you and have a meltdown and overthink things. Oh, and so I couldn’t research where we’re going. He’s making me go with the flow.”
The words are almost sour in my mouth, even now.
This trip may have made me rethink my career and my love life, but it didn’t break me from my need to plan.
“Go with the flow? You?”
“Yes, me. God, I’m not that uptight.” Silence.
“Luna!”
“I mean, you’re not uptight,” she says with skepticism. “But you’re definitely a planner. You like to know what’s going on.”