Emery was still outside when I came out of the shower, and I pulled out my dress from Vegas. Antonio had showed me alternate ways to wear it, one of them being as a top, and I followed his directions, tucking it into shorts and tying the left end of it in a knot that revealed just a sliver of my stomach. When my leg was back on, I slipped into the ballet flats I’d bought in Vegas and stepped out onto the balcony.
“I’m going out for a nice dinner tonight,” I said, but Emery was still writing frantically in his journal. The sun had almost disappeared already, just a sliver of it beyond the horizon as I stepped closer to him, leaning against the railing right in front of him. “Would you like to join me?”
He went to shake his head, eyes flicking up to me for just a moment before they were back on his journal, but then his pen paused, hovering above the pages as he lifted his eyes again.
They trailed slowly up my legs, catching on the point where my dress-turned-top showed my midriff before they climbed the rest of the way up to my face. The breeze blew in from the beach behind me then, sending my hair up in a whirlwind, and I tucked it behind my ears, waiting.
Emery stood, his journal falling into the chair he’d just sat in with the pen rolling to the ground. His hands reached for me first, finding my waist and sliding around until they clasped together at my lower back, and he moved until every inch of us was fit together in a seam. His nose brushed mine, eyes closing, and I lifted my chin until our lips met.
It was like that kiss brought him back to life, back to me, and he groaned into it, his hands fisting at my back and pulling me closer. I need you, that kiss told me, and I deepened it, letting him know I needed him, too. Dusk settled on the beach as he pressed his forehead to mine, quiet slipping between us.
“Thank you,” he whispered, leaning back until our eyes connected. “It was a bad day, and you let me have it. And more than that — you told me without words that you were here. I don’t…” He shook his head. “I don’t know that I deserved that, but you gave it anyway.”
“We’re both just trying, remember?” I said with a shrug. “That’s all we can do.”
Emery nodded, a smirk finding his lips as his eyes roamed my body again. “And yes, I’d love to take you to dinner tonight. Give me a second to get changed.”
He regretfully let me go, stealing a few more kisses before I shoved him inside, the journal already calling to me before Emery had even taken his last step off the balcony. I picked it up, bending to retrieve the pen from the ground, but instead of opening it, I took it inside, tucking it inside his bag without so much as a peek.
Emery smiled that night at dinner. He told me about how his family used to kayak and I pretended I didn’t already know. He told me it was one of his favorite memories with his grandma, and I pretended that was new, too. And he thanked me, for the day, for the understanding, though when we got back to the hotel, he slipped back into his mind, picking up his journal to finish the entry he’d started before we left.
I was thankful for the day turning around, but as the night went on, my heart thumped harder in my chest, reminding me with every beat that we were one day closer to Seattle, one day closer to the end. We hadn’t talked all day, which meant we hadn’t talked about us, about what we’re doing, about what we’ll do.
Anxiety washed over me as I watched him write from my side of the bed, my hand absentmindedly petting Kalo as she slept between us. He felt like mine, that lost boy, but he wasn’t — we only had the days we shared the road together, the days we traveled on the same journey with the same destination in mind. I didn’t know what would happen once we got there, once we were no longer tied together by a common thread.
I was giving myself to a boy who never promised to keep me, pretending I didn’t need that affirmation, that I was okay. I could do casual. I could do try. But when Emery turned out the light that night, pulling me into him and fitting his chest to my back, his legs curling underneath mine, I knew I’d been lying — to him and to myself.
I wanted his words, his promises, but I knew he couldn’t give them to me — not yet. So, I listened to his breaths, felt his hot skin against mine, and told myself it would all be okay. He felt it, too. I knew he did. I just had to trust that, without asking him to say it out loud.
I had to believe.
I only hoped I actually could.
Slow.
That was the only way to drive the Pacific Coast Highway.
The small stretch we’d covered the day before was nothing compared to the miles we drove that next day, the road winding up the central coast of California. Sometimes we’d hug the mountainside, high above the coast, the water stretching out to our left while the ridges climbed to our right. Other times we were mere feet from the water, maybe even inches, the salty breeze misting our noses.
I snapped a picture of Emery driving when we passed through Cayucos, the emerald water tinged with turquoise serving as a backdrop, his hair whipping in the wind, sunglasses up, smirk in place. We’d been mostly quiet all day, but it wasn’t because it was a bad day. We were quiet because there was so much to see, so much to observe, and we took that stretch of our journey slowly, stopping along the way for food, and sometimes just to sit and stare.
The downside to our quiet drive was that my mind wasn’t quiet at all.
All day, I ran through what I would say to Emery when we stopped for the night. I didn’t want to tarnish the new openness he had with me by asking for more than he could give, but I knew I needed to hear something… even if I wasn’t sure what. It was a delicate balance, wishing for him to give me more when all I’d asked originally was for him to try. Emery was like a firework with the fuse burnt all the way down to the end, momentarily paused, temporarily safe — and I didn’t know if he would remain in tact or blow to bits if I took even one step closer.
It was after midnight when Emery reached forward for the music dial, pulling off US Highway 1 and into the Big Sur River Inn. Kalo had been passed out in the back seat for hours, and she let me walk her long enough for her to go to the bathroom before she was over it. Emery checked us in and once we dropped our bags on the bed in the cabin-style room, I let out a long yawn, stretching my arms up over my head.
“Today was amazing,” I said, twisting back and forth to work out the soreness in my lower back.
“Day’s not over yet. Get naked, I’m taking you somewhere.”
I balked, arms falling to my sides. “Um… I think I misheard you.”
“You didn’t.”
Emery smirked, stripping down to his birthday suit before ruffling through one of the paper bags he’d brought back with him after our stop in Cambria. He pulled out two large, white robes, tossing one to me before covering his goods with the other.
I just blinked.
“Hurry up, we have a reservation in thirty minutes.”
“We have a reservation at one in the morning?” I questioned, still clutching the robe to my chest. “And you’re wearing that?”
“As are you. If you recall, you owe me — all thanks to a little wing challenge in Texas. Now,” he said, flicking his wind-blown hair out of his face before crossing the room to where I stood. His knuckle found my chin, lifting it until his lips brushed mine as he lowered his voice, his words tickling my skin. “Get naked, or I’ll be forced to strip you myself.”