Don't Kiss the Messenger (Edgelake High School, #1)(15)

“You have a car?” she shouted.

I waved my hand like it was obvious. “Apparently,” I said.

She frowned. The rain broke through the flimsy newspaper and pelted down on top of her. She tossed it in a recycling bin and jogged over to me.

“You know, when coaches say to save your energy for the field, it’s rhetorical. You can actually walk the 1.2 expansive miles of campus,” she informed me.

Usually her smart-ass quips were entertaining, but rain was getting in my car. I rolled up the window and pushed the door open before she could argue.

“Get in,” I told her.

She threw her backpack onto the floor and hopped in. She wiped the beaded water off the sleeves of her coat. I turned down the stereo playing “Rye Whiskey” by the Punch Brothers. I shifted the car into reverse and slowly backed out of the spot, trying to see beyond the wall of rain coating the windows.

CeCe looked around the ancient leather interior of my dad’s Chevrolet. CD’s were crammed between the front seats and the console, an eclectic mix of country, rock, and classical. Packs of spare guitar strings in square envelopes poked out from under the floor mats. Boxes of books in the backseat still stored my dad’s writing heroes, which eventually had become mine: Thoreau, Keats, Whitman, and Frost.

My dad had used the glove compartment to store away song ideas. It was like a mobile filing cabinet. I knew it was stuffed full of papers and prose and music notes scrawled in his messy penmanship. He always got a writing muse when he was driving. Seeing the world in motion gave it clarity, he had told me. It’s when we sit still for too long that we get stuck and lose sight.

I hadn’t cleaned the car out since he died. Some of our best memories were made inside here, driving at night and dissecting music under a broken sky of stars. Some things I refused to let go. Some memories were worth the weight of carrying. I felt like there was something in here for me, in a way I didn’t yet understand, as if this old truck could act as a portal into my dad’s mind and offer me advice.

“If the inside of someone’s car is any indication of a person’s psyche, you are a hoarder of classic rock and alt country, a closet poetry fan, and”—she sniffed the air—“a smoker?”

“It’s my dad’s car,” I informed her. She was right, it still smelled like him. Coffee and leather and the lingering scent of stale cigarette smoke that followed behind him as consistently as a shadow. “And I’m not a closet poetry fan,” I informed her. “I’m completely open about my respect for nineteenth century prose.”

“You must be very secure in your masculinity to announce such a blasphemy,” she said. “I mean, an athlete who reads poetry—isn’t that a sacrilege?”

I stopped a little suddenly, nearly missing a stop sign through the heavy rain, and CeCe’s knee nudged the glove compartment latch. The door flopped open and I winced as my dad’s notes and papers started to spill out. I panicked and leaned over CeCe, trying to hold back the dam of emotions threatening to break free. I pressed my arms on her legs while I wrestled with the latch to keep it closed. I wasn’t ready for the memories to escape.

Once the lock was secure, I leaned away. CeCe’s face was flushed as dark as her maroon rain jacket.

“Sorry,” I said, for basically climbing into her lap a second ago. My breaths were shallow and shaky from the brief encounter with my past.

CeCe looked between me and the glove compartment.

“You okay?” she asked. The rain hammered the roof and a car honked behind me, snapping my attention back to the road.

“It’s some of my dad’s old song ideas,” I said. “So. Um.” My voice cut off. My hands tightened on the steering wheel. I didn’t talk about my dad. To anyone. It’s like my mouth refused to form words when his memory came up.

“Do you want to talk about this?” she asked.

“No,” I nearly barked.

“Got it.” She picked a CD case off the ground and studied it. “What song are you playing for your recital?” she asked.

I ran my hand through my hair. I appreciated the change in conversation. “I’m thinking of writing my own.”

She raised her eyebrows with an impressive glance. “Ambitious.”

I nodded. “And probably stupid,” I said. Composing a piece of classical music was no easy feat. Tack on trying to practice while being on the road half the time.

“I’ve been inspired, lately,” I said. My mind traveled to Bryn. I hadn’t seen her since the night we texted song lyrics. I was still savoring those texts. Replaying those songs. Since the day I met Bryn, music started moving through my head again, like my heart was starting to thaw out after a year-long freeze.

“Can you drop me off at The Music Room?” CeCe asked. “I have an exam to study for.”

I nodded. I turned the corner and headed for the art buildings. CeCe looked out at the rain driving across the window in racing patterns. I noticed her profile, how the unscarred side of her face made her look like a completely different person. She had a great face. Her creamy complexion offset her dark eyes. But in a way, it wasn’t CeCe to me. There was no defining characteristic. I preferred the scar.

“Are you a music major?” I asked her.

She shook her head. “I just live by the credence that life is at its best when accompanied by music,” she said.