Forever Now (Forever - Book 1) (10 page)

BOOK: Forever Now (Forever - Book 1)
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“Where did you get it?” I asked Cruz.

We stood next to the tiny car and studied it. It was worse close up. I couldn’t believe it ran. It looked like it was a school project. Like it was made of paper mache and Elmer’s glue.

“It was a gift,” he said, smiling and obviously proud. “A free car.”

“A free car? A car for free? Like no money kind of free?” I thought free cars were urban legends, like spider trees and solar flares. “Who gave you a car for free?”

“A friend of a friend. He said he didn’t need it anymore.”

There were streaks of rust on the car’s roof, and the taillights were broken and covered with red plastic.

“Imagine that. He didn’t need it,” I said.

“Now, now. Don’t throw shade. It runs, and you know what this means?”

“What does it mean?”

“No more buses.”

The inside made the outside look like a Bentley. The front seats were ripped and stained, which were better than the back seats because there weren’t any back seats, discarded by the previous owner. It didn’t have any floor mats either, and we could see right down to the rusty metal undercarriage.

“We’re not going to fall through, are we?” I asked Cruz.

“I’m almost positive we won’t.”

“This car is street legal, right?”

“I’m almost positive it is.”

Besides a steering wheel and a stick shift with no knob on the end, the inside was empty. No radio. No nothing.

“I don’t think it has windshield wipers,” I noted.

“Luckily it doesn’t rain often in San Diego. This is called a choke,” Cruz explained, pulling something next to the steering wheel. “You don’t see these in cars nowadays.” He turned the ignition, and the car started on the third try.

“Phew,” he said. “I think I’m getting the hang of it. I flooded it twice before, but this time it started right up.”

He pushed the choke back in, moved the stick shift into first gear, and the car jolted into motion. It clack, clack, clacked through the parking lot, occasionally burping and farting and finally letting out an explosive backfire when we got to the stop sign.

“See?” Cruz said. “It runs like a dream.”

Cruz was intoxicated with the freedom that the car offered us. I was thrilled, too, even though I thought it would eventually fall apart completely and we would wind up stranded on the side of the road. But for now, I cranked open my window and enjoyed the ride.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“To the beach.”

“Which beach?”

“All of them.”

He drove up and down the coast, at least one hundred miles of scenic roads. After being cooped up at home and at school without any money to do anything and a fear of being found out, the freedom was delicious.

Four wheels and an internal combustion engine provided endless possibilities. We could go wherever our hearts desired. We were free, free, free.

Just like the car but with wind in our hair.

Free.

“What kind of car is this?” I asked.

“I think it’s Portuguese or Brazilian.”

I let that soak in a bit. I didn’t know anything about cars, but I was pretty sure Portugal and Brazil were not known for their automobiles.

“This thing gets amazing gas mileage,” I noted.

“I know, right?”

I leaned over and looked at the gas gauge. “It still says it’s full.”

Cruz flicked the gas gauge with his finger. The needle didn’t move. It still read that the tank was full even though we had gone at least one hundred miles.

“Did you fill it up today?” I asked.

“Fill it up?”

“You didn’t fill it up?”

“It was already full when I got it,” he said and tapped the gauge again. It didn’t move. “Oh.”

“Oh.”

“Tess, I have a bad feeling about this.”

As if on cue, the car sputtered and wheezed. Then it sort of died, its clacking, burping, and farting silenced. Cruz turned the steering wheel to the right, and we glided to the side of the road.

Out of gas.

“It was fun while it lasted,” I said.

“I guess I shouldn’t have assumed the gauge would work. I saw a gas station a couple blocks that way,” he said pointing behind us. “We can get a gas can and then fill it up. Hey, you know, the beach is right here.”

Across the street was a long stretch of beach, almost totally empty, and the sun was about to go down. A ribbon of pink stretched across the sky. It was a lovely evening.

“How about a picnic on the beach, and we could watch the sunset?” he asked.

It sounded heavenly. Like a dream. I was already planning on writing all about it in my notebook when I got home.

“I brought sandwiches,” he said, as if he had to convince me to picnic with him on the beach. “Only peanut butter, though.”

“I’d love to,” I said.

Even though I had eaten a million peanut butter sandwiches during the past month, these were delicious and special, eating them while sitting on the beach with Cruz. He surprised me with Doritos, too.

“When did we get so rich?” I asked, holding up a chip.

“I decided every time we get a new car, we can splurge for a bag of Doritos.”

“Wow. Fancy.”

The sunset put on quite a show for us. The evening sky was ablaze in pastel colors; as if it decided it wasn’t going to go dark without a statement.

“I think things are looking up,” Cruz said.

“I think so, too.”

“I’ve got a casting tomorrow. Nothing major—just an online catalog–but it would be a good paycheck if I got it.”

“That’s awesome.”

“I wish the modeling thing would happen quicker. It would help us out a lot.”

Us. When he spoke about his dreams, it was about
us
. I never thought about us when I thought about my dreams. Cruz was definitely out of the picture when I imagined myself writing in Paris. Was there an
us
? Could I ever hope for an
us
? An
us
in Paris?

“Tess?” he asked.

“Yes?”

“You don’t know how to drive, do you?”

My mother would never allow me to drive her car, so she didn’t see much use in me getting a drivers permit or license. No parent permission equals no driver’s license.

“You’re looking at me funny,” I said.

 

***

 

Cruz was crazy.

Nuts.

Cray-cray.

Certifiable.

I never thought I would say no to him. Not for anything. Not in a million years.

But no.

I mean…no.

“No!” I shouted, stomping my foot on the black top. I crossed my arms in front of me and scowled.

“It’ll be fun. You’ll see.”

We had walked to the gas station, gotten a gas can, and filled up the car. Then Cruz sing-songed “I know what we’re going to do,” and drove through the night to the stadium on the other side of town.

The stadium was dark—no games tonight—but the parking lot was lit up and noisy. Race cars and regular cars were driving at breakneck speeds along a chalk-lined course.

Amateur drivers of all ages were either racing, waiting in or by their cars to race, or were hanging out with each other, drinking beers and waiting for their turns.

The roars of the engines and the squealing of the brakes filled the air. They were driving like maniacs. Most of them couldn’t stay within the lines and would maneuver wildly to get back on track. Others steered straight into the fence. I saw two cars do that, and one had to be towed away.

“No!” I yelled again.

“It’ll be fun. You have to learn to drive sometime.”

He had a point. I did have to learn to drive sometime. At some point in my life, I would have enough money to buy a car, or maybe I would be like Cruz and get a free car, and then I would need to drive.

I had to admit that even Emily Dickinson would have learned to drive, if cars had been invented back then.

“No,” I said.

“It’ll be fun. Car racing. What’s more fun than that? Don’t you want to race my free car?”

I looked at his free car. Its side view mirror fell to the ground with a clank. Then I looked back at the racetrack. Two Porsche collided and spun into the fence.

“No.”

“Tess.” He looked deep into my eyes and put his hand on my shoulder. The instant he touched me a jolt of electricity went through my body. I swayed backward, and Cruz caught me. “Are you okay?”

No. I was definitely not okay.  I looked away and covered my face with my hands. My cheeks were hot to the touch, which made sense, because it felt like my whole body was about to go up in flames. I made a humiliating gasping sound, like I was hyperventilating or doing a Zumba class.

“I was joking, Tess,” Cruz said with concern in his voice. “I didn’t expect you to drive on the track. I was going to teach you over there in the corner. You won’t have to be near any of the racers. Tess?”

My hair had fallen over my face, and he gently tucked a thick strand behind my ear. “I’m sorry I teased you,” he said, completely misunderstanding why I was upset.

I didn’t correct him. I didn’t want him to know that his touch could render me speechless. Breathless and gasping for oxygen. I didn’t want him to know my feelings for him because it was obvious he didn’t share the same feelings for me. If he did, he wouldn’t be sticking his tongue down the throats of skinny, perfect models.

I finally regained control over myself, and I punched him in the arm.

“That’s for scaring me half to death,” I lied.

Cruz put his hands up in the air. “Sorry. Sorry. It won’t happen, again.”

I didn’t learn to drive that day. In fact, I didn’t learn to drive for years after. Instead, we sat in the free car in a dark corner of the noisy parking lot with me in the driver’s seat. Cruz showed me the gas pedal and the turn signal, and I played at moving the stick shift.

“It’s probably not safe for you to actually drive,” he said.

“You finally figured that out?”

“You’ve mixed up the gas pedal with the brake pedal three times,” he noted.

“Well they look exactly alike.”

“I know. That can be confusing. Normally people tell them apart because the gas is on the right and the brake is in the middle.”

“Ohhh…” I said. “Then what’s this other pedal?”

“I think we should leave well enough alone and just make vroom vroom noises.”

I laughed. “I think I can do that.”

I never started the car. We bounced up and down, pretending we were driving down a bumpy road, and I steered and stepped on the pedals, not worrying which one was which. We pretended we were driving down the Champs-Élysées in Paris, along the autobahn in Germany, and through a giant sequoia in northern California. When we had had enough, we switched seats, and Cruz drove us home.

With no radio, and our conversation used up, the car was quiet during the ride back to the house. In the dark with Cruz’s attention on the road ahead, I allowed myself to stare at him. It was like an artist had sculpted him. Like Michelangelo’s David. He was beautiful, but I saw more than just his beauty.

I saw inside him and found my heart there.

 

 

Chapter 10

 

“Beauty is not caused. It is.”

--Emily Dickinson

 

The house was quiet, and Cruz had nowhere to go, for a change. We sat on the couch together and watched a black and white movie on TV while I did my homework. Senior year was a lot easier than junior year.

Last year it was all about proving ourselves, making the grades to get into college. This year was more relaxed at school. Less homework, fewer tests. Our stress was now centered on the college application process and wondering what our futures would hold.

That was plenty of stress, believe you me.

December first had come and gone, and there was still no word from our parents. It was like they had forgotten they had kids. I pictured them living in a luxury resort on the beach in Mexico, sipping Mai Thais. I could envision my mother lying on the beach saying to The Boyfriend: “Have I forgotten something? Oh, well. Must not be important.”

Either that or they were dead.

Or in Jail.

Or they never existed, and I made her up.

I mean, anything was possible. Since I had no idea how to reach them, I guessed I would never know.

“Six more months,” Cruz mumbled.

“What?”

He turned down the TV. “I was just thinking out loud. We have six more months until you graduate and I leave for my modeling. We can stop paying bills at the end of March and ride it out through June. They won’t kick us out before then. Anything we make for those two and a half months we can save. Do you understand?”

I nodded. I had been living day to day and hoping for the best, but Cruz had been doing real planning. He was organizing everything around my graduation.

“What do you mean leave for your modeling?” I asked.

“Eric is going to get me work in Japan. A lot of male models make their start there.”

“Oh.” It was the first time I heard about Japan. I got queasy thinking about him leaving, going far away from me. But wasn’t that what I wanted to do, as well? I planned on going halfway around the world, too. And then something else dawned on me.

“Cruz,” I said. “If you can go in June, couldn’t you go now?”

“Oh, no,” he said, not looking at me in the eyes. “It’s better to wait. I can get more pictures taken for my portfolio in the meantime, and besides, Japan is cold in the winter.”

It was a flimsy excuse. I knew he was lying. He was obviously waiting around in order to take care of me. And I was selfish enough not to fight him on it. I would never make it at home without Cruz. He was giving me a huge gift by sticking around for another six months, putting off his career all that time. He was saving my life.

He was also counting on me to graduate in six months and be alright to go to France with some way of supporting myself. But how could I make that happen? Mrs. Landes, the college advisor, hadn’t found a scholarship that would pay for my plane ticket and my housing in Paris.

I had filled out an application to the Sorbonne with her help, but I didn’t know if I would be accepted. There were so many things that could go wrong. There was so much riding against me.

BOOK: Forever Now (Forever - Book 1)
6.67Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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