Chapter Four
Eli
She wants driving lessons? The second she puts it out there, I know why. My stomach drops. This is about Emory University and all the new guys she’ll be able to kiss.
Dammit, she’s actually seriously considering that place.
Also, thanks to my brother, she now thinks I want to kiss her. I know it’s not Ari’s fault that he just says things, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to kill him.
For reasons I can’t comprehend, I agree to go with her to see Gigi. Up in my bathroom, I get ready like it’s a damn date. It’s hot for February, so I body spray the crap out of every crevice, get dressed, and start to put in contacts. Then I stop, remember something Nora said a while back, about how she loves guys in glasses.
She was talking about some actor, I can’t even remember who. She said, “He’s not that cute in real life, but he puts on those glasses and I swear, I’d do anything for him.”
Anything.
Although she wouldn’t, would she? Not if she kissed him first and it sucked. She’d just add him to her list of unlovable dudes.
I scowl at myself in the bathroom mirror. God, do I really think girls like these stupid things? Do I think that she likes them?
Don’t be a dumbass. That girl doesn’t care how you look. She’s spent the last five years reminding me that I have absolutely no place in her messed-up plan for future happiness. Meanwhile, I’ve spent the last five years trying to move on, all while watching her date and dump a string of guys who didn’t measure up. According to Nora, we’re two people who kissed once, badly. End of story. After that, she stuck me in the friend zone, where I’ve hung out ever since.
That’s when the idea hits me like a lacrosse shaft to the shin. What if one of us first-kiss losers escape the friend zone? Changed her mind? Proved her theory wrong? Maybe she wouldn’t want to go to Emory. Maybe she’d stay in Edinburgh.
What if she fell for someone she crossed off her list a long time ago?
Someone like me. No one else could pull it off. No one knows her like I do.
Just like that, I have a plan.
The five miles to and from school every weekday isn’t enough time to make it happen, but giving her driving lessons changes things. We’ll have to spend more time together. We’ll have to go places, besides school and home, together.
I will make Nora Reid fall in love with me.
I slip the glasses back on and try to ignore how totally impossible that sounds.
She’s in the garage talking to Ari when I come down. He’s comfortable with her, more than he is with most people. Sometimes I wonder if, deep down, he has a crush on Nora. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t really understand love or romance, but what do I know? Ari’s got a lot of secrets locked inside that brain of his. He’s super smart, so smart that I’m pretty sure my parents wonder how the hell they ended up with a dumbshit like me.
Ari would hate it if she left. I’m doing this for him, too.
“Can I go with you?” he asks Nora. “I’ve never been in a 2015 Ford Escort.”
“You have karate today, numbnuts,” I remind him.
“Ah-yah!” He chops through the air. This kid. I love the dude.
“All right, calm down, Chuck Norris. Go inside. Mom wants you.”
A turd-like grin spreads across his face. “You’re going on a date.”
Dammit, I’m gonna kill him.
Nora spits out a laugh. “No, we’re not, Ari. Not in a million years.” She catches my gaze and sneers. “No offense,” she says. Those eyes sparkle.
It sucks having your own words thrown back in your face.
“None taken,” I say. She hands me the keys and I’m confused. “I thought you were driving?”
She walks around to the passenger side and gets in without a word. I get behind the steering wheel and close the door behind me. “What’s going on?” I ask. “You aren’t gonna drive?”
“Yes, I’m going to drive,” she says. “Just not here. Mom’s inside.”
I nod. “Oh that’s right, I forgot we’re perpetrating a lie. Will she mind that I’m driving your car?”
“I told her we wanted to see Gigi,” she says, “and that MJ isn’t exactly reliable.”
I stick the key into the ignition. It never leaves the garage, so I guess it makes sense that it still smells like new car. It purrs like a kitten when I turn the key. Not like Michael Jordan. Of course, MJ has heart, and this thing is pretty much a soulless shell of generic steel.
I back down the driveway. “He’s not unreliable.”
I don’t have to look at her to know she’s smirking.
“Not at all,” she says with maximum sarcasm.
“When are we switching places?”
“I don’t know—the Mermaid?”
Fine. I drive us there in silence, feeling like this plan of mine hasn’t got a chance in hell. When I pull into the Mermaid and put the car in park, she gulps, loudly.
“You sure you want to do this?” I ask. “You look sort of pale.”
She hesitates, blinks slowly. “Yes. I’m sure.” Doesn’t sound convincing at all. “It’s time. It’s definitely time.”
I run my hands along the top of the steering wheel. “Why? No one’s forcing you.”
She gnaws on her bottom lip. That’s her tell when she’s worried. “No, I know.” But she doesn’t make a move to get out.
“You sick of me?” I ask.
She turns to face me. “No. Of course not. I just need to do this. It’s time.” Her eyes, they’re so big. “Will you help me?”
I feel a twist in my chest, like an overturned screw, and something inside me breaks. Damn this girl and the power she holds over me. I reach for the door handle. “Let’s switch.”
She doesn’t move.
“You know,” I say, “if you want to get a driver’s license, you might actually have to drive.” I’m relieved that I can still be a sarcastic son of a bitch, even when I’m a total pushover to this girl who is keeping a huge secret from me.
“Okay,” she says, so quiet I almost can’t hear her. “Just don’t make fun of me.” She hesitates, then opens her door. “Promise.”
“I don’t know. I’ll try?”
There’s a half smile, but by the time we trade places, it’s gone. It’s pretty much just sheer terror on her face.
“You all right?” I ask.
Tiny nod.
“You know, if you puke, you can kiss this new car smell good-bye forever.”
She grips the steering wheel. “You couldn’t even get out of the parking lot without making fun of me.”
I set my jaw. “Okay, right, sorry, sorry.”
“You know,” she says. “A pep talk, maybe, might be good.”
“Okay. Right.” I’ve been playing lacrosse since I was four. Pep talks I can do. “Hey, Nora?”
She stares blankly out the windshield like she’s stoned. Damn, she’s really freaked out.
“Nora? Yo. Look at me.”
She turns my way. There she is. Terrified.
I put on my serious game face. “So, there’s nothing to this driving thing. It’s easy.”
Her gaze moves back out the front window.
“Eyes on me, Reid,” I say. “Listen. To successfully drive a car, you have to do two things: one”—I hold up a finger—“stay in the lines, just like in kindergarten. Remember, coloring? Stay in the lines. And Two.” I add another finger. “Don’t hit the car in front of you. That’s pretty much all there is to it.”
“That is not all there is,” she says.
“Well…” I dip my chin. “True. You should also look behind you when you back up so you don’t break anyone’s legs. I’m guessing you won’t forget to do that again, though. Right?”
She sits up straighter. “No. I won’t. Right.”
“Okay. You remember which pedal is which?”
She hits me with her angry eyes, still huge and sparkling. “I do have a functioning brain.”
“I know, but it’s been a while. You gotta adjust your mirrors. Can you do that?”
“Yeah, I think so,” she says and reaches for the rearview. She runs the little automatic side mirror switch and then turns back to me. “Okay.”
I slap the dashboard. “Great. Okay, let’s go.”
She looks over her right shoulder, puts the car in reverse, and starts to slowly back up. And by slowly I mean she’s not moving at all.
“You gotta give it some gas.”
“I know. Just…give me a second.”
I’m trying to stay calm, but I’m starting to think maybe this was a bad idea.
“It’s all right.” I keep my voice low. “I get it. Just get past the first back up and you’ll be gold.”
She breathes deep again and steps on the gas. The car jerks, but eventually she finds the sweet spot and manages to back out in a perfect arc.
“Nice.” I turn around. “Don’t see any bone shards.”
“Shut up.” She shifts into drive and maneuvers slowly through the parking lot.
“Good. You’re really doing good. You feel better?” I ask. She was almost done with driver’s ed when the accident happened. She knows how to drive. It just freaked her out, which is why her mom has paid me to drive her to school for almost two years.
“Yeah, sort of.” She tries for a confident expression, but doesn’t quite hit the mark.
Coach once made the team do yoga together, so I try to channel what I remember. “Just stay calm. You’re doing fine.”
She turns onto Main Street and gets honked at almost immediately.
She squeals. “Why are they honking at me? Idiots!”
“That’s it,” I say. “Embrace the road rage. Use it. Maybe to push the gas pedal?” She’s totally crawling.
“I asked you not to make fun of me,” she says.
“Sorry. Sorry. You’re doing great, just a little more gas. Please.”
She guns it so she’s actually going the speed limit, for about thirty seconds.
I don’t say anything.
It takes us twice as long as it should to get to Edinburgh Oaks Assisted Living Center. Nora stays about five miles an hour below the posted speed limit the entire time, and passes the entrance twice. She parks the car like she’s legally blind, but the lot is mostly empty so I don’t make a big deal of it.
I don’t think this plan is gonna work.
She uncurls her fingers from the steering wheel. It’s like they’re shrink-wrapped to the leather. “Okay,” she says. “I did it. That wasn’t too bad, was it?” Her body visibly relaxes. “Thanks, Eli. What would I do without you?”
“You’d be totally fucked.”
She frowns. “I hate that word.”
“Sometimes it’s the only one that works.”
We get out of the car and walk side by side to the front doors. The building looks like a hospital, it’s a dull beige color with two floors. As usual, there are a bunch of really old people on the benches out front, or in wheelchairs, a lot of them in pajamas. Most of them smile, some of them wave. I wave back at one old guy sitting right by the door. He’s thinking, This is you one day, sonny boy!
Nora leads the way through the automatic doors and I’m hit with the usual smell—shit and cough syrup.
“God, can’t they do something about that?” I cough. She signs us in and I follow her down the wide hall. I’ve been to visit more than a few times, and I try not to let this place or these people creep me out. But it does. And they do. Because that dude outside is right. This is where we’re all headed, and that’s depressing as hell.
We get to room 116, and Nora raps lightly on the door.
“Come on in,” a voice, not Gigi’s, says.
Nora pushes the door open and there she is, sitting in her chair, with her nurse, Claudia, brushing her hair.
What happens next is anyone’s guess. Sometimes Gigi remembers us, sometimes she doesn’t. Nora gets really sad when she doesn’t, so I hope for the best.
There’s something about Nora being sad that, since the day we met, makes me nuts. There’s nothing I can do about Gigi, but with my new plan, I might be able to save Nora from future sadness as a lonely cat lady.
All I have to do is make her question everything she believes, get her to fall for me, denounce her dumbass first kiss theory, and now, make sure she doesn’t kill us both in a car accident.
Sure. No problem.