Kids These Days

Chapter 32: Andy

"I have to admit, sinking a car isn't exactly how I imagined our first date."

Talia shoots me a sharp look. "This is not our first date." The wind whips through her dark-brown hair as she speaks, sticking it to the Carmex lip balm she always wears. She brushes the loose strand away impatiently. "A first date is going to the movies. Or mini golf. This looks like the set of a low-budget Hollywood zombie movie."

For context, we're standing side-by-side on the rocky beach of the Salton Sea, a pale blue lake that used to be a major vacation spot until the water got too salty to swim in. It could almost be romantic if the chemicals in the water didn't smell so bad. (Still more romantic than mini golf, in my opinion.)

"Hey, you gotta give me some credit for finding the one place in California where a stolen vehicle won't look suspicious," I say, gesturing to the burnt-out hippie vans corroding in the shadow of a drive-in sign. "All the tourists picked up and left pretty quickly when the resort shut down in the 70's. One more busted car won't look out of place."

"You know a weird amount of information about a lake in the middle of nowhere."

"I had to do a presentation about it in school. One of California's great environmental disasters." Talia squints at me, unconvinced, and I almost laugh. She's the one with a secret obsession with lost gold, but I'm suspicious for knowing my state's history? "I know a lot of weird facts, okay? You've never questioned me on it before."

"I'm not questioning you on it now."

"The look on your face feels very questioning."

Talia scowls at me, and I drop the subject. "What happens when Harper files a police report? What then?"

"The police will never find the car," I say, more confidently than I feel. It was easy enough to sink the car -- really, all it took was a discarded cinder block, some rope from Talia's pick-up, and the reflexes to not get my arm ripped off while switching gears -- but evading law enforcement is a whole other kettle of fish. "This place is too far off the map."

She gives me a long, scrutinizing look. "I hope you're right."

I don't know what I'll do if I'm wrong. That's part of the reason I didn't let Oliver tag along, even though I knew leaving him at home would piss him off -- I couldn't drag him into another one of my messes. He's a solid student. Has a shot at getting a college scholarship. If anyone deserves to take the fall for this, it's me.

"I didn't realize it would sink so fast," Talia says. Her tone is carefully neutral, as if we're discussing the weather, not a stolen car. "Weighing down the gas pedal was a good idea."

"Yeah, I learned that trick in one of my classes for the criminally inclined."

She doesn't laugh, though the corners of her lips quirk up a little. I wish the sight of her smile didn't make my heart leap, but it does, and I want to kick myself for being stupid enough to fall for the only girl in Dusty Valley who doesn't plan to stick around.

I should've known better. She practically admitted to it during our first conversation -- I was sitting in a greasy booth at Sorrento's, and she was smiling at me as if I was the most interesting part of her day, and when I asked her if she was new in town, she replied, oh, I'm just passing through. Then she grinned at me and said, unless I find a good enough reason to stay, and I was foolish enough to believe her.

All of the emotions that have been swirling inside of me finally bubble to the surface. "Why didn't you tell me about the key?" I blurt out. 

Talia blinks. If she's surprised by my bluntness, she must not know me as well as I thought she did. "There really is no middle ground with you, is there?"