Sex and Radio (Book 2)Completed||

13

 We rode up the coast draped in a heavy cloud of silence. As if a heavy, darkened thunderstorm loomed over our heads in the car about to burst open. Bodhi’s foot hit the accelerator harder and harder the further from school we got. The engine hummed with speed overpowering the sound of the shitty pop music flowing through the speakers. 

We didn’t speak a word to each other. We didn’t even look in each other’s direction. We simply rode to our mutual destination side by side with our lips sealed. I stared out the window, catching my pale reflection in the glass. My hair tousled with sleep, and my face drooped with exhaustion. Before Bodhi had come, I had only been asleep on Dex for maybe two hours. I knew in my gut it would be a long night for both of us. But I couldn’t think about sleep now. My only concern landed on my mother. Was she ok? Was she even alive? What happened? 

Bohdi turned a three-hour drive into a two-hour drive. Either the lack of traffic on the interstate or the sickening speeds he chose helped us along. We made great time. I didn’t dare look at the speedometer needle moving across the glowing numbers with every push of his foot. I wouldn’t complain or nag him about it this time, because desperation hit us both. As time went on, my mind drowned in depressing thoughts. The moment the overhead lights beamed above us and the moment the traffic didn’t exist, neither did my rational thoughts. 

Did Kacee exaggerate about Mom’s condition? Was Mom really dying, or was she just dehydrated from the Flu my father said she had? But Kaycee is Kaycee…..  She didn’t freak out over small incidents. Kaycee didn’t cry. Kaycee just did things without anxiety or thought. Always the rational one. She thought every situation through to the end and weighed the pros and cons. So hearing her wailing on the other end like the apocalypse had come---made me rethink this whole “mom is ok” act. Dad didn’t seem concerned. He hadn’t even called us to say something was up. So it couldn’t be that serious, could it? 

“Did,” I broke the silence in a whisper, as Bodhi took the exit to our hometown. “Did Dad mention anything to you about Mom being sick?” He stopped the car at a stop sign and looked both ways. He locked his eyes on my face and shook his head. 

“No. He said she had the flu, and that’s why she wasn’t there last night.” His voice dipped low and cracked under his suppressed emotions.

“Yeah--that’s what he told me too.” I sighed, as Bodhi moved the car again to another abandoned highway. 

“I’m sorry about dinner,” he blurted, as he shook his head. He ran his left hand through his brown hair and kept his eyes on the road. 

“Yeah,” I muttered. Because I sure as hell didn’t want to tell him it was ok. It wasn’t. His behavior wasn’t acceptable one bit. But it was the least of my worries now. 

“Can you just,” I took a deep breath and looked out into the darkened world. “Can you just not bring him around me?” I pleaded once again, reverting back to high school when I begged him to stand up for me. When I begged him to get Zane to back off of me and leave me alone. It was futile then, but maybe it wasn’t now. 

His teeth gnawed into his fingernail, and he shook his head. “I feel like we’re back in high school suddenly.” He muttered without malice and looked over at me with skepticism written on his face. “Are you ever going to let me know what happened between you two? Why the bad blood?” He asked, quirking a brow. As he pulled into the large hospital’s parking lot. 

“Am I going to have to kick his ass?” He growled in frustration at my silence. Yes. Please punch him in the face, but save his dirty balls for me. My foot belongs there. 

I closed my eyes as the car came to a halt in a parking spot. His intense stare burned holes through my body like I was an open book. He searched me for answers I couldn’t willingly give him. I grappled with my thoughts. I could tell him. I could just tell him right now. But what would it change? What could he do now? It happened in the past. A past I desperately wanted to get over and move on from. It sat like a ghost in the back of my mind and haunted my dreams. My life. I wanted it to end but now wasn’t the time. Not now. Later.