“Uh, if the light’s yellow, speed up to get through it before it turns red. I hate waiting.”
“Okay.”
“All right then, baby. Put this bitch in reverse and back up.”
She grabbed the gearshift, putting it in reverse, and took a deep breath before hitting the gas. The car jolted backward as she whipped it around, running up on the sidewalk. She slammed the brake hard, and they stopped abruptly. Carmine clutched his seat. “Christ, I said hit the gas, not floor it. Just press lightly.”
She put the car in drive and pressed the gas. They drove through the parking lot to the stop sign, and she hit the brake hard, jolting them again. She stayed there, and he grew impatient, wondering why she wasn’t going anywhere. “If there’s nothing coming, you can go.”
She sighed. “And where am I going, Carmine?”
“Oh, that way,” he said, pointing left.
She looked both ways before turning out onto the road, and Carmine wondered why she hadn’t signaled until he realized he forgot to explain that part. She got into her lane, her hands trembling against the steering wheel. They neared a yellow light, and he expected her to brake. Instead, she slammed the gas and ran straight through it after it turned red.
“You ran a f**king red light, Haven! Red means stop!”
She cut her eyes at him. “But you said I should hit the gas when it was yellow.”
“Yeah, if you can make it through, which you couldn’t.”
“How was I supposed to know?”
He had no answer. How was she supposed to know when he hadn’t told her? He felt bad for snapping and glanced through the windshield in enough time to see her heading for a mailbox. “Oh, fuck!”
He grabbed the steering wheel and turned it sharply, the side mirror clipping the mailbox. Haven slammed the brakes, the car skidding to a stop on the side of the road.
He let go of the wheel. “Let’s see if we can try this again. I’ll shut up and quit distracting you, and you just pay attention to the road.”
He was going about it wrong, but he didn’t know how to teach something that came naturally to him. He grabbed his seatbelt and put it on, waving his hand and silently telling her to go.
Haven pulled back into the lane and hadn’t driven more than a hundred feet when she came to a yield sign. It struck him that he hadn’t told her what it meant, but he was too late. She blew right through it without slowing down.
Tires screeched, and Haven screamed as she slammed the brakes in a panic, the wrong thing to do if she cut off a car. He told her to hit the gas again, and she clutched the steering wheel tightly as her eyes welled up with tears.
“Pull into the parking lot to the right,” he said as they neared the grocery store. Haven turned, and the car skidded to a crooked stop across some parking spots. A tear slid down Haven’s cheek. Carmine undid his seatbelt and pulled her into his arms. “I made that a lot harder than it should’ve been. I think someone else would be better at teaching you this.”
“Why do I have to learn?”
“So you can get around on your own,” he said. “Besides, it’s a nice skill to have, and one you’ll appreciate when we start over.”
She pulled from his embrace, a curious expression on her face. “Start over?”
“Yes, a clean slate. No matter what it takes.”
“You really think . . . ?”
“I know.”
“Then I don’t want anyone else to teach me to drive. I want it to be you.”
He chuckled. “Your short-term memory must be f**ked if you forgot about the disaster of a teaching job I just did.”
“We’re learning everything together, remember? Driving should be no different.”
“Okay, then,” he conceded. “Let’s try one more time. First and foremost, when you come to a yellow light, slow the f**k down and stop.”
27
Haven stood in the kitchen, surveying the refrigerator as she contemplated what to cook. Dr. DeMarco’s words infiltrated her thoughts, echoing like a song on repeat. She wanted a life with Carmine, but they would need to find a way that didn’t involve running. Was that possible? She wasn’t sure. But against her better judgment, she desperately hoped so.
Haven yelped when an arm slipped around her waist, so lost in thought she hadn’t heard Carmine approach. “Let’s get drunk tonight, tesoro.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s Friday? Does one need a reason to get drunk? I promise to be a perfect gentleman.” He leaned down, nipping at the nape of her neck with his teeth. “Well, maybe not a perfect gentleman.”
She laughed but didn’t bother with a response.
“You know, we do have air-conditioning,” he said. “You’ve had that fridge door open for so long I thought maybe you were trying to cool the kitchen or something.”
“I’m thinking about dinner.”
“Awesome, because I’m starving.” He grabbed a glass from the cabinet. She took it from him, and he looked at her before just shrugging. She grabbed a jar of cherries and a bottle of Coke, making him a drink. He took a sip. “You’re entirely too good to me.”
“You can make it up to me later,” she said playfully.
“If you wanna go upstairs, I’ll make it up to you right now.”
“Dinner’s supposed to be ready at seven, which means I only have thirty minutes to throw something together,” she said, pulling some sausage out of the freezer. She stuck it into the microwave to defrost, but Carmine grabbed the sausage and tossed it back into the freezer. “What are you doing? You’re going to get me in trouble!”
He didn’t answer, instead pulling out his phone and scrolling through it to make a call. As soon as the line was picked up, he asked them to grab some pizza before coming home. He ended the call with a cocky smirk.
Haven rolled her eyes. “We’re still not going upstairs.”
“Fair enough, but I do wanna get drunk tonight.”
* * *
Haven heard a car approaching and watched the Mazda pull up outside. Dr. DeMarco stepped out with some boxes of pizza. “He’s home.”
The front door opened, and Carmine sighed exasperatedly as he let go of her. Dr. DeMarco walked into the kitchen and laid dinner on the counter before glancing at Carmine, a light groan escaping his throat. It was barely audible, and Haven looked at Carmine with uncertainty as he sipped from his cherry Coke.
The two of them exchanged keys, and Dr. DeMarco headed for the door again before any of them could react. He walked to his car, pausing at the passenger mirror. A long scratch dug into it, noticeable against the shiny black paint. He turned slowly toward the house, his eyes coming to rest on Haven at the window. She worried he would come back inside to somehow punish her, but he climbed into the car and drove away instead.
Haven turned to Carmine once he was gone. “I think I want to go upstairs now.”
“We can do that,” he said, snatching the top box of pizza. “I can still get f**ked up, right?”
She smiled at his expression, his lips turned down in a childish pout. “Of course you can.”
“And you’re gonna drink with me, aren’t you?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“I wanna do everything with you,” he said. “Even shit we’d be better off not doing together.”
“Like driving?”
He laughed. “Yes, so let’s get smashed and forget you nearly killed me today trying.”
* * *
Haven brought her cup to her lips and took a sip of the sweet fruity drink. The alcohol taste lingered in the background, not so bad that it hindered the taste. “This is good. What is it?”
“Sweet-Tart. You know—orange soda, Kool-Aid, and Everclear.” Haven didn’t know, but she liked it anyway. She took another sip as Carmine grabbed his bottle of liquor and took a drink. He was shirtless, and Haven was captivated by the way his stomach muscles grew taut as his body quivered. His calloused hand scratched the scar on his side, his long fingers transfixing Haven.
He crouched down to look under the bed and dug out the shoeboxes, glancing inside before shoving them back under. He found what he was looking for and pulled out a gray game console and a controller, wordlessly hooking it up to his television.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Classic Nintendo,” he said.
“And you’re going to play it?”
“We are,” he corrected her, blowing into a game before sliding it in the console. “Or we’re certainly going to try.”
He turned it on. The game started right away as he sat on the floor, stretching out his legs and patting the space between them. She sat down between his legs, and he held the controller in front of her to explain the buttons. She watched as he navigated the first board.
“Mario’s a rite of passage. You’re nobody until you’ve conquered it.” His tone was serious, yet youthful and innocent. It made her smile. “Here, finish this part.”
She took the controller. “But what if I kill him? He can die, right?”
“He comes back to life. It’s not like we’ll have to plan a funeral.”
It took her three tries to get the coordination to jump him over things. Carmine grabbed their drinks and sat back down, pulling her body against his chest.
The next few hours passed as they fell into a cycle. She’d kill the character, and Carmine would complete a level so she could try the next one. Haven could feel the alcohol in her system, her limbs tingly and head foggy. She found it nice, the two of them doing something so childish and carefree. He was giving her parts of a life she’d missed out on.
She was playing a board with a bunch of turtles when Carmine nuzzled into her neck. Distracted, she ran the character right off a ledge and tossed the controller down in frustration.
“Does my drinking bother you?” Carmine asked, taking a swig from the bottle of vodka.
“You don’t drink enough for it to,” she said. “You aren’t a mean drunk like Master Michael.”
“I’d like to kill that guy,” Carmine said. “You don’t know how bad I want him to suffer.”
She shook her head. “You can’t do that.”
“Why not? You can’t seriously care about him.”
“No, but I do care about you. I don’t want you to hurt people. I don’t want you to be a killer.”
Carmine pulled her back to him tighter, kissing the top of her head. “You know, I never knew what I wanted out of life. Going to Chicago always made the most sense, but now that I have you in my life, I’m starting to see it differently. What you want matters, so if you don’t want me to do that shit, then I have to really think about it. It’ll be your life, too, and you mean a lot more to me than any of them.”
She smiled as his words washed through her.
Carmine took the game apart and put it back into the box.
“I wondered what was in those,” she said. “I worried it was just more porn.”