HENRY FELL ASLEEP on Millie’s shoulder five minutes into the drive home and succeeded in crowding her into my side, gobbling up more than his fair share of space on the bench seat for the ninety minutes it took to get back to Salt Lake. I liked it too much. I liked the press of her thigh against mine, my arm resting between her knees every time I touched the gearshift, the smell of her hair every time I glanced down at her face. The conversation with Moses taunted me, and I felt a flash of anger that he had called me out on my friendship with her, that he’d forced me to examine the relationship. I didn’t want to examine it. I wanted to enjoy it.
We’d spent the afternoon in comfortable conversation and time with the animals. Henry had taken to the horses with very little fear, and I had a feeling we were going to be getting a whole slew of statistics and interesting facts about jockeys and horse races in the days to come. Georgia had told Henry he was exactly the size of most professional jockeys, which made him puff out his chest and walk a little taller. He was already asking when we could go back. I’d promised him soon and scowled at Georgia and Moses when they’d waggled their eyebrows and smirked. They weren’t very subtle about their fascination with Millie, but it was impossible not to be fascinated. She hadn’t shown any fear either, and I’d spent much of the day trying not to stare at her, trying not to feed my friends’ curiosity.
“How did that feel, being on a horse?” I asked Millie, my eyes swinging from the road to her face and back again.
“Like having eyes. The horse knew where to go and I was just along for the ride, but it felt good.”
“You weren’t afraid, not even a little?”
“Sure I was. I’m afraid all the time. I was so afraid when I first lost my sight that for a while I just sat in my room and played my guitar. But after a while, I realized if I allowed myself to be too afraid to do anything, that I wouldn’t just be blind, I might as well be dead. That scared me more. The only thing I can see is me, you know? The stuff going on inside of me. My thoughts, my feelings, my fears, my faults. They are the only things I see clearly. The rest is a guessing game. Being blind forces you to come to terms with yourself, I think.”
“Perks of being a blind girl,” I said, and she laughed.
“I say that a lot, don’t I?”
“You do. And it’s damn cool that you do.”
“Well, I could list the sucks of being a blind girl, but that would take all day.”
“The sucks?”
“Yep. All the many things that suck about not being able to see,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Tell me one. The first thing that comes into your head,” I insisted.
She started to speak and then shook her head, biting her lip. “Nah.”
I bumped her with my shoulder, making her head bob a little. “Come on. Whine, baby. Whine.”
Her cheeks grew rosy. “No.”
“You were going to say something and you changed your mind. I saw that!”
“All right. That. That sucks.”
“What?”
“I can’t see what YOU are thinking. I can’t look at your face and get some kind of clue as to what’s going on in your head. It’s so unfair. I would really love to see your face. Just once.”
We were both silent for half a second before I broke the tension.
“Damn. That really does suck. I do have a beautiful face,” I teased, but my chest felt tight and my throat ached a little. I gasped and laughed as she dug her sharp little elbow into my ribs.
“You know what else sucks?” she shot back, emboldened by my apparent lack of empathy.
“I told you you could only name one. We don’t want to open the floodgates, Millie.”
She growled and continued on as if I were driving her crazy.
“I can’t drive. I can’t run away. I can walk, but that’s not the same thing as just getting behind the wheel and taking off. Instead, I’ve got to rely on meanies like you to take me places. I hate that more than anything,” she huffed.
Without warning, I changed lanes and took the nearest exit at a pretty aggressive speed. It was an exit just past a little town called Mona, and I sped under the overpass and turned onto the frontage road and pulled to the side of the road with a screech of tires. Henry bobbed in his seat belt and changed positions without waking up, conveniently freeing Millie’s shoulder.
“Whoa!” Millie cried, grabbing at my thigh. “What are you doing? We’ve got a ways to go, don’t we?”
“I’m gonna let you drive.”
“Wh-what?” she gasped, clutching at the dashboard.
I adjusted the wheel up to create a little more clearance, shoved the seat back as far as it would go, which wasn’t much farther, considering my size, and pulled Millie up onto my lap, ignoring the warning light that was bleeping in my head. Too close. Back away. Hot female in lap. Breach! Friend zone breach!
“David!” She was pressed back against me, her hands clinging, as if I’d told her we were jumping from a cliff.
“Stop wiggling!” I laughed so I wouldn’t moan, and she immediately froze.
“I’ve got you, Millie. I’ve got you. This is going to be fun. Just like riding a horse with Georgia holding the reins.”
“Okay,” she squeaked, nodding vigorously, her head bumping against my chin, and I chuckled, impressed all over again by her guts and her trust.
I placed her hands where I wanted them on the wheel and she ran her hands down and back up, as if she had never touched anything like it. Maybe she hadn’t. She turned the wheel this way and that and giggled nervously before she put them back where I’d placed them.