Anger rises but I bite it back. Once more, I’m tempted to tell him that I do, in fact, know. How I know exactly what it’s like to watch someone you care about devolve into an entirely different person because of a disease. The cancer had eaten away at Dad so badly, given him such pain, that by the end he was no longer the smiling father in the photograph my mother ha—
“Shit! Stop the car!”
Caleb jerks as I reach for the steering wheel.
“What the hell are you—?!”
“Stop! Stop the damn car!”
I reach for the door and Caleb lunges over me.
“Are you insane?! Wait, don’t—”
We struggle back and forth like kids fighting in a playground until he pulls the truck over to the right and toward the hard shoulder. Someone sounds their horn, and there’s a screech of wheels.
Caleb flattens me to the seat but keeps his hands on the wheel.
“Just open the—!” I’m breathless under his weight.
“I’m not opening the damn door while we’re—”
Gravel and dirt crunch under the wheels of the truck and we grind to an awkward stop down a side road. I shove at Caleb with all my strength and he’s pushed back with a grunt of surprise. I dive for the door, wrench back on the handle, and spring myself out onto the grassy verge.
“You’re insane!” Caleb calls after me but I ignore him.
I’m racing down the side of the truck and throwing my upper body up over the back. My coat is there, half unfurled, with the corner of my picture frame working its way loose onto the metal bed. Exhaling with all of the stress of the last few hours, I snatch them both up and hug them to my chest.
When my pulse calms to something closer to its natural rhythm, I brace myself and climb back into the cab.
Caleb looks at me with the fury of someone who just watched his life flash before his eyes, but he says nothing. We just stare at each other in silence for a moment, Caleb’s rage steaming up the windows of the truck.
It’s another minute before I’m brave enough to speak.
“I’m sorry.” I offer, dragging my lower lip down awkwardly.
“Sorry!” he repeats with disgust. “Are you a complete idiot? Do you have any idea how many cars were speeding by?”
“Speeding by?”
Caleb waves a hand, clearly frustrated that he has to explain. “Passing the truck! Right next to your door! Do you have any idea how many were behind us? It’s a 60 limit, you crazy woman! You open a door on that and…” he doesn’t seem to be able to finish that particular thought. “Geez, Lizzie. Just warn me next time you want to commit suicide, alright?” Caleb swallows, finally getting his emotions under control. “You tell me when and I’ll help you find a way that doesn’t involve me totaling my truck, OK?”
Apparently exhausted by this little speech—the most words I’ve heard him string together since I’d met him—Caleb falls back against his seat. His head hits the rest, and he rubs at his brow. For a moment, my eyes linger over his arms, the way his biceps bunch beneath his shirt, and how the tension is bringing out the sharp tendon of his neck.
I swallow.
I always find the most awkward times for ogling.
Then again ogling is awkward in general, especially when I’ve already decided I want nothing from it. And after he’d made it infinitely plain he’d prefer to stay clear of me too.
The money is the only reason he’s still allowing you to sleep under his roof, remember?
Then again, despite the flippant remarks about the safety of his truck, he’d gotten a whole lot of worried there for someone he supposedly wanted nothing to do with.
Or is that just my imagination playing romantic optimist?