“Oh, okay,” he says.
The arena is a good hour away. With every minute that ticks by and Cody doesn’t talk, my stomach is churning with nerves. I waver between wanting to pretend I’m ill and wanting to tell him I lied—to tell him the truth. I have to do something to ease my anxiety, so I start to look through my purse for my wallet, for the only thing that ever seems to stop the panic attacks—the only thing that rights me when I’m getting off course.
I flip the last fold open on my wallet, and the old photo slides onto the wrinkles of my dress. It’s worn and bent in half, so I’m careful when I flatten it out. It was the last time Mac and I were together before he died. We had finished celebratory slushes from my tournament win, and both of our tongues were stained red from the syrup at the soda shop. Mac said I should get a picture of us sticking our tongues out, so we smashed our heads close, and I snapped one with my phone. I had a print made the next day, after he died, because I never wanted to forget how we were that day—I never wanted to forget my dad.
“Can I see?” Cody’s voice surprises me. I crook the corner of my lip into a faint smile and hold the fragile photo up near the steering wheel, again sharing a piece of me that has only ever been private.
“That’s my dad,” I say, not even masking my pride.
“He was a cop, huh?” Cody asks, taking the photo in his fingers and holding it up in front of him while we sit at a stoplight. He’s careful with it and hands it back to me gently.
“Yeah. He was a great cop,” I gulp. “That was the day I won the state championship. We were celebrating. He died that night.”
Cody doesn’t look at me, like he knows how far I’ve gone—and that if he pushes, I’ll only retreat. And he’s right; I will.
“You were really good at golf. You shouldn’t have quit,” he says, deciding to focus on the part of what I told him that isn’t wrapped in scars.
“It wasn’t fun anymore,” I say, glad that Cody didn’t ask for the rest of my story, but also desperate to keep him talking. I put the photo away and let my guard down, but only a little. “It’s kind of like you and riding.”
Cody smiles, his lips tight while he breathes slowly through his nose. “I get it. I didn’t ride for about five years. At least, not often.”
“Gabe said you do sometimes. That you rebuilt a bike…that one I saw,” I say.
Cody’s biting his lip while he’s listening to me, with a smirk on his face, and I get the feeling he’s hiding something.
“I did,” he says, pausing for a long time, sucking in his lips and taking another long breath. “It took a while to build, and I did some riding here and there. But I didn’t really start riding a lot again…until I met you.”
I know my eyes are wide. I can feel the blast of the heater drying them out. But I can’t mask my surprise and the butterflies inside me that are starting to suffocate me.
“Oh,” I say bashfully, sucking in my bottom lip.
“So, tell me something about you. Who is Charlotte Hudson…really?” Cody says, and I bunch my brow at him with confusion. “I mean, come on. You can’t wear khaki pants to school and like The Killers—those are two different girls. Which one is the real Charlie?”
I’d love to answer him. Hell, he has no idea, but I’ve been asking myself who I am since the day my mother dropped me off on Mac’s doorstep. So I just shrug, not sure what the hell else to say.
“Oh, come on now. That’s a cop-out. You know who you are—even if you think you don’t,” Cody’s playful side coming out again. “Here…let’s see…”
I grip the sides of my dress to dry the sweat from my palms and wait for Cody, both nervous and excited to see where our conversation goes.
“Favorite ice cream?” he asks.
That one’s easy. “Chocolate,” I say.
“Hmmmmm, that’s predictable,” he says, reaching up and scratching at the whiskers on his cheek. I allow myself to sneak a look at him, to admire his face. “Okay, how about this…rock or country?”
“Both,” I say, sort of surprising myself. My head fills with the sounds of Mac’s car—the classic rock and the sad country he’d play late at night.
“Good. Good. Okay, steak or pasta?” he fires back.
“Pasta, definitely pasta,” I’m smiling at the thought, remembering almost every dinner I ate when I was a kid.
“Why do you want to be an architect?” he keeps going, not giving me time to rest—time to think.