Page 59 of Homesick

“You should’ve said you were hungry. I would’ve gotten you something.”

“It seems like you’re in a hurry to get home. I didn’t want to prolong this trip any more than we have to.”

“Okay,” he replies softly.

I shift uncomfortably in my seat and try to keep my eyes on the greenery outside. My silence is short-lived, though.

“Blake, nothing happened with that guy,” I admit, turning to face him in the driver’s seat.

I watch as his body goes taut, and his knuckles turn white from gripping the steering wheel.

“It wouldn’t matter if it had,” he counters, sending an invisible punch right into my gut. “Let’s just get through the next few hours and we can be done.”

Done. A four-letter word I can live without.

Not being able to hold back my irritation, I snap and say, “oh wonderful. Another silent four-hour ride. Fucking wonderful.”

All of a sudden, Blake pulls the truck and trailer to the side of the road and practically slams the vehicle into park.

“What is there to talk about, Wren? You made it very clear that things between us are over. I’m not sure what more you want from me.”

The harshness from his voice pushes my head toward the window. I’m willing us to return to comfortable silence again. I’ve been running from uncomfortable situations this entire summer and I can feel this one beginning to bubble over.

“Do you forgive me, Wren?”

“What,” I say before peeling my eyes from the glass pane of the truck window.

“The other night when I said how much I regretted what I did six years ago, I didn’t ask if you forgave me. Do you?”

This entire time I’ve been so consumed in avoiding my feelings, I haven’t thought about what moving on from this situation looks like. In a perfect world, I could erase that night from my mind and get the happy ending I deserved. But there’s a part of me that can’t move on until we finally talk about it.

No more rules about avoiding old memories. It’s time to revisit the one that broke us.

“I don’t know,” I answer honestly. “I’ve been avoiding that question all summer.”

Blake closes him eyes and lets his head rest against the driver’s seat. I hear the deep breath he takes as he contemplates what to say next. “Wren, I—” Before he can continue, we both hear the truck sputter and stall before shutting off completely.

“Fuck,” Blake says before turning the key. Each time he turns the key, there’s a small sputtering sound and then dead silence. After many more failed attempts and curse words, we both pull out our phones and start googling.

I decide to call the nearest mechanic and Blake hops on the phone with my brother. I’m strangely calm while I can feel the stress of the situation practically radiating off Blake. Thankfully, we don’t have any animals in the trailer, though.

“Okay, so the nearest mechanic is about ten minutes that way,” I say, pointing north. “They’re sending a tow truck to come pick us up and then they’ll let us know what the damage is after they look at everything.”

“Okay, good. I told Chris we’d call back when we had more news,” Blake says while rubbing his palms together. “Of course, this would happen to me.”

I gently tap his shoulder, trying to be as comforting as he’ll let me. “It’ll be fine. There’s nothing we can do but wait.”

My words seem to bring Blake back down to earth. I can see his chest stop rising and there’s color coming back to his cheeks. But the calmer I feel him get, the more I can feel myself begin to panic. Except I’m not panicking about the truck. I’m panicking about six long years of pain boiled down to one moment.

CHAPTER 21

“The guy said it’s going to take at least a full day to fix. He’s going to call in the morning to give us an update,” Blake says nervously as he rocks back and forth on his boots.

“Tomorrow? What are we supposed to do until then?”

“Well, he said there’s a motel up the road that we can stay in.”

I slump against the brick wall of the garage. The last few hours have been nothing short of awkward with a huge side of tension. I’m eager to get back to our conversation from earlier.

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