Page 8 of The Risks of Reuniting

My view is slightly better than hers, as Chloe is a petite woman and I'm blocking her ability to see much, but with as crowded as this space is, I can only see the sign. I grunt in response, and trust that she can figure out my non-answer.

"Did you just grunt?" she asks, annoyed.

I laugh. "I did." I resist turning around to see if she's flashing daggers at my back.

She grunts in response to this, and I chuckle under my breath, loving it.

The crowd clears enough that I can see an older Peruvian man holding our sign. Two other young adults are standing there too – an American woman and a South American man. I step to the side to allow Chloe to join our group, and greet the sign-holding man in Spanish, telling him who we are. Chloe stays silent, her round eyes taking it all in.

"I am Cesar," the young South American man says in rough English. "From South Peru."

It's only natural that all eyes then move to the blonde American woman, who offers up a small smile. "Rachelle," she says in a Southern accent that has become familiar over the past months that I've been living in North Carolina. "I'm from Georgia."

Rachelle makes eye contact with Chloe and lifts her brows. Chloe blinks before standing up straighter and smiling the genuinely warm smile I haven't been offered yet.

"I'm Chloe. I'm from Utah," she says. "So nice to mee you."

Even though I'd already introduced us to the driver, I realize that Rachelle probably hadn't understood that, so I reintroduce myself to her. "Holt. Also from Utah, but currently living in North Carolina."

Rachelle glances between Chloe and me. "So, you two know each other?"

Chloe doesn't bother to look at me. "Utah is a pretty large state," she teases lightly.

Rachelle pulls asilly meface and opens her mouth to respond, but I'm not going to spend the next month pretending I don't know Chloe, so I jump in.

"Chloe's giving you a hard time. We do know each other. We went to school together at the University of Utah before I moved east."

Rachelle nods. "Oh, so did you plan this trip together then? Sort of a reunion?"

Chloe scoffs and opens her mouth, but I beat her to it. I'm not looking for negativity either. There's no reason for drama here.

"Total coincidence," I force a laugh. "You should have seen this one's face when I showed up at the gate in Atlanta." I point my elbow toward Chloe and make an exaggerated shocked face.

Rachelle laughs, Chloe glares, and Cesar frowns a bit in confusion, so I hurry and give him an abbreviated Spanish translation. The driver is also listening and he smiles when he hears the story, and then launches into telling us to follow him. It's time to go.

Ready or not, the adventure has officially begun.

Chapter 4

Chloe

Iamtotally,one-hundredpercent freaking out right now. Holt Alvarez is sitting in the seat in front of me, looking as delicious as always, and my brain has completely malfunctioned. I'm trying so hard to process what has happened. How did I start this day waking up in my condo in Holladay, Utah and end it riding through the traffic of Lima, Peru in a beat-up van with him and his cedar-scented body wash floating back at me?

I doubt my body wash smells like anything at this point. I'm pretty sure I nerve-sweated it off in the Salt Lake airport, and the rest fizzled under the load of seeing him for the first time since last July. It's May now. Nearly a year. And yet, time collapsed somehow, and if I close my eyes I can believe that we're simply off on an adventure together, still as close as ever, him reading my mind and me laughing at his antics.

I must be dead. It's the only explanation. We're all ghosts and this is the bus to the underworld, where I will be tortured by having to see my lost love every single day for the rest of my existence.

The soft tones of Holt humming along to the music pull me out of my spiraling. I'm surprised to hear seventies American music playing out of the speakers. Dancing Queen. Of course he'd be humming this one. It's practically a rite of passage as a college student to play this song at allthe parties and dance around until your hair is sweaty and you've left all your stresses behind.

The windows of the van are down, and traffic doesn't really move even though we're on a freeway. I watch as cars make five lanes out of the painted three, and drivers seem to find pockets to merge into that I'd never have even noticed. It's a wild dance, and I find the lack of logic somehow fascinating rather than infuriating. How are they not crashing into each other? Why is no one shouting out their window? It's insanity in motion, but everyone is totally chill with it.

I pull in a deep breath through my nose and push it slowly out my lips. I can be chill with this insanity.

Holt turns his head to look at me over his shoulder. Our eyes meet, but I shift mine back out the window to watch the cars. Holt always did seem to know when I was feeling things, and never failed to check on me. How could he care enough to do that, and then leave me?

Another deep breath. The van lurches forward and we're moving now. It might only be thirty miles an hour, but it's something, and I lean back in my seat. Another mile closer to our destination, another mile closer to getting out of close contact with the man who still makes my heart ache terribly.

The driver says something in Spanish, and I think I understand a few of the words, but I'm mostly lost until Holt translates for me and Rachelle.

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