Page 50 of An Irish Summer

There wasn’t much traffic, but that didn’t stop me from thinking every car we passed was going to hit us head-on.

“You can breathe, Chelsea,” Collin said after a while.

“I know that.”

“Then why aren’t you doing it?”

I shot him a look, which I regretted as soon as I saw the way his eyes caught the sun. Two sage-green planets, turned to glass by the brightness of the morning. He looked impossibly relaxed, slouched in the seat with his forearm out the window, so I figured maybe he was right. I could breathe.

“Lean into the curb on the left, stay wide on the right,” he said as I turned onto another side street. “Lean left, wide right.”

“Lean left, wide right,” I repeated.

Fortunately, we were close to the highway, so it wasn’t long before all I had to do was drive straight.

“Yer a fast learner,” he said as I picked up speed to merge with the other cars.

“I have a decent teacher.”

“Normally, I’d be offended by ‘decent,’” he said. “But from you, I think it’s quite the compliment.”

“Whatever you have to tell yourself.”

He clucked his tongue but said nothing else, and I resisted a smile at my little victory. It was time two played at that game.

“Where exactly are we headed?” I asked after another few minutes of silence. “Aren’t those cliffs somewhere over here?”

“First of all, if another Irish person catches ya calling thevery sacred Cliffs of Moher ‘those cliffs’ they’d kill ya, so watch yourself. And second of all, you aren’t ready for the Cliffs. We’re going in the other direction. Toward the castles.”

“Why am I not ready for the Cliffs?”

“The Cliffs change people, Chels. Or they bring ya back to yourself. They can be quite a lot if you aren’t in the right headspace.”

I should have stopped being surprised when Collin talked like this. In a way that was serious. Contemplative. That made me feel like glass. Fragile and transparent.

But still, it caught me off guard, and I fumbled around for an answer.

“Are you saying I need to be changed?” I asked eventually, keeping my eyes on the road. “Or are you saying I need to come back to myself?”

“Aye, neither,” he said. “Only the Cliffs can answer that.” Before I could say anything else, he gestured out the window. “Right, so we’re going to take this exit up here.”

Still processing our conversation, I tried to refocus on the road. I downshifted to slow down, checked my mirrors, lost my bearings, and—

“Chelsea!” Collin shouted, reaching for the wheel and jerking us out of the way of an oncoming car and onto the shoulder of the exit ramp. I was sure the tire screeching was louder in my imagination, but that didn’t stop it from feeling like we were in an action movie. A really bad action movie, where the main character had no idea how to drive and almost killed everyone else just trying to get off the highway.

Once our breathing slowed and our heart rates returned to somewhat normal, we dared to look at each other. I was as mortified as I was terrified, and I’m sure it was written all overmy face. I expected to see the same look on Collin, but what I saw was his usual crooked smile. Only his lips were pressed together, seemingly trying to contain a laugh.

It wasn’t long before it exploded out of him like fireworks. It took me a few seconds of processing before I could join in, then the two of us sat laughing like children on the side of the road, half in the way of traffic, not caring a bit.

“Holy shit,” he said as he regained his composure. “I thought the goal wasnotto get us killed.”

“I thought you were going to help me.” I wiped tears from my eyes.

“Iwashelping you.”

“You were distracting me.”

“Not on purpose,” he said, and I groaned. “Besides, you’ve been distracting me since the moment you got to the Wanderer, so it’s only fair.”

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