Page 46 of Reel Love
“I remembered. I just didn’t put together that he was that much older when he had you. Isn’t your grandma sixty-nine?” I wrinkled my forehead and tried to imagine what it would be like if my mom and BamBam were the same age. That would not have worked in our house.
“Yup. It can get weird when the two of them geek out over the same generational stuff. Like they both saw the originalStar Warsin theaters. Not together, obviously, but like they have the same memories about it. We sort of don’t talk about my parents’ age gap much,” Ethan said, then added, “Okay, well, my grandma sometimes talks about it in a shady way when she’s had two glasses of wine.”
I snorted. “BamBam would do the same thing. She pretends to like my mom for my dad’s sake, but I’m pretty sure she would like her to go to Antarctica for all eternity. At one point, after my grandpa died and she first moved in, she seized control of our kitchen and insisted on doing our hair before school. There is a reason my parents built her an apartment above the house rather than giving her a suite in it.”
“The kitchen and the morning routine? That’s diabolical.”
“It really was. My mom is not the kind of woman to appreciate someone making her look like she doesn’t know what she is doing. Although, in BamBam’s defense, my mom really did notknow what she was doing with our hair. My hair isn’t as thick and my curls aren’t as tight as my brother’s and sister’s, but none of us could withstand washing it every other day like my mom. BamBam staged a social intervention before we got teased off the playground.” I shook my head as I remembered her coming into the room my sister and I shared with about a gallon of Pink Lotion, Blue Magic, and a wide-toothed comb, determined to get us together before we ended up “bald-headed.”
“That’s kind of what I like about having my grandma around.” Ethan smiled as we weaved our way up the canyon. “Stuff that my parents don’t get or freak out about, she usually has a different perspective on.”
“Right!” I hadn’t meant to get so excited, but this was a thing that my friends who didn’t live with their grandparents couldn’t understand. “It’s like having an adult who can help you figure out your adults. I don’t know what I’d do without BamBam. I’d probably already have given up. I’d wear sweater sets and be a junior accountant in training.”
Ethan wrinkled his nose at me as if I’d grown a second head. “I really can’t imagine you in a sweater set.”
“Oh, you don’t have to. Every year on picture day, my mom makes sure I’m in one. For last year’s Christmas card, I’m even wearing pearls.”
“No. You?” Ethan shook his head, like the mental image was as disturbing to him as it was to me in real life. “You don’t really wear jewelry, do you? That feels wrong.”
“It feels wrong because it is wrong.” I laughed. The golden hour had officially begun, bathing the angles of his face in agentle orange glow as we wound past rust-red canyons and scrub brush.
I tried to be stealthy as I started filming him driving, the scenery flashing by. Even if we didn’t use this footage for anything, I wanted to remember this moment. Ethan in his element, singing along to music that was made for people decades older, in a car he loved. It felt like I was getting to see another side of him. Like I was seeing the Ethan that only close friends and family saw.
After a moment, he looked over at me and furrowed his brow. “Are you filming?”
“Yup. The lighting is perfect.” I bit down on my bottom lip to keep myself from saying any other thoughts out loud. Like that this moment with him was perfect.
Ethan pushed his hair out of his eyes, then smiled at me. It was a big, goofy smile, meant to ruin the shot. I sighed, trying to sound irritated, but I couldn’t make myself stop smiling back at him. At the beginning of the trip, him doing that would have made me nuts, but now, I found it—him, really—endearing. I stopped recording and put the phone down. Maybe I’d be able to get some more shots once we parked.
Ethan turned back to the road right as the song changed again, his eyes going wide as someone sang about how it might be nice to touch someone else’s body. He cleared his throat and pressed a button. “Not George Michael right now.”
“Wait.” I tilted my head as a funny thought struck me. “Is your old-man mixtape a little sexy? Because now I’m curious about the song and—”
“Oh look. We’re here,” Ethan said in mock surprise as he changed the subject. The parking lot was small yet packed. Ethan slowed down to a creep. “Watch for a parking—aha!”
White reverse lights came on an SUV, and Ethan floored it to get to the spot before any of the other cars circling could figure out what was happening. Sliding into the spot at almost the same time that the SUV with Arizona plates pulled out, he grinned at me like he’d won us a prize at a fair. We were parked on the edge of the lot facing the overlook. If we wanted to, we could watch the sunset from the driver’s-side window. Not that I wouldn’t get out of the car. The view was simply too good to miss.
I was about to grab my gear, when Ethan held up a DJI Osmo. “Since it’s crowded, maybe we just put my camera on the car and let it do the work. Then we can enjoy the sunset.”
“Oh, alright.” I felt strangely naked getting out of the car without my gear. Ethan’s forehead wrinkled in concentration as he messed with the camera’s positioning and the suction mount he was using to hold it to the car. Pink streaks started to trace the sky, gently highlighting his face. He was beautiful in this light.
Ethan must have felt me staring, because he said, “This will only take a second.”
“Right.”
Great. Now I was being a weirdo. I walked around to the front of the car and leaned on the hood with my hip, deciding to focus on the natural wonder we’d come to see. In front of us, the craggy painted rock faces were transforming—the strips ofmountain that had been a rust color became a deep red, while the strips of white in the stone almost mirrored the darkeningsky.
Behind me, I could hear the doors’ hydraulics slowly shutting, meaning Ethan must have sorted out how to make the camera stay put. I figured he’d let me know when he was ready to walk over to the railing, so I kept my eyes on the sky as little wisps of clouds began to turn magenta. Below, the lights of Las Vegas started to sparkle.
“It’s beautiful.” Ethan appeared next to me. For a moment the two of us stood there, watching the sky. Then he asked, “Should we go over to the actual lookout?”
“I guess we should have the full experience.” I smiled up at him, and we headed toward the railing.
Ethan took a sharp breath and then pulled out his phone. “I almost forgot. I took this just now.”
I peeked at the phone. He’d taken a picture of the car at an angle that made it appear as if it were alone at the overlook, the sunset coming off in bright oranges and pinks against a deep-blue sky. I was technically in the photo, but because of the shadowing, you couldn’t really tell it was me. Mostly, I was a sheet of hair and a pair of sneakers. It was a really good photo, like the kind a car company would pay big dollars to try to create.
“It’s amazing. Professional-car-photoshoot vibes.” I grinned.
