Wesley has one foot in the car and looks at me like I’m insane. “Hiking? Aw, shit Jaxon. If I’d known that, I would have stayed at home.”
“It won’t be so bad.” My words come out rushed, fearing he’ll not want to hang out with me today. But I want to spend some time in the quiet of the morning talking to him.
He glances at me skeptically but sits in the passenger seat. I blow out an imperceptible breath and get in as well. “Hiking is pointless,” he says as he puts his seatbelt on. “We walk somewhere, then turn around and walk back. All it does is make me tired.”
I scoff as we head out of town. “You run, don’t you?” I glance at him as he shoots me the same dry look. “It’s justlike that. You run to get the endorphins, then you go back home. Hiking is just at a higher incline.”
“You hike often?”
“A few times a month if I can get away. It’s a good way to exercise, and I leave the city.”
He lets out a sigh as if he’s put out. “I guess I’ll join you when you go other mornings too. Unless you want to be alone,” he hurriedly adds.
“No, no,” I say quickly. “You can come.”
We’re both silent for a few seconds, then we break into laughter. “Fuck, this is awkward, right?” Wesley asks when he catches his breath.
“It is. But probably because we’re thinking too much about it.” I rest my hand on the center console, palm up. He grabs it quickly, threading our fingers together. “Let’s just be, you know? We can remember we have a past, but let’s not let that define our future. Okay?”
“Okay, college boy.”
I roll my eyes, and he pokes me in the side, making me yelp and giggle.
“There’s nothing wrong with being college educated. You earned that degree.”
“Degrees,” I emphasize but not boastfully. “Shit was no joke either. I spent more nights than I care to share with my nose stuffed in books.”
He squeezes my hand gently. “But you did it. I knew you would.” I peek over at him, and his cheeks are a slight pink. “You were always such a brainiac in school, but you weren’t braggy about it.”
I shrug self-consciously. “Probably because I grew up with all these people that knew from an early age that I was smart. It wasn’t new for them.”
He hums.
I glance over at him. “You’re smart too, in a different way.”
He shoots me a grin. “How do you mean?”
“Any instrument you hear, you can play. It’s effortless. You know how many people would kill to be able to do that? It’s not common. You can play what? Six instruments?”
“Eight,” he says, a smile clear in his tone. “Piano, saxophone, guitar, flute, drums, violin, cello…” We stop at a light, and I look over at his cocky grin. “And the triangle.”
I laugh so hard my stomach hurts. “You’ll have to teach me the art of playing the triangle.”
“It’s not as easy as it sounds,” he says seriously, making me chuckle harder as I turn off on an exit. “You have to time it just right, then you have to make sure the note doesn’t last too long. It’s a delicate art.”
“I believe you, instrument master.”
Wesley chuckles, then leans forward to turn the radio up. An upbeat pop song plays for a few seconds. Wesley opens his mouth as if to say something, but then the DJ comes onto the radio, and who they’re discussing makes both of us freeze.
“As we said before our break, Ryder and Lana’s Mischief was spotted at a restaurant in Seattle, and he looked hot!” the female DJ says.
“Yes, he did,” someone else says, a man with a gruff voice, as if giving Wesley a compliment took effort. “We’ll see how long that lasts.”
Wesley’s hand tightens in mine. I take my other hand off the wheel and reach to shut the radio off, but he says, “No. I want to hear.”
I want to turn it off anyway, to protect him from hearing some bullshit that might hurt him, but I honor his wishes. Even though it kills me.
The female DJ makes a noise that sounds like a grunt. “He has to start somewhere, Cecil. Sheesh. Give him props for seeking help and getting himself healthy.”
