Pull Over - a short story

Chapter Three - Piggyback

Pull Over

Chapter Three - Piggyback

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Elliott, the empath.

It's why my quiet days become his quiet days. My good days are his good. It's why we are almost never in opposite moods – which can be amazing or exhausting, depending on the level of our energy.

It's also why there is a twenty-two year old girl in the backseat of my car right now.

"Where'd you say you go to school?" Elliott asks with one hand on the wheel. His other hand is gently picking at the stitching of my passenger seat, right next to my thigh.

"Texas Southern." She has an innocent accent, a little bit of Southern charm. "Not a big school, but we know how to have fun."

Elliott flashes her a bright smile, and it makes my stomach jump. I don't know how he is always good at meeting new people; being interested in them, truly caring what they say and how they say it. All I do is get nervous. Who is this woman and what if she's lying?

We left the Space Center and found her at the far end of the parking lot. The hood of her car was open and she was frantically trying to type into her phone. Elliott was going to stop no matter what, so I let him. There was something wrong with her engine, so we called for the car to be towed and Elliott offered her a ride back to campus.

"Thank you again for this," she sighs. "I know it's probably weird to pick up a stranger, but I promise I'm not crazy."

"Hopefully not," I mutter. Elliott's hand instantly hits my thigh, and I whisper an ouch. He rolls his eyes. But Hallie just giggles.

"I promise!" Her voice is cheery. "Wait, are y'all doing anything tonight? My friend is having a party, you should come!"

The plan, the plan, the plan.

"I..." Elliott is about to answer, he's about to agree, but then he turns to me. He understands that it's not part of the plan, but I can see it in his face. The same face that drove us off the highway to the Gator Boardwalk in Alabama. The same face that brought us down to the river for a picnic with our jambalaya. "I'm not sure we can." He smiles to her in the rearview mirror.

"I'll leave you with my number, anyway," she grins. "If y'all decide to come, just text me!"

She's nice, she's so nice, and I feel like an asshole for hating every second of this. It's not her, it'll never be her. It will always be the reasons for a detour or the ten extra minutes we spend in a gift shop. It will always be the stupid things that cause an ache in my neck, an overreaction to time.

Elliott parks on campus, which happens to be in the heart of downtown Houston. A friend meets Hallie to pick her up, thanking us once again. She exchanges numbers with Elliott and then drives away with her friend.

I close my eyes and fall back into my seat. "I'm sorry, J. We had to help her."

"I know," I swallow. "You're such a good person." He keeps his hand next to my thigh, but he doesn't touch it. The suffocating inch between us only gets worse with the silence that follows. Elliott takes us to our hotel, and just as the itinerary says, we change out of our car clothes again.

As we sit and eat at our café on the Bayou, Elliott finally speaks up. "We should go."

"E."

"No, I'm serious." He sets down his fork. "We should go to that party tonight." I don't look up at him. Instead, I push my food around and take a sip of my water. But his eyes stay on me the entire time. "The Opera starts at five o'clock. I checked the average run time online, and we'll be out of there before eight. It's a college party, it won't start until at least nine. Maybe ten."