ON THE ROAD

Hallie

There was a powerful sense of safety when held tightly inside loving arms.

That night, we had created a little bed for ourselves on the backseat. We barely had place to move, but our lack of money forbid us to sleep in a hotel. I had always been told that sleeping in a car was dangerous, but the need to feel Max's arms around me that night was too strong to fuss about it and I knew that if we got a room, I could only dream of her hair tickling my face and her smell invading my nostrils.

When we had broken the kiss a few hours ago, the car fell into a silence that was comfortably awkward. I drove the vehicle to a random parking lot, trying to concentrate on the road instead of drifting away into the memories of her soft lips on mine. I didn't know what attracted me to her, but less than a week had been enough to make me fall hard. I was trying to blind myself from the inevitable pain that would follow this obvious bad choice from my heart, but I couldn't stop my mind from thinking I would eventually be hurt.

We hadn't gone to sleep without a little more exercise. As I pulled into the parking spot that would be our home for the night, Maxine let out a heavy sigh.

"In a hypothetically world, if you could sell your soul to the devil, what would you sell it for?"

I stared at her in disbelief. The first words we spoke in ten minutes after sharing a moment I never even considered could ever happen, Maxine wanted to play the game of "what if's"?

"This is hypothetical, Hallie, no need to think about it for hours."

I wonder if she even knew how weird of a human being she was. I doubted she did. And if she did, I doubted she cared.

"Well... possibly for something like this."

I didn't quite know what I meant by that. By the way her eyebrows lifted to the top of her forehead, she didn't either.

"I mean, not this, this being two girls sitting in silence in a freezing car, but the week we've had. We haven't done much except for driving around and meeting shady men in clubs, but there's something about freedom that makes
everything taste sweeter. I don't really know how to explain this."

She seemed satisfied by my answer, but still answered as sarcastically as ever.

"If that's freedom to you, I'm so sorry, since we've been trapped in a car for what feels like ages."

"What about you?"

"I wasn't being a bitch. Well, I always am, but that wasn't my intention, your answer was good."

She looked embarrassed for a second, before unbuckling her belt and turning to face me.

"If the Devil came for my soul, I would tell Him to fuck off. My body has been messed up by drugs and alcohol, my mind has been turned into a mess by life, but if there is one thing that's still untouched, it would have to be my soul and I don't want anyone having control over it."

"That's interesting."

"You don't like my answer."

"Yes it's interesting, I simply don't believe your soul makes you who you are. I think we're a mix between our actions and our experiences."

"Alright, but then, tell me, if our souls don't represent who we are, what does? If right now, we switched bodies, would you simply become me, an angry bitch who gets into fights any second, a character that is so far from yours?"

"I don't know..."

"Do you believe in Paradise?"

"Of course..."