6 bab Bersambung DewasaI didn't mean for any of it to happen that way.
Not the road, not the nights, not him.
At first, it was just somewhere to go when the apartment got too small and Beckham's voice got too loud. A stretch of gravel where the air didn't feel so heavy. Somewhere I could sit in my car, music low, windows down, and remember what it felt like to breathe.
That road didn't promise anything-just peace. But that was enough for me.
The first time I drove out there after everything with Beckham started falling apart, the sky was this bruised kind of purple, the kind that comes right before the dark settles. The smell of bonfire smoke carried through the trees, and you could already hear the bass from somebody's truck long before you saw the lights.
That's what I remember most about those nights-the sound. The laughter. The way it all wrapped around you like the world outside didn't exist.
Taylor was always the first face I'd see, blunt in hand, that same easy grin like nothing bad ever lasted long out here. And then there was Colin-always in the mix, never looking for attention, but somehow he had all of it anyway.
I didn't think much of him at first. Just another familiar face in the crowd. But the thing about the dirt road is that it keeps you long enough for things to shift. The longer I stayed, the more I started to notice the way he looked at me when he thought I wasn't watching, or how the sound of his laugh stuck in my head even after I drove away.
Looking back now, maybe it started right there-somewhere between the smoke, the music, and the way he said my name like it was something worth softening for.
But that night, I wasn't looking for meaning.
I was just trying to forget.
And the dirt road?
It never lets you forget. It just teaches you to pretend you're not remembering.
