All the Forever Things

by Jolene Perry

  “But it was for a good cause. Anyway, you’re like the safest driver in the universe, which is maybe the only reason you passed your driver’s test. I’m willing to set aside the fact that your driving is super annoying because it would be really nice if you could drive.” Her smile is so damn hopeful, but there’s something in her eyes…I’m entirely suspicious.

  We might not be operating on the same wavelength lately, but I do still know my friend. “You have a purpose. You’re doing this for a reason.”

  “Yes.” She places her hands on her hips, gives me a smile, and does this great wide-eyed exasperated stare. “I’d really like my best friend to be able to drive.”

  Nope. There’s something else. I start for her car. “You know when I drive, I drive the hearse. Almost always.”

  “But…” Bree shrinks back a little, and I know…I just know whatever’s going to come out of her mouth is not going to be cool. “Bryce thought it might be fun to ride in the hearse to prom?” Her voice gets all squeaky at the end.

  Bree has never, ever, ever opted to take the hearse anywhere. I think I’ve driven us in the Subaru twice. But…but if I were to be her driver, I could maybe watch out for her better.

  “I’d just be the chauffeur, is that right? I don’t have to go to the dance?”

  Bree sighs. “I’m still going to try to talk you into it. You’re maybe into Hartman, yeah?”

  “I’m maybe into him.”

  She claps her hands together and grins.

  I make a big show of slowing my trudging steps when I get near the driver’s side of her car.

  “Just get in.” Bree laughs.

  Once we’re inside, I buckle in and rest my hands on the steering wheel. There are so many ways this could go disastrously wrong. At least I’m hanging with Bree. She seems to think we’re all okay. She’s acting like we are, so maybe it’s just me who’s moody and strange right now.

  “Earth to Gabe.” Her fingers snap in front of my face, and I jump.

  “I’m here.” I think.

  Her phone sings, and she starts typing.

  “What’s up?” I ask, pointing at her phone.

  “Um…” She bites her lip.

  I check the time and slowly put the car into Drive, my foot still firmly on the brake. Now that I’ve checked all directions, I ease my foot off the brake and head for the parking lot exit onto the street.

  “Bryce is just being sweet.”

  Gag.

  I check the street both ways, once, and then again before pulling out. I can tell Bree wants to tell me to just move already with how she’s leaning forward but she won’t. She won’t because she wants me to drive her to prom, in a hearse.

  “Gabe. This last year has been so crappy. I’m finally having fun. Please let me have fun without that frowny disapproval.” She sticks her finger against the corner of my mouth and wiggles it. “Don’t think I can’t tell when you’re thinking things you don’t want to say out loud.”

  The problem is that I can already feel the heartbreak from him coming. Will I feel more responsible if I don’t keep warning her? Or do I need to find ways to let my frustration go so I can be happy with her now?

  A little blue car speeds around us to the left, and I jump in my seat. Why are there so many other people on the road? It’s way early to be out and about. What could they all possibly be doing?

  Bree blows me a kiss, and I try to relax as I grip the steering wheel. My heart pounds and my mouth dries out at every light. I watch for drivers on their phones, or drinking coffee, or generally not paying attention.

  “This is good for you. You hate that I force you out of your comfort zone, but you also secretly love it.” She pinches my cheek, and I pull away to keep my eyes on the road.

  “I don’t love it right now,” I tell her as I hold the steering wheel tighter.

  “So…” She trails off, biting her lip. “Since you’d be driving Bryce and me to the prom anyway, we sort of hoped you’d be cool with taking the group.”

  My foot slams on the brake so hard that the seat belt crushes my left boob.

  “Gabe!” Bree yells. “Drive!”

  Two horns honk before cars zip around on our left.

  My hands shake at my stupid driving move, or maybe at Bree. Having me drive was a dumb idea. Grasping the steering wheel, I try my three breaths as I let off the brake. She’s just talking about a couple more people. That I don’t know. That I don’t talk to in school…

  She sits back in her seat and taps her phone on her chin. Her face is flat. I can’t believe my stupidity in hitting the brakes in the middle of the road.

  “Yeah. Okay. Sorry,” I say. “I was just surprised.”

  “Well…” Bree says with a smirk. “No guessing where you fall on this issue. But you’ll come around. You always do. It’ll be good for you. They’re all super nice.”

  I’m sure they are. I’d just rather not find out on prom night, in a hearse, while I’m driving. Normally, I’d ask Bree for reinforcements for a group situation, but she’s the one dragging me into it. I’m used to having a partner for horribly uncomfortable high-school situations, not a small crowd.

  I flip on the turn signal when we get to the student lot, but it’s sort of a nightmare for me with cars buzzing in so many directions.

  Bree’s lips are both sucked into her mouth as she tries to not yell something like Just park already! To her credit, she holds it in. Maybe I need to try to do the same.

  “Driving the group could be…fun,” I choke out.

  “Liar.” But she laughs a little when she says it, so I think we’re okay.

  I park way near the back of the lot so I don’t have to navigate through student traffic. “This good?”

  “Perfect.” She’s lying, but at least we made it to school.

  Once the car has stopped, I put it in Park and turn the thing off. Finally. My shoulders ache from the tension. Bree holds her hand out, and I drop the keys in.

  “What else has been going on?” I ask. “I feel like I’ve barely seen you.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I guess mostly—”

  Her car door is jerked open by Bryce, who growls and jerks her from the car.

  Seriously?

  I stand up, and Bryce is now growling into her neck.

  “Can we have a minute?” I snap over the roof of the car.

  Bryce stops and his eyes meet mine, his mouth dipping into a frown.

  “A minute?” I ask again.

  Bree looks back and forth between us a couple times.

  Bryce takes back his hands and backs away. “Whatever.”

  Bree scowls.

  “I…” Crap. “I’m sorry. I just thought we might talk or something.”

  Bree glances over her shoulder. “Can we catch up later?”

  Bryce high-fives one of his friends and then fake humps the front of his car. I gesture toward Bryce. “Really?”

  Bree smiles a little and rolls her eyes, but it feels more endearing than annoyed. “They’re just screwing around.”

  “I thought you were smarter than that.”

  Her smile falls. “I’m sorry, what?”

  Crap again. I tuck my hair behind my ears. “That didn’t come out right.”

  “But it’s how you feel. Isn’t it?” The look she throws me forces me back a step.

  “I’m sorry.” But I don’t know how to fix what I said.

  Bree backs up and then sprints away from me and slams into him. He picks her off the ground, she wraps her legs around his middle, and even from two car lengths away, I can see their tongues as they kiss. Gross.

  I have no idea what the balance is between supporting my friend and warning her, but I’m obviously screwing it up.

  When I go to classes, I don’t see Bree. And when I text her at lunch, she doesn’t text back. Did she seriously skip school and isn’t answering me?

  After school, I stand on a bench to try to see the whole school parking lot. Bree’s car isn’
t here. And no texts…It’s just not like her.

  And then, predictably (because he seems to be popping up everywhere), Hartman’s car stops next to the curb.

  “Gabe!” he calls through the window. “Let me give you a ride?”

  I pause like I need to think about it.

  “Come on!” He gestures with his head.

  I jump off the bench, and he leaps out of the car to get my door.

  “Seriously?” I ask with a laugh.

  “Seriously.” He shuts my door and crawls into the driver’s seat—his long limbs and all. “A ride home? Something else?”

  His smile still doesn’t quite reach his eyes, and even though I’m never exactly sure what to say aside from the generic lines that slip out, I don’t want to tell him no.

  “A ride home would be great.”

  Chapter 15

  The breeze is really coming off the ocean today, and there’s nothing that makes the air feel cleaner. The sun has heated the hood of Hartman’s car almost to the point where I’m ready to slide off, but not quite yet. My back and head rest against the windshield, and my nearly bare legs are soaking up the heat from the black paint of his car. The view of the ocean from this part of the parking lot at my house is too good to move.

  “So, Bree and Bryce are quite a thing,” Hartman says.

  I make a face. “I don’t trust him.”

  “Does Bree know that?”

  I let out a long sigh. “Well, yeah, she definitely knows I don’t trust him, but I’m not sure how much she cares. Now I’m just trying to figure out how to be her friend, but also to keep warning her that he’s not the best idea.” And I’d like to be able to talk to her about what’s happening in my life. Like, it would be nice to talk over this afternoon with Hartman.

  Hartman shifts his weight—I know this only because I hear the movement, not because I actually open my eyes. “You can’t force her to not like him.”

  “I know,” I say. “But our rhythm is totally off, and our rhythm has never been off. It’s me and Bree and all the things we love versus everyone and everything else. Has been since seventh grade.”

  “Until now.”

  We sit in silence for a few moments, and I let the sun keep soaking into my tired body.

  “She wants me to drive the hearse to prom. With them.” Just the thought of it makes my palms sweat.

  “You’re going to prom?” he asks, his voice a shade higher with surprise.

  “No. Just driving.”

  “Oh.”

  Silence.

  A breeze rustles through the tree leaves. I had no idea that I’d ever be able to relax around Hartman. Something else I’d like to share with Bree, but I’m not sure how anymore. It’s not like I can open with that, can I?

  Wait a minute…If I want a partner in this stupid high school situation, maybe Hartman could be my fix instead of Bree.

  I sit up. “Could you come with me? Help me drive, I mean? Like…be my buffer?”

  He blinks. “Are you asking me to prom?”

  My insides topple. That’s totally what I just did. “It’s that…” My neck and cheeks burn. “Bree’s usually my partner for stuff like this, but we’re not really in the same groove right now and…you and I…” are.

  Hartman doesn’t speak. He turns to face me fully, but the car isn’t nearly long enough for his tall body, so he looks like he could topple off with one small move. He readjusts his elbow a few times before sitting up and crossing his legs on the hood. Still silent.

  I’m such a moron. “I’m sorry. Forget it. It was a stupid ide—”

  “I’ll go. With you. Yeah.” He swallows, his face sort of flat and maybe in shock.

  I just wasn’t thinking that by asking him to drive with me to prom, I’d also sort of be asking him to prom.

  “I’d vote for no photos,” he says. “Aside from whatever our parents need. And I also vote we only stay as long as we want, and…”

  Oh, photos…prom stuff…no. “I wasn’t even sure if I was going to go inside, you know?”

  His head falls to one side. “Your plan was to sit in the car and actually be a chauffeur?”

  I stare at my lap. “When you say it like that, it sounds kind of…”

  “No, I get it, I think. But…” He taps on his knee. “But if we’re already there…”

  My chest is doing that tumultuous rolling, flipping thing where I’m not positive how to breathe, so I press my hands to my chest and start my three-breath thing.

  “You okay?” He laughs a little. “You did ask me, and now you look like you’re panicking.”

  I wave him away. “I’m weird.”

  “Better than being normal.”

  My mouth tugs into a smile, and my hands drop into my lap. “So, you’re saying I’m not normal?”

  He snorts. “I’d think you’d be used to that by now. You used to take naps in coffins, Gabe. That’s not normal.”

  “Uh…”

  His long hands sort of flop around in front of him as he gestures and sputters for a moment. “That came out wrong. Weird is what makes our world worth living in.”

  “While we’re here,” I add.

  He gives me another one of his odd stares. “While we’re here.”

  My gaze floats over the rest of the parking lot and the open garage door, which reminds me there’s one more catch. “We’re…We’ll be driving a hearse.”

  “A hearse?” He sits back a bit. “Why not a limousine? You have one or two, right? I thought I saw them the other day.”

  I nod. “But I can’t drive them because of the insurance company. There’s an older hearse that Dad switched to our personal insurance.”

  “Uh…” He suppresses a smile. “Okay, then. Prom in a hearse.”

  “And I might beg you to drive.” I bite my lip waiting for his response, but instead of rolling his eyes, he just smiles.

  “So you don’t really want to go to prom, but you’ve asked me anyway, and I’m coming.” He slides off the hood and stands. “But I have this feeling you’d take back the invite if I said I didn’t want to drive.”

  He’s pretty much spot-on, but I’m not ready to admit that to him. “Thanks?”

  Hartman nods once, his outrageous hair moving with him. “Walk?” he asks.

  There’s a beat of silence, but it’s not like I have something else going on today. “Sure.”

  “Can we walk through the cemetery?” he asks.

  “Do people go to other places to take walks?”

  His mouth twitches. “I’m sure they don’t.”

  After scooting off his hood, I breathe in the warm, spring air. “My sister will be home before too long, so ya know…”

  “I’ve been warned.”

  But now we’re walking, and neither of us is really saying anything. The last thing he wants is to hear me talk about how I’m worried about my friend with Bryce. And even though he seems okay with all the funeral home talk, I’m still waiting for a time when he’s not okay with it. Or if I say something weird, or something that makes him sad again over his dad…There are just a lot of ways I could screw up. I can’t believe I just asked him out. I want to tell Bree so badly that my fingers itch to pull out my phone.

  When we reach the fence around the cemetery, he holds open the small gate for me to step through.

  “This was my park when I was growing up,” I say. “Because it was close enough that Mom and I could get back if my dad or my grandparents needed help.”

  Hartman smiles a little, and I feel myself warm up at the way his face changes with the subtle movement. “But your sister spends a lot of time with your aunt?”

  “I think a lot of it has to do with my summer of counseling, and maybe my general callousness toward death.” We’re in the oldest part of the cemetery now. Late-1800s dates on the headstones. “My parents are just trying to limit exposure or something. Make sure daughter number two isn’t as strange as daughter number one.”

  Hartman scratc
hes his head. “And your aunt Liza’s is a better place to be?”

  “That’s what I said!” I laugh a little.

  Then he sighs. And then he looks up for a few steps. And we’re still just walking.

  He takes his hands out of his pockets and accidentally brushes mine, spinning heat up my arm. I fold my arms. We walk. I start to ask him about Connecticut or his mom or his old friends, but stop myself. Maybe he doesn’t want to talk about those things.

  Hartman stops. I stop next to him.

  We’re now in front of his dad’s grave. I’m not sure if he meant to come here or not.

  I press my lips together because I’ve seen worse tragedies. Kids on bicycles for one.

  “Let’s head back.” His eyes rest on the stone for a few moments longer. “Before I have another one of those moments when I want to break everything around me.”

  He spins and starts walking back up the hill.

  “Wait!” I call as I jog to catch up to him. I reach for his arm, but last time touching him made me all flushed, and I need to think.

  Hartman pauses, and we watch each other for a moment. And watch is a much better way to say it than stare, because it’s more than staring. I’m trying to get a better read on him. On who he is. What he wants. Maybe he’s doing the same. Our eyes aren’t locked—I’m scanning his face, and his gaze floats over mine. I don’t notice the tension around his eyes until he relaxes and then his lips turn up in the slightest of smiles.

  “Sorry,” he says. “I’m kind of a mess. I feel…Everything inside me feels raw and mixed up. I’m just decent at putting on a normal face.”

  “S’okay.”

  We start walking in silence, but it doesn’t feel awkward anymore, just kinda nice. New. Different. We slowly weave through the headstones, and once in a while I point at a name I like, or at someone who died really young, and he does the same.

  There are a few people buried here whose families I remember, and we pause at those for a minute so I can tell Hartman a detail about their life or their family. His dark eyes lock with mine often enough that I know he’s taking it all in. Actually listening instead of cringing away.

  “Isn’t it awful to watch people grieve over and over?” he asks quietly.