Page 125 of Collided

She is trouble to my heart.

She has the power to wreck everything in me with her eyes and I’ll be a goner. Yet I can’t seem to avoid her.I should. I really fucking should. But I can’t.

“Come here.” I’ve lost my fucking mind, but that’s not new. I lost my mind the day she collided with me and turned my world upside down with her pretty eyes. At this point, there is no going back. I’m too fucking invested in her. Fuck, I don’t even want to go back.

Hope scoots over to me and cuddles in the crook of my arm. Her head rests on my chest and I’m certain she can hear the fast rhythm of my heart.

“Who doesn’t believe you, Rose?” I finally ask her when one song ends and another starts playing.

“No one.” She holds the edge of the blanket to her chin.

“I’ll believe you.”

“Because you’re my friend?”

“Yes.”

Right, of course, how could I forget we’re just friends and nothing else?

“So, then who—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Later then.

“What’s the scar-boy up to?”

A laugh bubbles out of her, and the sound is the sweetest fucking thing I’ve ever heard. It thaws the ice around my heart and makes it warm.

If I could, I’d record her laugh and play it on a loop on nights when death seems like the only option. I believe this sound can make me stay a day more.

Hope elbows me in the ribs playfully. “His nameisHarry. You know that.”

I do know that, but I enjoy it when she corrects me.

“Harry or scar-boy, what’s the difference?”

She gasps as if I’ve killed her favorite character. “Bigdifference,” she protests.

“What’s happening in there? Tell me.”

Just like that, she gives me a run down and I listen to every word. I cling to her like a survivor does to a lifeboat. Midway her voice gets slower and quieter and her body molds more into me.

I bet she’s about to sleep on me, and the strangest part is, I’ll let her.

“I’ll tell you more tomor…” The word barely passes her lips before she dozes off on me.

I stop breathing and my body goes still. I don’t want to move a single muscle that’ll wake her up.

The low hum of the engine and the melody of the song fill the car.

I check the time and it’s 6:45 p.m.

Not two minutes later she jostles awake.

“I’m not asleep.” She stirs and looks around with sleepy eyes.

“I never said you are.” I scowl as she sits up straight but doesn’t move away from me.

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