Page 174 of When the Storm Breaks
Calla played DJ, scrolling through playlists with the same quiet intensity she approached everything else with. She never said it outright, but I knew—music was how she let me in.
I never asked to play anything. I never needed to.
I learned her moods through the songs. Felt the shifts when she played something soft and aching. When she reached for my hand on certain lyrics.
What I never told her—never got the chance to—was that I made playlists too.
For when she was ready.
I never asked. I would never take that from her. I wanted it to be hers—something she gave me freely.
But still, I made them.
Just in case.
Just in case one day, she wanted to hear from me the same way I had listened to her.
From the driver’s seat, I always traced my fingers over her thigh. I saw her trying to figure it out—the loops, the swirls, the start and end.
But I never admitted the truth.
That every time, my fingers wrote the same words.
I love you.
That was the first time I said it.
The first time I told her.
Traced it into her skin.
That last drive, I was reckless. My hand tangled lazily in her hair, kissing her at every stop sign, every red light.
Sealing my fate.
Making promises she didn’t even know I’d made.
And once, when there wasn’t even a stop sign at all.
I knew it was dangerous. But in that moment, kissing her felt more important than being alive.
She laughed breathlessly, swatting my arm. “There wasn’t even a stop sign!”
I just tightened my grip in her hair, pulling her closer.
“Didn’t need one,” I muttered, breath warm against her lips—then kissed her again, like I couldn’t bear to let her go.
When I finally pulled over on a quiet stretch of road with no streetlights, I kissed her harder. Deeper. One hand still tangled in her hair, the other gripping her waist like she was the only thing tethering me to this world.
Like she was the sun, and I was just a planet in her orbit.
Like loving her was the only real thing I’d ever known.
She climbed over the console without hesitation, pressing into me. The air between us filled with the kind of longing that always felt inevitable.
She made it so easy to love her. It was effortless.
The stove timer beeps, yanking me back into the present.
