Page 44 of Isn't It Obvious?
“And it went okay?” he asks, those very drunk puppy-dog eyes full of hope.
“It didn’t go as badly as I feared, or as well as I hoped. I think that’s true for a lot of people.”
Leo deflates a little bit. “Do you think that will be true for me?”
Ravi wishes he could tell him that everything will be okay, that he’ll be welcomed with open arms. But he doesn’t know Leo’s family, and even if he did, sometimes people surprise you in the worst kind of way. “I don’t know. Nobody can tell you for sure before it happens.”
Leo deflates further. “How did you decide to do it, then? If you didn’t know?”
“I think, at some point, it felt better to me to have them know, no matter what happened,” he says. That’s not quite true, though. It was more like there was something eating at him, slowly but surely, and there was only one way he could make it stop. “Or maybe it just felt too awful for them not to know.”
“Okay,” Leo says.
“Hey, guys,” Yael says softly, the car slowing to a stop. “We’re here.”
“Leo, you need to do what’s right for you. I can’t tell you what that is,” Ravi says, “but I can listen, okay?” He waits for Leo’s nod, then presses the button to release his seat belt. “Alright, let’s get you to the house.”
ALIGHT INSIDEflicks on as they approach, and Yael gives Leo a sidelong glance. He’s not fooling anybody in this state. At the door, she helps him unlock it and waits for the sound of his footsteps inside to fade away before turning back to the car.
She finds Ravi leaning against her car’s front passengerdoor, one ankle crossed over the other, his arms folded. “He’ll be in a lot of trouble,” he says.
“Yeah, probably.”
“You don’t feel a touch of guilt, delivering him to his sentencing?”
Yael shrugs. “My job as a SafeRide is to get them home in one piece, no questions asked. The rest is up to their parents.”
Ravi looks at her for a long moment, and the glint in his eyes sends a shiver down her spine. She is suddenlyveryaware of the fact that she doesn’t have a bra on under what was the most accessible item in her closet—her favorite loose cotton jersey dress that now seems quite thin to her. She’d cross her arms over her ribs for warmth, but that would pull the fabric taut, which would be much, much worse.
“I didn’t know you could be so ruthless with anyone but me,” he says.
She balks at the suggestion. “I’m not being ruthless,” she sputters. “That’s what the deal is! And it’s good, you know. We haven’t had a drunk-driving accident since the program started. When kids are afraid to get in trouble, they do stupid, dangerous things. The point is to delay the trouble long enough that they won’t be stupid, not to get them off scot-free.”
And, God, he laughs.Incredibly frustrating.
A breeze cuts right through the weave of her dress, and this time Yael has to use all her mental fortitude not to wrap her arms around herself.
“Here,” Ravi says, pulling off his shearling-lined denim jacket.
Yael lifts her chin. “I’m fine.”
“Sure, except that you’re cold.”
“I don’t need your coat,” she says.
“Just take it, will you? Christ,” he says. He thrusts it ather before getting into the car and shutting the door loudly behind him, and she’s surprised enough to slip it on.
Mistake. It smells like him, fresh and warm. But he’s looking at her through the car window expectantly, and ripping the jacket off and throwing it back at him like she wants to do would make her look petty and ridiculous. She takes deep, careful breaths on the walk to the driver’s side, and by the time she climbs in, she’s pretty sure she’s projecting her desired air of normalcy.
“Where do you live?”
“Laurelhurst,” he says. “It’s across the river—”
“I know where Laurelhurst is,” she interrupts, starting the car and pulling onto the street.
Ravi sighs loudly. “I’m just saying you don’t need to drive me all the way there if it’s too far.”
“Nowhere in Portland is too far away at this time of night,” she says.
