number I used to contact your father a few hours ago.”
She could never know how hard I’m trying not to smile. Turns out introducing her to my family might be easier than I’d imagined; she’s already one of us. I don’t mean to give my family too much credit; honestly, we’re not that crafty. But it appears our motivations and means are quite similar. Though the greatest benefit of her story comes from my ability to drop any worry that she’s working in collusion with the feds, setting up my family—and me. I know Melody’s had to develop skills at deception and misleading people that I could never understand, but I could never be convinced this elaborate scheme was scripted.
Melody turns her hands out as if to imply, That’s all I got.
I can no longer restrain the smile, and it bursts through embedded in laughter. “Man, Melody, you really are…” She looks at me like she’s anxious to hear the rest, leans forward like she wants to make sure she hears the punch line of the sentence. Instead, I just repeat it, and end it: “You really are.” I mentally follow with all the things I’m thinking but cannot confess: beautiful, clever, misunderstood.
She sits back, nods in disappointment: It’s okay.
I start the car and pull away from the café. Rain begins to trickle, noticeable on the windshield before it can be felt. I put the top up while we’re slowly drifting toward a red light. Normally, a few drops of rain would mean nothing, but I use it as an excuse to keep us veiled from the outside world. We roll out to I-68, and as the sun drops and our speed increases, the temperature in the car has cooled enough that I put the windows up. The sudden quietness in the cab makes noticeable how we’re not talking.
Melody rests back like she’s considering sleep, then slowly turns her head to me. I can sense her staring; I ignore it for a while, but feel compelled to return it. I catch her stare, clear my throat and ask, “Do you want me to take you anywhere?”
She keeps her eyes on me, reaches down and unbuckles her seat belt, carefully leans over and drops her head to my lap, lays her cheek on my thigh, and says, “Yes, take me anywhere.”
Within seconds, the heat of her face seeps through to my leg. I glance at her long torso extended across the center of the cab, at the rise and fall of her curves. I try to again remember her as the innocent little girl twirling about the sidewalk in front of Vincent’s, but that image is nowhere to be found. I can’t deny that the grown woman whose body is stretched before me has developed into a masterpiece, a work of art worthy of study and emulation. It would be easy to dismiss how attracted I am to her, that our history together is improperly skewing my opinion of who she is, but it seems unlikely; isn’t the girl next door, the one you’ve known over too many years, the one usually overlooked? Even if how she’s been a significant part of my life and attention for so long is somehow influencing me, it doesn’t change the fact that she is genuinely attractive—it just makes her more attractive.
I take my right hand from the steering wheel and let it slowly drop to her shoulder and I squeeze it softly, run my thumb gently against the back of it. She takes a deep breath, and as she lets it out, she slides her hand around my thigh and underneath, so that it rests between the seat and my leg.
We drive like this for ten minutes and she eventually falls asleep. Every now and then she makes a quiet vocal sound in her sleep like a newborn. I notice her shirt has drifted up and exposed her midriff and back. I carefully slide my hand over and try to pull her shirt down to keep her warm, but I accidentally brush her skin, and as I do her body shifts a little and rises to meet my hand, and I keep it there longer than I should.
Then I remember why I’m doing all of this, why I want to set her free—and none of it has to do with feeling anything romantic toward Melody. Without question, romance is the worst thing I could offer her. I quickly return both hands to the steering