My face recoils when the smell of vanilla and cloves fills my nostrils.
Simon grins through his beard, tapping his cigarette into the ashtray perched on the table next to him. “Filthy habit, I know. That’s why I only smoke when there’s a full moon.” He lifts his chin to the sky, and when I look up, I don’t know how I missed something so quietly beautiful.
I can’t help but think of all the other things I’ve never noticed. All the stuff I’ve never experienced. And I know I’m doing a horrible thing, but maybe there’s beauty in it too.
Because I’m finally and truly chasing my dreams.
For me, this is a fresh start.
I bring my eyes back to Simon and cross my arms over my chest to fight the dawn chill. “I brought what you asked for,” I say.
He nods. “I gathered you wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t.” He extends his hand expectantly.
I pause, adjusting the bag hanging from my shoulder, before bending down to retrieve the box at my feet.
There’s no going back now.
I thrust the container of sheet music in front of me, letting him grab hold of everything that will inevitably break my parents’ trust in me forever. Before I let go, I say, “I have one request.”
His peculiar eyes flash with mischief. I get the overwhelming feeling he’s not usually the type to grant requests, but his smile doesn’t fade. “What would that be?”
“I don’t want anyone to know who I am. Who my parents are.” I burn my stare into his, because this part can’t be negotiable. I don’t want to be treated any differently. I want to earn this, the way everyone else has.
It’s the only way I’ll know whether I truly belong.
He raises a brow. “If anyone finds out, it won’t be from me.” I let go of the box, and he shifts it onto the nearby table, looking quickly through the pages of music Dad worked so hard on. The music he worked so hard to keep secret.
I press my lips together and dig my heels into the concrete.
When he’s satisfied, he straightens like he’s getting back into character. “Simon Tarbottle. It’s a pleasure to officially meet you.”
I shake his hand, feeling my insides twist like cotton candy being spun around a stick. “Harley. And… thank you for this opportunity.”
He chuckles like I’ve said something amusing, before motioning over his shoulder. “I’ll just grab my suitcase.”
It feels like my skin is crawling with a billion tiny bugs. Big, ugly green ones. Representatives of my betrayal.
I try to ignore them.
Simon doesn’t say a word until we’re outside the city limits, the backdrop of Las Vegas hotels shrinking fast behind us.
“I’m guessing you’ve never run away from home before,” he says. He’s not smoking anymore, but I can still smell ash and vanilla.
“I’m not running away.” My voice clips. “I’m an adult—this is me moving out.”
His laugh is coarse. “Whatever you say, kid.”
We don’t speak for another whole hour.
“You been to Arizona before?” he asks, his fingers covered in silver rings that make a hypnotic clicking noise against the steering wheel every time he taps them in time with the music.
“No,” I say, soaking in the red and yellow desert that seems to stretch for an eternity. It’s so empty here. Lifeless.
I feel like there’s a kind of poetry in me leaving a place so vacant and dead, but I’m finding it hard to be excited. I’m too aware of what I’ve done—too aware that Mom and Dad are going to notice I’m gone any minute now and my phone is going to explode with angry texts.
Not that I’ll get them. We haven’t had a bar of signal for miles.
“I left home when I was sixteen,” he says suddenly, his chin jutted forward like he’s recalling a fond memory. He glances over at me, his amber eye like a hawk’s. “It’s scary at first, like you’re in a dark tunnel and you know there’s a monster watching you, and you’re just hoping to get the hell out of there before it decides it’s hungry. But you get out, eventually, and you’ll see you’re all right after all.”
I pin my eyes to the horizon. I’m not scared of a monster—I’m worried I’m the monster.
I’m worried my parents will never speak to me again.
But if I had stayed, my life never would have been my own. Leaving was my only option.
And I’m angry at them for that. Maybe even as angry as they’ll be