trunk. He laid his garment bag on top of it, moved her seat slightly back so she’d be more comfortable, bought himself some bottled water, some Coke, and got back on the road. He put on Rihanna’s “Only Girl,” the only girl in the world, and Zakiyyah put on Sam Cooke’s “You Send Me” as Ashton flew a hundred miles an hour across the Mojave while Cooke slowly warbled that she sent him, she thrilled him.
When it was his turn again, Ashton put on “Hey Baby” by Stephen Marley.
“Now that’s more like it,” Zakiyyah said, and actually smiled. Her dazzling smile lit up the desert.
“Aha,” said Ashton. He stared sideways at her beaming face. “You like Stephen Marley?”
“You like Stephen Marley,” Zakiyyah said. “I love Stephen Marley.”
Ashton turned his eyes to the road and the volume up. At the top of their lungs, together they sang “Hey Baby” along with Marley, afterward expressing a reluctant surprise that they’d finally found a song they both knew and liked.
“It’s one of my favorites,” Zakiyyah said.
“Mine, too,” Ashton said. “I love all the Marleys.”
“You do?”
“Yes, why? A white boy can’t like reggae?”
“Stop getting defensive every five seconds,” she said. “You don’t look like the type who would like Stephen Marley is all I’m saying.”
“What type is that, Z? The white type?”
“Why don’t you put on the song again instead of speaking. That would be best.”
“Couldn’t agree more.”
They sang along to “Hey Baby,” three more times, and then to UB40’s “Red Red Wine” and “Please Don’t Make Me Cry.” They sang along to everything because they knew it all. They argued about who was better, Sean Paul or Jimmy Cliff, agreed that Ziggy Marley was amazing, that Bob was in a class by himself, accepted that Third World and UB40 were fun to listen to, especially in the car with the top down, but both confessed to a particular weakness for Stephen Marley’s hip-hop/reggae brilliance. Next time they stopped, Zakiyyah asked for the top to be down and Ashton said, “Make up your mind, will you?” but he put it down happily, and they cruised down Desert Inn Road, cranking Marley all the way up and turning him down to passionately disagree about which album was better, Revelation Pt. I: The Root of Life or Revelation Pt. II: The Fruit of Life.
If, at the start of the trip, Ashton had been breaking every speed limit trying to get to the end of the journey faster, by the end, he was dogging it on Highway 15 at forty an hour, still trying to persuade the infuriatingly unpersuadable Zakiyyah that he was right and she was wrong.
They stopped at a watering hole in the Mojave to gas up and grab a quick snack. The food was gross. Old wrapped burritos, nachos with dried-up cheese, dubious-looking tuna sandwiches.
They got sodas and Doritos and brownies and potato chips and sat at the picnic table in the desert dust under a canopy, continuing their ardent conversation. The topic veered off to the horror genre.
“Your ignorance of classic horror, Zakiyyah,” Ashton said, “leaves you woefully unqualified to run my haunted house.”
“I have a job,” she said. “Why would I ever want to run your haunted house?”
“I didn’t say I was going to pay you,” Ashton said. “You’re not even qualified to run it for free.”
“I wouldn’t run it even if you paid me,” said Zakiyyah.
When their lunch at the decrepit picnic table on the side of the gas station convenience store in the middle of the desert began, Ashton knew he was sick in love with her. By the time it was over, he knew he couldn’t live without her.
Why are you looking at me like that? she said.
He waited to answer. Like what?
I don’t even know. Like I got something on my face.
Is that how I’m looking at you?
I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.
He said nothing.
What’s wrong with you? she said.
Everything’s wrong.
Ugh. What is it now?
Ashton didn’t say anything, he just stood up. He lifted himself off the bench, leaned all the way across the table, over their garbage train wreck of travel mart food, and kissed her.
For God’s sake, what do you think you’re doing, Zakiyyah exclaimed, breathed out. She dropped her drink. Her arms wrapped around his neck.
I really don’t know, he said. He came around the picnic table and pulled her up. His hands were in her hair, his lips were on her. His arms slipped down her back, down her cotton dress, pressing her