Too fast. Everything is moving too fast.

Riley's fingers ache from how tightly she's gripping the steering wheel. Dave is rumbling along the roadway, nothing but stretches of concrete in either direction, but the scenery is passing too quickly for her to make out where she's going. No way to orient herself. Just the world cascading by in an increasingly fast blur.

She glances down to the speedometer in front of her. The arrow ticking up and to the right with each passing second.

Too fast. She needs to slow down. She needs to stop.

When she puts her foot on the brake, nothing happens. Dave doesn't even hesitate. In fact, slamming the brakes seems to have the opposite effect—she can feel the engine revving beneath her and sending her careening even more wildly down the roadway.

"It's not—," she starts, surprised by how her throat is so dry. She clears it, but it does nothing to alleviate the effect. Not responding, just like the brakes.

She knows she has to make the car stop. She can remember what she's supposed to do, the memory of something warm and supportive guiding her towards the right maneuver. But she feels disconnected from it, like a recollection that doesn't belong to her. That she was never supposed to have, a mistaken acquisition just like all her other choices.

But she knows who to ask. If anyone will know how to fix the problem, she knows it would be him. And he's been there by her side every mile since he entered her life, so she doubts he's going to let her down now.

When she turns her head to request his help, the words get caught in her throat.

The passenger seat is glaringly empty.

She wants to call out for him, to bring him back to her side, but much like the awareness of knowing what to do in this situation, her memory surrounding him is foggy. Like he's disappeared from her consciousness just as swiftly as he entered it, taking everything with him including his name.

Ice sears through her chest, an ache spreading in the pit of her stomach. She's overwhelmed with the sudden sensation that she's lost something irreplaceable, so painful to misplace that tears form in the back of her throat even though she can't even remember what is was. A nameless ghost, leaving her to deal with the danger alone.

Danger. Imminent. Immediate. Out of her control.

"Help!" she croaks, at a loss for what else to do. Abandoned and without any other options, groveling for a scrap of anything feels like her last resort. "Help, I'm—,"

"Oh, Riley, don't be so loud. There's no reason you can't dial it down a couple notches."

The passenger seat is no longer empty. Tilting her head from the road she finds the unmistakable form of her mother, polished to perfection as usual and eyeing the situation with careful consideration. Seemingly unmoved by the fact that they're barreling down the highway at horrific speed and far from able to slow themselves down.

Topanga raises an eyebrow, nodding towards the steering wheel. "Keep your eyes on the road, honey. The last place you want to let that mind of yours wander is behind the wheel."

Riley fights back her tears, even more important now that her mother is watching her. She can't seem fragile in front of her, can't let even the thinnest of cracks appear in her composed façade. The last time she let such a thing happen resulted in a full-on demolition, and although her mother witnessed the wreckage and was there to help pick up the pieces she's never treated her the same since.

When all Riley expected was a little more empathy, instead the scrutiny just seemed to intensify. As if Topanga believes if she eyes her every move, she'll be able to find which tiny part of her daughter isn't working quite right. Then she'll get it patched up and rebuild the perfect daughter she so desperately wanted.

Allowing her thoughts to drift for a second, especially to such a dark place, hasn't helped her trajectory. Riley blinks back into the moment and gasps, swerving the vehicle back onto the shoulder instead of back into four lanes of incoming traffic.

"Mom, I need you to help me," she croaks. It hurts to swallow.

Topanga sighs. Sympathetic, but in a way that makes her feel even smaller.

"Riley, I can't help you unless you help yourself first. And can you honestly tell me that you feel as though you've made all the right choices to avoid ending up in this situation?" Topanga turns her gaze to her, a particular brand of critical and condescending with the usual light smile on her face. "I mean, I'm sure if we work our way back through your decisions as of late, we can easily deduce how we got to this point."

Riley doesn't care about how she got here. What she cares about is stopping their free-wheeling joy ride before they slam into the highway dividers at more than sixty miles per hour.

"Please, I just need help—,"

"I don't know, Riles," a new, smooth baritone replaces the voice of her mother. It's a shock to hear, guiding her attention back to the passenger seat. When his blue eyes meet hers, it's like she's been thrown right back into college. "You always seemed to prefer doing things alone."

There's nothing she can say to Evan that will make his words untrue. There's nothing more she can ask of him, because the last time she needed his help—or anyone's help, for that matter—she didn't know how to ask for it. She didn't ask, and he didn't offer it when she truly needed it.

He made her feel less lonely, most of the time. But he didn't keep her from being alone.

Still too fast. When she blinks, Evan is no longer there but instead the terrified eyes of her father are staring back at her, frantically gesturing her to the road. "Riley, watch where you're going!"

Riley jerks her head back to the lane in front of her, feeling a shooting pain erupt across the back of her neck before pooling into warmth she knows can't be good. Whatever muscle she just pulled, it's not going to be the worst of it if she doesn't get this thing to stop.

But she can't think. She can't orient herself. She doesn't know if she'll ever be able to get rid of that hole in her chest that's making it hard to breathe.

"You have got to stop doing this, Riley!" Cory snaps, his tone harsh. It's not out of anger, she knows—it's out of concern, frustration born out of love, and that's almost worse than fury. "You can spiral all you want on your own time, it's your life, but what about the rest of us? Did you even think about that? Did you think about me?"

"I'm sorry." She shakes her head, trying to get her words to work correctly. "I never meant for this to happen. I don't know how—,"

"It doesn't matter how," he says curtly, waving her off. Directly contradicting her mother, making the solution more confusing to identify. "Just make it stop."

She wishes she could. More than anything, she wishes everything would just stop.

"Why are you doing this, Riley?"

She feels her breath catch in her throat. Allowing her gaze to drift from the road one more time, she locks eyes with her younger brother sitting in the passenger seat. All curly hair and wide eyes and an inquisitive brow that seem far more wise than she thinks he should be permitted to be.

"Why?" Auggie examines her, eyes rimmed with that same wetness from one of the last times she saw him in person. Heavy, attempting to grapple with a situation so far out of his realm of understanding. "Is it because of something I did?"

"Auggie, no," she stammers, shaking her head. She clears her throat, willing it strong enough to gift her more than a few strained words. "This has nothing to do with you. This is me. And I'm figuring out how to fix it."

He lets his eyes shift to the road careening by behind her. "Are you?"

"I'm trying. I'm trying everything I can."

"But at what point is that enough?" Topanga jumps back in, somewhere behind her in the back seat. "Do you think that's going to be enough?"

"I asked for help, and no one is helping me!"

"You wanted to be alone," Evan states.

"You've always been so good at being alone. So independent," Cory laments, struggling to figure out how they ended up in this mess.

Topanga clicks her tongue. "I should've never trusted you to be alone."

"Alone," Auggie repeats. He holds her gaze. "You were going to leave me alone."

Riley is out of words. Her throat is cracked dry, not granting her another word. She shakes her head, releasing her grip on the steering wheel with one hand to reach out for her little brother.

It's the biggest mistake she could have made.

"Riley, look out!"

She sees Auggie's whole expression twist in fear. Her eyes flit back to the road, where the end of the line seems to have appeared out of nowhere. The time to stop has come, and she's barreling uncontrollably towards it with no power to do so.

When her eyes flit back to the passenger seat, it's empty again. Echoing the sentiment that she's alone, just as her world fills with stars and the sound of metal crunching accents the way every piece of her seems to fold in on itself, collapsing the world into fragments and then infinite darkness.


The moment Dave hits the wall, Riley jumps awake with a choked gasp. She grasps for the comforter as a tether to reality, still very much wrapped in the fast-paced adrenaline of the dream.

Her heart is pounding like a kickdrum, rattling in her ribcage and threatening to explode. Her throat aches just as sharply. She feels her cheeks wet with tears, and more are already pooling in the corners of her eyes.

She's alive, the deadly crash only a nightmare. But the panic of it left behind is all too real.

Riley forces herself to sit up, cradling her head in her hands and trying to calm her breathing. It's been ages since she's had a nightmare of this shade, and never before has the threat of it felt so authentic. Usually she's able to talk herself down by picking through all of the fallacies, highlighting all of the ways the dream felt so pointedly unreal.

But this peril was not so unbelievable. Not so easy to spin herself out of the spiral.

"Come on," she whimpers, chewing on her thumbnail and screwing her eyes shut. Trying to get the image of the speeding highway out of her head, trying to forget the way everything seemed to crumble into ruin in seconds.

She's not helping herself. She can feel the tingling in her palms, the tell-tale sign that this spiral is far from over lest she come up with some magical trick to thwart the panic before it rises full force into its planned attack.

Riley throws the covers off of her, stumbling out of bed and towards the door to the hall.

When she emerges into the dark hallway, a new sense of dread takes over her muscles. For a moment, she forgets where she is and all that it's taken to get here, and she's consumed with fear at the prospect at being in an unfamiliar home. No sense of where she should go or whether she belongs there or not.

She spots the bathroom halfway down, pushing down her panic to hobble her way towards it. As she crashes through the doorway and flicks on the light, she only gets seconds to close the door behind her and flick on the ceiling fan before the terror fights back.

Her panic isn't the only thing it pushes back up. Riley drops to her knees over the toilet just in time to vomit. At the very least, she can feel grateful not to have thrown up on something irreplaceable. She'd be a pretty terrible guest otherwise.

Once the nausea subsides and bile stops making her throat burn, Riley rolls back into a sitting position and leans back against the cool porcelain of the bathtub. She pushes the stray fly-aways out of her face, thankful she tied her hair back into a braid before falling asleep.

The ceiling seems to swirl slightly above her, little black fish swimming in her vision the longer she stares at the fluorescent bulb glaring back down on her.

It had been so long since a nightmare. So long since she felt this blatantly alone.

Unable to look at the endless white of the ceiling any longer, Riley pushes herself onto her hands and knees. It's a slow rise to her full height and then a careful walk to the sink, taking the time to swish around some water to get the acrid taste out of her mouth. There's a lot she wants to think about—wants to contemplate and pick apart—but her mind is barely in working order. Logical thinking, she decides, will have to wait until tomorrow.

She can't help but notice the way her hands are trembling as she moves to turn off the faucet. They continue to as she turns out the light and steps back into the hall, eyes adjusting to the dark with each moment she lingers in the space.

Although exhaustion creeps into her muscles as the adrenaline wears off, she cannot fathom heading back to that room. Due to no fault of its own—it's quite a nice guest room, all things considered—but due to the way her chest constricts at the thought of facing that territory again. Having to lay in that bed surrounded by nothing but her thoughts.

So, so alone.

But she's not. It's what her mind tried to tell her even as the walls were caving in and the danger speeding up the world around her—that warmth and ghost of a memory that almost gave her the guidance to figure out the problem on her own.

Her eyes drift to the stairs, that same sense of warmth guiding her in that direction.

She'll simply ask him to come stay with her. Not the most logical request, certainly, but she's already deemed logic a forsaken entity of the night. He already refused the offer once, but she likes to tell herself that was more on the basis of being a gentleman than an actual desire to stay as far away from her as possible.

When she makes it to the foot of the stairs and spins to find the living room, however, the notion of such a bold move escapes her.

Lucas is asleep on the couch, tall form just able to fit comfortably within the space limitations and tucked underneath a quilt blanket she's ninety percent sure Rachel must've draped over him before heading to bed. Baby the tabby cat is asleep on his legs, the two of them resting soundly as moonlight bathes them in soft grey through the window.

She can't bring herself to do it. She knows from observation how inclined he is to have restless nights—taking this one away from him just because the tables have turned on her feels selfish. She can't wake him up just to force him to help her with her own sleeplessness.

Even still, the mere image of him sleeping so soundly eases some of the tension in her chest. The reminder that he's nearby, and he's certainly not going to leave her alone.

But then, she realizes, maybe that's all part of the problem. One of the early signs of the trouble in her nightmare was the fact that he wasn't there, and she could hardly remember a thing about him through the haze of hysteria. She's had those worries in the real world, too, the nervous thought that he'll just float right out of her life as quickly as he entered it. And without a cell phone to share, she wouldn't be able to find him again.

She can only handle one panic attack per night. She forces the thought out of her mind, closing her eyes and clenching her fists and walking herself through a deep breath. Grounding herself back to reality.

When she opens her eyes again, he's still there. As he has been since she met him.

Tentatively, she pads her way across the hardwood and approaches the couch. Bunny lifts his head from laying on his paws, eyeing her curiously from the dog bed where he appears to have been watching Baby sleep enviously with their new housemate. She gives him a timid smile as she lowers herself onto the floor, resting her side against the base of the couch and wrapping her arms around her knees.

She lets her gaze drift to Lucas again, in awe of how gentle his features are. She remembers feeling similarly when they shared a bed at the last motel, and when he dozed off on the ride to the beach. Perhaps because he carries himself with such intensity throughout the day, muted but still noticeable to anyone who took longer than a few seconds to look for it.

Here, and in those moments, the walls come down. He's safe, uninhibited, and Riley hopes that she can make him realize that he's allowed to be that way in the light of day, too. When she told him she heard him, that she wants to hear him, she meant it. She wants him to know it as confidently as she feels it.

More than anything, she hopes that he gets the same sense of comfort that she does when he's with her. The knowledge that at the end of the day—when the nightmare cuts and it is indeed just a dream—they're not alone.

Bunny's collar jingles as he rises from his spot across the room, lumbering his way over to her in interested anticipation. She can't help but smile as she reaches out to scratch him behind the ears, feeling even more secure as he settles down in front of her.

Riley props her chin on her arm, tilting her head back against the couch. She keeps her gaze on Lucas until some of the peaceful energy makes its way into her system, causing her eyes to flutter closed. One hand scratching Bunny's belly, the other gripping tight to her knee to keep everything from folding in on itself again.


When Riley comes around at a more reasonable hour, it's as if she didn't sleep at all. Unsurprising, considering she only got about an hour of rest when she dozed off in front of the couch before she jolted awake and crept back upstairs to wait out the rest of the night. Although being in the presence of Lucas and their current animal companions did ease her nerves, she figured he wouldn't appreciate waking up to find her so close without a warning. It takes enough caution to enter his personal space when he's fully conscious.

She sits up with a groan, rubbing her face and willing the headache tapping behind her eyes to disappear. With the sunlight permeating the room the shadows don't feel as intimidating, but the questions and decisions from the night don't gain any clarity.

Although, she supposes, the reason the nightmare seemed to reappear out of the blue does have a logical explanation. Despite how well she likes to believe she's handling it, the near-death experience she endured with Dave could probably be considered a traumatic event. It makes sense that coming so close to serious danger would trigger some of those old memories and fears to jump back to the forefront of her mind, albeit subconsciously. Especially given the context of her nightmare this time around, it definitely makes sense.

Whether she wants to admit it to herself or not, that stalled brake could've done more damage than just roughing up her car. If Lucas hadn't been there, she might not still be here.

Lucas is the piece that remains confusing. While comprehending her feelings about him has always been an unexpected challenge, adding the layers of heroism to it doesn't help matters. Even before last night she'd been grappling with how easy it felt to get lost in him, how badly she wanted to figure every part of him out, how she found herself drifting closer to him in any given moment like some sort of gravitational pull. What does it say about them that he's been the only thing able to pull her out of impending panic, both in the car on the brink of disaster and in the middle of a sleepless night?

She keeps trying to apply logic to him, to whatever relationship they share now, and the truth of the matter is it can't be done. The two of them defy logic, and maybe that makes her foolish or impractical, but at this point she doesn't care. She's always been imaginative, a romantic, all traits that her mother considered weaknesses rather than assets—so why should she change her tune now? Her desire to explore the unknown, to uncover just how foolishly and impractically deep their growing connection can go, is far stronger than her aversion to the illogical.

Still, maybe a third party opinion would be some help. One last search for sanity before she goes full-tilt into Rileytown.

There's only one person she can even think of talking to about the situation. Her lack of discussing it up to this point shouldn't be so odd when one considers the fact that she can name the people she trusts on one hand, and the number of people who she would actually talk about something so crazy is basically down to one finger.

She pulls herself out of bed and jogs over to close her bedroom door, feigning getting ready for a semblance of privacy. Then she grabs her phone from the side table, dialing their number and pacing the floor as the phone rings pointedly in her ear.

Just as she's considering giving up—she must be annoying her, after all—her friend picks up.

"Hello? Riley?"

Riley lets out a sigh of relief, crossing her arms and smiling. "Jade. Hi."

"Hi, is everything okay?" She hears rustling on the other end. "You're not calling me because you're trapped in a ditch or something are you? Did you crash? Call 9-1-1—,"

"No, no, I'm fine. Had some close calls, I'll admit, but I'm all good. What makes you assume that's the only reason I'd call?"

There's a pause. "Well, it is like five in the morning."

Riley grimaces, muttering a cuss under her breath. She had completely forgotten about the time change.

"Shit," she exhales, immediately itchy with guilt. "I'm so sorry, Jade. I didn't even think about that. Traveling so much, time is sort of like, fake—,"

"It's okay, seriously," Jade assures her. She's always been Riley's most understanding friend, once again making her regret taking so long to actually focus on their friendship rather than getting lost in the weeds of everything else. "But you can see why I had to assume the worst."

"Yeah, that makes sense."

"So, what, then?" She can imagine Jade's inquisitive eyebrow raise perfectly. Quiet as she might be, she has a sharp bullshit detector. As annoying as it could be, it did come in handy during their last year of college. "Am I really supposed to believe you're calling this early to tell me about your journey across the prairies of middle America?"

Riley releases a sigh, flopping back against the bed. "No, I guess you wouldn't."

"I don't," Jade confirms. "So what happened?"

She doesn't even know where to begin. And now that she's put herself in the position of talking about it, she doesn't know how to even broach the topic of her car companion without sounding completely insane.

"You have to promise not to judge me. And not to laugh or… question my sanity. Or call my mother."

"Never," she responds, as if the latter is even a question. "But now you're kind of freaking me out. Riley, what's going on?"

Another pause, just long enough for Riley to piece together a sampling of her conflicted thoughts. "You know how people sometimes pick up hitchhikers, right?"

Once she gets started, it's surprisingly hard to stop talking about Lucas Friar. She gives Jade the full story—how she ran into him, how stupid the decision seemed at the time but how many times over its paid off in the last couple of weeks. She explains the Applebee's treachery, the lessons, their brief stint with the heir to Minkus International. She can't seem to stop talking about all the things she likes about him—his soft-spoken nature, his complex combination of bashful and defensive, his tendency to jump to her defense whether it's against the distrustful Applebee's staff or a broken suspension system careening them down the highway.

She attempts to explain the mystery surrounding him, all the questions she doesn't know the answers to and the pieces that don't add up. The napkin phone number, the odd behavior at the gas station, the evasion of touch and how all of it seems to be safely hidden away under years of practiced self-defense and a protective layer of denim. She tries to paint an accurate picture without raising alarm or sharing something that feels like it isn't hers to share, which turns out to be more complicated than expected with how intertwined their narratives seem to have become over the course of the trip.

When she finally reaches present day and her current uncertain terrain, her throat hurts from talking so much. In her heart, though, she knows she could've talked for an hour more. She feels like she's only scratched the surface.

Jade is silent for a long moment, evidently processing all that she's been told. "You've been traveling with this guy for days? Sharing rooms and stuff?"

Riley is grateful that if Jade is judging her, it doesn't show in her tone. "Yep."

"And he didn't kill you? Or make any obvious attempts to do so?"

"Not yet, no. At this point I've sort of ruled that an unlikely possibility."

She hums thoughtfully. "And he's never made you feel uncomfortable? Like, have you felt unsafe? And be honest."

"No." How quickly Riley is able to answer the question speaks enough for itself. She rolls onto her side, propping herself up on her elbow. "And that's what's so weird about it, if anything I feel safer when he's around. Like I'll be honest, J, traveling the country by yourself is not the most relaxing endeavor."

"Let alone as a woman. No, I believe you."

"But it's like after the first couple of days of adjusting to one another, he's definitely made this trip infinitely better. Easier. And I've never felt uncomfortable around him, especially considering like I said, I'm usually the one inevitably putting us in close quarters. He's not short of chivalry, I can assure you of that."

"Where have all the good men gone," Jade muses, sing-song. She hesitates, formulating her next question. "I mean, what do you want from me, exactly? What do you want me to say?"

A fair question. Riley shrugs, pushing herself into a sitting position. "I don't know, honestly. Permission to be an idiot? Confirmation that I'm not crazy?"

"Well, I can't give you that, we both know you're bonkers. But you've always been that way, it's one of my favorite things about you."

Riley smiles in spite of herself. "Well, thank you."

"But you're not an idiot. And I don't know, I mean, if you're telling me the truth and he hasn't been problematic or given any obvious indication that he's dangerous… what am I supposed to say? Stop having a fun road trip with this seemingly awesome guy you befriended on the side of the road?" She huffs. "Especially when you've already crossed the line and kissed him once."

"Twice."

"Wait, seriously?" Jade's voice indicates how wide her eyes must be. "You've kissed more than once? You didn't tell me that part."

Her cheeks are suddenly warm. She shrugs awkwardly. "The first time was the lesson thing. The second time was… well, I didn't exactly anticipate it."

"And you still feel comfortable after that. That didn't freak you out."

She shrugs again. "If anything, I was more disappointed that he pulled back. I know that sounds insane."

"It does," Jade admits. But she doesn't seem overly concerned, which Riley counts as a good sign. "I mean, is he cute?"

Yes. Undeniably. Extremely. Excruciatingly. "I'm not dignifying that with a response."

"I know it's subjective, but I think that's what you should really be concerned about. If you're probably going to throw yourself deeper into this rabbit hole anyway. Can I get a picture?"

"Jade."

"Look, Riley," she says with a laugh. Riley can hear the exhaustion creeping back into her voice, indicating this call likely isn't going to last much longer. "You might be crazy, but your instincts are sharper than anyone I know. If this situation presented any actual danger, I'm sure you would've sussed it out by now."

Although she had figured out that much for herself, it is a relief to hear someone else say it. She nods, before remembering that Jade can't see it. "Right."

"If you're looking for like, my blessing or whatever… sure. You have my blessing to follow your gut, and trust that regardless of what else unfolds. This has nothing to do with him and everything to do with you. You've spent so much of your life following the gospel of others, that yeah, it's going to be scary to follow your own. Especially in a situation like this, which does have a lot of… grey areas as far as societal acceptance."

"Trust me, I'm well aware."

"Good. As long as you know that, and you're listening to yourself and not letting anyone else's perception color your decisions… then go forth. Do whatever you're going to do, just do it with the confidence that you're doing what feels right to you."

It's odd to think about, but she knows that her friend is onto something. This road trip is one of the first things she's ever done on her own, driven by her own ambition and decisiveness. Being open to possibilities with Lucas is the next big decision, and to be fair it feels much grander and more important than a cross-country trip.

But the ball is in her court. She has the power to decide how things unfold, and it's up to her to wield that power. Everything else is just white noise.

"I'll do my best." She feels a sudden ache in her chest, hit with the realization of how sincerely she appreciates her best friend. "Thank you, Jade. Seriously, thanks."

"Of course. Any time. And I still want a picture. In return for my early morning efforts."

Riley rolls her eyes. "I'll consider it." She hesitates. "I miss you."

"I miss you too, girlie," Jade assures her, and warmth spreads through her. How nice it is, the reassurance that you're an irreplaceable piece in someone else's world. "I can't wait to hear about the rest of your trip. We'll talk soon, I'm sure. Just maybe not at six in the morning."

"Deal," Riley laughs. "Talk to you later."

"Nighty night," she says distantly, obviously well on her way back to bed. Riley grins as Jade ends the call, clasping her phone in her hand and pressing it to her chin.

Now that the uncertainty has faded, she's filled with an entirely new emotion. Anticipation pricks at her nerves and propels her with a unique kind of electricity as she gets ready for the day, much more enthusiastic about what the future holds than she was when she woke up.

When she descends the stairs and reenters the main floor, she's a bit surprised to find Lucas still asleep. He looks just as restful as he did hours earlier only now Bunny has joined the cuddle, half-sprawled on top of him with his head laying contently against his torso. Baby still holds court on Lucas's legs, keeping one eye open to watch Bunny warily.

The view is endearing in the deepest way possible. Riley can't help but grin, glued to the spot and fully aware of the butterflies that have taken up residency in her stomach.

"Isn't it so funny?" Rachel says from behind her, directing her attention to the kitchen. She's brewing herself a cup of coffee, auburn hair pulled back in a messy ponytail. "The way they're smothering him you'd think we're neglectful pet owners. I promise we're not, he's just got a quality about him or something."

She feels like she knows that quality all too well. She's likely a victim of it herself.

"I won't argue with you there," Riley says genially. She saunters to the bottom of the steps. "To be honest, I'm surprised he isn't awake yet. We've been doing a lot of early mornings on the road, so I guess I just assumed he was an early riser."

Rachel snorts, nodding. "He can be, but not by choice. At least, if he's the same as he was a few years ago. I don't know, I feel like it's a guy thing. But if we don't bother him, my bet is he'll crash there until noon. Especially with Bunny and Baby enabling him like that." She gestures Riley into the kitchen, nodding towards the table. "Can I get you anything? How did you sleep? That bed in the guest room can be too soft for some people—,"

"It was perfect," Riley assures her, taking her directive and stepping onto the tile flooring. She opts not to mention the nightmare or the time she spent on the floor of the bathroom—all that certainly isn't the fault of the bed in any case. "Decaf?"

Rachel grins, raising her mug indicatively. "Fresh pot. Help yourself to however much you need."

As she picks a mug from the eclectic selection in the cupboard and pours herself a cup, Riley lets her mind buzz with the proper way to approach a conversation with her surprise host. Rachel is effortlessly pleasant, of course, but she's also an unanticipated and seemingly vast store of knowledge on Lucas from a period of his life that he refuses to discuss. She doesn't want to come off as nosy, but she's desperate for more clues to help her complete the jigsaw puzzle of his personal history. Whatever scraps she can elicit out of this brand new source, she's going to do her best to get them.

"So," she starts, settling down into the seat across from her and focusing on tearing a sugar packet. "Lucas used to work for you?"

Rachel laughs lightly, instinctively lowering her voice an octave or two. Whether it's to avoid waking Lucas or to keep him from overhearing them talking so openly about him, either way it's for his sake.

"I wouldn't necessarily call it working for me. It wasn't nearly official enough for that. One day I came home from the store with Esther, and this scruffy teenager is walking around the neighborhood going door-to-door. I had half a mind to call the cops on behalf of neighborhood watch—you know, no soliciting and all that, and he really did look off. I mean, dusty and sun-tanned and like he didn't know where he was. Like, there was the glimmer of who he was shining through, but it was so starkly out of place. Like in an instant, you could tell that he didn't belong."

Riley thinks about the first time she ran into him, how she recognized those same traits. The tan, the grit like he just arose out of the dust billowed up on the side of the road, but more so than anything that lack of belonging. She can remember how distinctly she could tell from the moment she locked eyes with him that he was searching for direction. For a way to escape.

It's sobering, she thinks, to know he displayed that quality even in the place that should technically have been home.

"So he gets to my door, this nowhere boy, and I've got my cell phone in my hand ready to dial. I mean, I'm with kid you know, and I'm not taking any chances." Riley nods along, remembering that phase of getting to know him too. "But all he asks is if I'd be willing to throw him a few dollars if he volunteers to mow my lawn. And don't get me wrong, this is still weird, but it seemed harmless enough. Lord knew Rick wasn't going to do it, so I figured hey. Why not?"

"And that was it? He just stayed and mowed your lawn."

"Well, no. You'd think it would be." Rachel takes a long sip of her coffee. Riley can't tell if it's for dramatic effect or not. "But a few weeks after that first time, he disappeared. Didn't see him until about… a year? A year and half later? That time, he hung around a bit longer. Few months. That was when I actually started to make headway with him, at least gave him a grilled cheese or two for his trouble."

Riley can't help but smile. "Sure he appreciated that. He loves them."

"Religiously so, I know. Weirdo." She runs a finger along the rim of her mug, obviously lost in the memories. "Feels like a million years ago. Time feels so endless, but so much can change in such short stretches of it. I have to admit, part of me did hesitate before moving to North Carolina. The thought of him coming back around and me not being there to greet him…"

The silence is heavy between them. Although she's known him for far shorter a time, Riley feels like she understands Rachel's dread completely. Or some inverse replica of it. For all the times Rachel must've imagined his face when he showed up on her doorstep and found it empty, she can think of a second spent on that fleeting fear that when she wakes up, he won't be there. That she'll go out to the car, and Dave will still be there, but he'll be long gone.

Rachel just said it herself—he disappeared. One day he was there, and the next…

"But it worked out," Riley states, as if it'll comfort both of them. "You gave him your number, and here we are."

"I'm amazed he remembered it, honestly. But you're right on that front."

She takes a sip of her coffee, allowing the heat of the beverage on her tongue to wake her up more effectively than any caffeine would. She attempts to build a timeline in her head, building out the world of Lucas's existence before she stumbled into it.

"How old did you think he was when you first met him? That first time he showed up in your neighborhood."

Rachel hums thoughtfully, twirling the end of her ponytail on her shoulder. "It's hard to remember. The second time, that's so much more vivid considering he actually talked to me. But he can't have been more than… I don't know, twenty? So when he came the first time, he had to have been younger than that."

Riley knows he never went to college. She knows because he said so himself, but she hadn't considered the possibility that his time on the road stretched even back into high school. She supposes it makes sense given their conversation about his lack of a diploma, it just feels so hard to imagine.

"I can't tell you how many leers I had to endure just to offer the kid some sustenance. Every time I invited him into my house, the PTA mom across the street would shoot me this look from her porch like she'd just downed a whole lemon. Never could tell whether it was because she didn't much like his presence in the neighborhood in the first place, or if she really believed the rumors she spread at the country club that I was quite the cougar."

The coffee goes down wrong this time around. Riley coughs and straightens up, Rachel jumping and reaching behind her to grab a napkin from the counter.

She hastily hands it across the table, watching as Riley dabs at her mouth. "It was just rumors, to be clear. We were never—,"

"No, no, I know," Riley assures her, clearing her throat.

She believes Lucas's statement that she was his first kiss, despite how his level of handsome would suggest otherwise. In fact, given how quickly she offered to take it, Riley can say with absolute certainty that Rachel is far from the greedy one between the two of them when it comes to Lucas Friar.

Once she's regained the ability to speak, Riley ventures another question. "Did he ever say why he was out there? Drifting? Did you ever figure it out?"

Rachel hesitates, thumbing the rim of her mug. The silence is thick between them, but it doesn't feel imposing.

"No, no I didn't," she admits. "And in some ways, I don't think I could tell you even if I did. You know him, I can tell that you do. You know how protective he is, how hard he works to keep everything under wraps. Even a grilled cheese won't solve that problem."

She can't help but feel a bit disappointed. She nods, knowing that truth all too well.

Rachel's gaze drifts beyond her, back towards the living room where Lucas is still snoozing away. Her expression grows softer, the contemplation blending with sentimentality that smooths away some of the lines on her pretty face.

"Something happened to him," she muses. Her voice is even quieter than before, as if the sheer notion of discussing his secrets might jolt him out of his slumber. "He lost something—I don't know what, but I could see it. I could recognize that, and it's a prime accelerant for reckless abandonment."

Riley hesitates. "How could you tell?"

There's a somber edge to her host that wasn't there before. Rachel lets out a plaintive sigh, allowing her eyes to meet hers.

"It's not hard to spot grief when you've familiarized yourself with it already."

She supposes she knows the truth to this as well. She's seen it on so many of her loved ones faces in the last couple of years, mixed with a myriad of other emotions—resentment, frustration, a deep sense of betrayal. She's felt it herself, although she never did quite figure out what she lost that made her so familiar with it. It's like she was brought into the world knowing it, so consumed by it that living felt like carrying the weight of the world.

But she's not in that place anymore. She's here in the cozy kitchen of a friend of a friend, sipping decaf that still manages to awaken her senses and surrounded by the promise that things will be okay. She's in a universe where strangers can become lifelong friends, and a summer downpour can come and go in an instant, and a stalled brake doesn't guarantee a grisly end.

"Enough about him," Rachel says, obviously ready to embrace the sunshine as well. She props her chin on her palm, eyes twinkling as she regards her. "Tell me about you. That silly cowboy is old news—I want to hear about how he managed to befriend a supernova of a gal like you. What brought you through the Austin outskirts, anyhow?"

Riley has never liked talking about herself. But it's a new day, in a new place. She's in a place where she can breathe again, light with the knowledge of it and waiting for her enigma boy to wake up so they can greet a new day. All that considered, talking about herself doesn't seem like such a tall order.

And so she does.


Riley doesn't even realize how long she chats with Rachel, ingesting another cup of decaf and watching the sun rise to its full height and beam across the green lawn outside the window. As the conversation stretches on the rapport between them becomes comfortable, effortless. She learns quickly how funny her host is and can't help but laugh loudly, only remembering to stay quiet for Lucas's sake the first couple of times.

Baby is the first to break the ice, traipsing into the kitchen with a hungry meow. Riley glances over her shoulder, finding Lucas still out like a light and Bunny happily taking up the extra space and time with him without the tabby giving him the stink eye.

Esther descends from the stairs a few minutes later, bustling around the kitchen to help feed Baby and make herself some breakfast. Rachel opts to get up and start cooking actual food as well, the clamor becoming much more pointed as they shuffle around one another. Esther accidentally drops a pot and all three of them cringe, Riley glancing over her shoulder once again.

Still, nothing. She knows Lucas needs the rest, but this is impressive. Half of her wonders if he's simply faking as an excuse to cuddle with the dog—the neurotic other half worries that maybe he's dead.

Rachel glances in his direction too, before making a face and shrugging. "It's almost noon. If we wake him up for simply getting on with the day, that's more his problem than ours."

Bunny trades the quality snuggling for the smell of Canadian bacon, leaping off the couch and bounding into the kitchen excitedly to traipse around their feet for scraps. Riley hears the couch creak behind her, but doesn't bother to look. If she could demonstrate a fraction of patience, she figures the universe would reward her for it.

In this case, the universe decides to honor the deal. It's only a few more minutes before Lucas meanders over to join them, looking pointedly more rested than he has since she's met him and sporting a slight case of bedhead to prove it. He stifles a yawn, rolling his eyes when Rachel begins a sarcastic clap in his honor.

"It's about damn time," she teases, finishing off her mock applause with a flourish.

Lucas gently steps past her to reach for a clean glass sitting on the edge of the sink, filling it with water. His voice is still raspy with sleep when he speaks. "You were the one who invited me into your home. As the guest, aren't I supposed to take advantage of your courtesy?"

"Yeah, but you would think you could pull your ass out of bed before half the day is gone." She throws him a playful squint, reaching up and messing with his hair. "I hope you have a comb in that knapsack of yours."

The breezy, mutually appreciative dynamic they share is refreshing. Lucas is constantly brushing off his importance and insisting he's a nobody, but time and time again Riley has seen evidence to the contrary. Rachel, Dylan, Asher from the way he talks about him—it's obvious how deeply he's valued by those who would know him best.

Riley, on the other hand, is growing too fond of him in the softness of the morning. She likes the way his shoulders slouch with permission to be relaxed. She likes that hoarse quality to his voice, still shaking off the gravel of sleep. She likes the numerous cowlicks in his hair that have sprung up overnight, can't help but think smoothing out each one of them wouldn't be such a bad way to spend an hour or so.

When he slides into the seat next to her and tosses her a smile, she has to resist the urge to reach up and start the endeavor. It takes a surprising amount of her willpower. "Sleep well?"

"Oh, yeah," she lies. "Take it you did too, considering your bed buddies. Now I understand why you passed up the offer to stay with me."

He laughs. Riley can't seem to look away from him, fixated on the pillow crease lingering just below his cheekbone. She has half a mind to reach forward and smooth that out too, but she knows such a thing isn't plausible. More so, she thinks she's just searching for an excuse to touch him.

Rachel pulls them into conversation as she lays breakfast on the table, Riley immediately filling her plate in the hopes that it'll distract her from him. Existing as a functional human being was so much easier when he was asleep.

She tunes back into the conversation when the topic shifts to their plans for the day, Esther having long since retreated back upstairs and out of sight. Riley isn't all that surprised—the moment Lucas reentered the scenario, she became a deer in headlights. She wishes she could assure her she knows the feeling, but that she should hardly worry. Lucas is far from aware of the effect he has, that unidentifiable quality of his.

"Well, yeah, but it's not going to be ready until this evening," Lucas states matter-of-factly. He preps another forkful of bacon and eggs, obviously intending to indulge the moment he's done speaking. It's nice, she realizes, getting to see him eat as much as he pleases without overthinking it. "So I'm not sure what we're going to do until then."

Rachel scoffs. "'Not sure.' You'll hang here is what you'll do!"

The prospect of a quiet afternoon is more appealing than Riley would've thought. It's hard to forget how much driving she's done in the last few weeks, a perpetual prisoner to the road. Even just a few more hours of getting to do as she wishes in such a welcoming environment sounds like heaven.

She can see the hesitation on Lucas's face before he vocalizes it. "But—,"

"You know, Lucas," she says loftily, twirling her fork in her fingers. "It's almost as rude to refuse the hospitality of a friend when they offer it as it is to be a perceived burden in the first place."

Rachel lets out a bark of a laugh, pointing to Riley as if to accent her point and raising her eyebrows. Lucas is speechless, glancing back and forth between them before settling his gaze on her. It's clearly the first time anyone has ever questioned his own constant state of self-antagonizing.

He's rather cute when he's so dumbstruck. Riley stabs her fork into a piece of bacon on his plate, popping it into her mouth before he can retort and giving him her brightest beam.

With that, it's settled. Lucas gives up the argument and the two of them plan to spend the afternoon with Rachel, lazing around the house and enjoying the chance to relax.

At first Riley doesn't even know what to do with the free time, so she's grateful when Rachel pulls her into the task of helping her make chocolate chip cookies. Lucas ends up hanging around while they do so, doing more eating of the dough rather than preparing it. She makes a point of bopping a bit of it onto his nose as he's hovering over her shoulder, disrupting her very important work of mixing it properly. The gesture definitely surprises him enough to back off, and then Riley finds herself regretting it since she didn't so much mind how close he was.

Once the cookies are in the oven, Rachel ropes Lucas into walking Bunny for old time's sake while Riley temporarily retreats to her room. For the first time since she started her road trip, she finds herself drawn to the notebook tucked in the inside pocket of her backpack. It's cover is well-worn and the first chunk of pages are crinkled with use, but the journal feels cold with abandonment. Considering she had sort of lost touch with her muse even before she took off cross-country, such a feeling is far from surprising.

Settling back down at the kitchen table with the sunlight streaming in and an unusually clear head, Riley puts pen to paper and actually writes for the first time in months. The words come in a sort of magical burst, clear and sharp and itching to be written after such a deep hibernation. She doesn't know if it's any good, and she doesn't know if she'll use any of it ever again. But the sheer sensation of it is progress enough, and feels like coming home in a way she doesn't think she'll ever be able to replicate.

Or maybe, the reason she's able to do it now is because that feeling has already felt familiar in the last couple of weeks.

Glancing out the window, Riley gets wrapped up in watching Lucas run around the backyard with Bunny. He looks about as carefree and enthusiastic as the dog, smile wider than she's ever seen it as he tosses the ball across the lawn and cheers until Bunny rams back into him and yaps for him to do it again.

Carefree is beautiful on him. If she could have it her way, he'd never have to know anything else.

She's stirred out of her daze by her phone buzzing on the tabletop, catching her attention. Her stomach sinks as she dreads the contact lighting up her screen being someone from home, but her derision is premature. No, it's merely Farkle, informing her that he made it home safely and thanking her once again for her generosity in offering him a ride.

When she unlocks her phone to read the full message, she's surprised by the drive link that he's attached at the bottom.

Riley, it's Farkle Minkus. Just wanted to inform you that I made it home safely. When you're in New York again, we will have to catch up. Thank you again for allowing me into your car and thusly, into your world. Even though we only crossed paths for a handful of hours, I feel I learned more from you and Lucas than perhaps the collective four years of my collegiate education. Don't tell my father that, though. It would break his heart (and his wallet).

I was able to get the photos from the disposable processed, and I took the time this afternoon to go through and upload them. Thought you might like to see them. (Number forty-seven is my personal favorite shot). I kept the camera, so I hope Lucas doesn't hate me any more for it. Although, with you as a distraction, I'm confident in hypothesizing he won't even notice that it's gone.

Best of luck with the rest of your travels, and all other endeavors.

Riley feels her heart swell as she rereads the message, grateful for the additional new friendship that came to life unexpectedly on the side of the road. She creates a reminder to get in touch with him the moment she returns, before clicking on the link and scrolling through the photos. Although she wants to take her time really browsing them later, her curiosity is killing her and she jumps to forty-seven as quickly as possible.

It takes a few seconds for the image to load, but the moment it lights up her screen Riley feels her heart skip a beat.

She and Lucas are standing in front of the pond at the nature reserve, captured in a completely candid moment from Farkle's observer perspective. They're facing out towards the water, Riley in the midst of verbally framing a shot for him. Her arm not cradling the camera is stretched out wide in front of them, gesturing to make her point as she's been known to do. Lucas is hanging on her every word, hovering close like at the bowling alley or with the cookie dough and gazing over her shoulder towards whatever visual she's attempting to capture.

Everything else is irrelevant. All that natural beauty of the nature reserve around them, and Farkle managed to capture the solitary moment where the two of them were the most striking element in the landscape.

Letting her gaze shift to find Lucas again, it's not hard to see how such a feat is possible. He's often the most striking piece of her scenery, especially when he's smiling the way he is now.

Riley saves the image on her phone, jumping to settings. Before she can question herself she changes her home background, content with the way her stomach flips as she closes her applications and finds herself gazing at the two of them surrounded by the reserve but totally wrapped up in their own little world.

Smiling fondly, Riley sets her phone back down on the table and focuses back on her notebook. Determined to get another hundred words out before the muse threatens to sneak away from her for good.


Rachel drives them to the repair shop, and Riley finds herself wishing the journey could stretch on forever. She's become accustomed to the friendly banter between Rachel and Lucas, and it's nice to be able to recline in the backseat and get lost in watching the world pass her by in a blur like she used to when she was a kid. If it wasn't overcast, she'd attempt to find the moon in the sky and imagine it was following her, keeping her safe on her travels with some of that magic she hasn't thought about since childhood.

But the trip doesn't take a little more than an hour, and it's not long before they're parked on the curb and Rachel is helping them unload their bags on the sidewalk. She pawned off enough stuff on Lucas that he's got a brand new duffle bag to accompany his backpack, and it gives Riley a sharp sense of satisfaction to see it piled on the ground with her things.

The more pieces of a concrete existence they give him, the more weight of affection and care he has to carry around, the less likely he might be to float away with the wind.

Rachel heaves out a sigh as she slams the back end of the van, blinking at the two of them standing there on the curb. Then she breaks into a grin, holding out her arms and marching towards Riley to offer her a hug. "Come here, lady."

She smiles, stepping over the bags to meet her in the middle. When Rachel pulls her into an embrace, she's surprised by how secure it feels. It feels like being hugged by family, not a strange woman she met in a desperate situation less than twenty-four hours ago.

"You drive safe, okay? Lucas has my number, so grab it from him and let me know when you make it wherever you're trying to go. Please?" Riley pulls back and gives her an eager nod, doing her best not to get choked up. Rachel gives her a beam. "Atta girl. And you take care of that weirdo, yeah?"

"I'll do my best," she promises without hesitation.

As she returns to the curb, Lucas eyes her before shifting his gaze back to his feet. She knows there's no way he's going to let Rachel leave without a proper goodbye, but perhaps his bashful nature at displays of affection haven't faded as completely as Riley thought they had. She remembers how she glimpsed his reunion with Dylan at the motel, just a fleeting glance on her way out of the picture.

If he needs space, she'll give that to him. It's the least she could do, considering he let down his walls enough to make this life-saving call in the first place.

She reaches out and gently touches his elbow. "I'll go see if I can get the process started."

Lucas lifts his gaze to lock eyes with her, offering a nod. She gives Rachel one last wave before traipsing her way towards the entrance, pushing open the door and feeling a rush of air conditioning hit her in a burst.

Still, she can't fight the instinct to get one last look.

Rachel has him in a bear hug, much like the one she gave him when she first arrived to rescue them. She's murmuring something, token guidance to go with the goodbye, and she can see Lucas nod along to whatever it is she's saying.

When they pull back from the embrace, Rachel reaches forward and cups his face in her hands. The warmth in her expression is so overwhelming, the proud twinkle in her eyes so bright, Riley can see it even from so many steps away. She had forgotten what it looked like, to see a mother look at their child with so much love.

She has to look away. She disappears into the repair shop, wondering if Lucas has any idea how loved he actually is.


As it turns out, Riley's mission to get started on retrieving Dave is short-lived. Lucas was the one who filed the paperwork in the first place, so it's not until he comes in with their bags that they can actually get the process moving. So she lets him take over and goes to take inventory of their stuff, mostly to give her the sense of contributing somehow.

Her phone vibrates in her pocket while she's going through her backpack, triple-checking that she got everything from Rachel's before they continue their journey up the coast. She only gets a glimpse of Auggie smiling on her lock image before the caller ID consumes the screen, broadcasting exactly who is ringing her up.

This time, the reminder takes her by surprise. She feels her stomach drop as she reads her mother's contact name, an old photo of the two of them from high school staring back at her and inviting her to pick up.

She knows she can't ignore her forever. She already answered her last check-in too hurriedly when Farkle was with her, so she knows she's probably just making her more anxious. And the longer it takes her to answer this time around, the more she's going to amplify that effect.

Casting a glance in Lucas's direction to make sure he's still occupied at the counter, Riley steps just outside the doors and swipes to accept the call.

"Hello?"

"Good afternoon, dear!" Topanga says cheerfully, obviously in a good mood today. "I didn't catch you while driving, did I?"

"No, nope. Just pulled over for a spell, actually," she lies, crossing her arms and beginning a subtle pace along the edge of the building.

Topanga exhales in relief. "Good. How goes the journey today? You should be almost to D.C. at this point, right? At this rate, you could probably make it to Philadelphia by tonight. I'm sure if you called up Amy and Alan, they'd be happy to have you a night earlier than expected."

Hearing her mother state so matter-of-factly how close this trip is to reaching its conclusion gives her a strange sense of anxiety. She doesn't know what it is—the inevitable goodbye she has to face that her mother doesn't even know about; the prospect of being back under the watchful eye of her parents whose good intentions might just suffocate her; the fact that it feels like she's spent so much time on the road at this point that when she hits park for the final time and stops moving she doesn't know how she's going to reorient her world order.

"Riley, did you hear me? Are you still there?"

"What? Yes," she covers quickly. "I was just thinking, um—,"

"We're so excited to have you back soon. Cory has been worried sick, you know, I think your homecoming will be a relief for all parties involved. And I've already got a list going here of jobs you could take up, at least for the remainder of the summer—,"

She can't do it. She can't stomach the thought of returning to her dreary everyday existence, having her mother hook her up with a sensible job that she resents and back to trying to fill that empty space in her chest. It's shrunken so small since she left Texas that she almost forgot about it, but the nightmare and well-intentioned nag from her mother allows it to eat up a little more of her soul.

"Actually, mom, I'm running a little bit behind schedule," she stammers out. She takes a deep breath, willing her words to work properly. "I'm not sure when I'll be back, but it's not as soon as I initially anticipated."

Radio silence. She can't even hear Topanga breathe. For a second, she has half a mind to wonder if she hung up.

"How long is a little bit?"

Riley grimaces, twisting her mouth into a nervous frown. "A couple of days? I'm really not sure. Some unexpected things have just come up, and—,"

"Riley, you've got to be kidding me," Topanga sighs. She can imagine the way she's running her hands through her hair, shaking her head in disappointment. "We had a schedule for a reason. It was an exercise of trust enough to let you do this crazy experiment in the first place—,"

She can feel her cheeks warming out of frustration. She scowls. "It's not a crazy experiment."

"And you're not the one fronting the bill, are you? You realize you're out there coasting on our money, right?"

"I know that. It's not like I meant to do—if you would just hear me out—,"

"I knew this whole thing was going to be too much trouble. It was ridiculous when you asked to do it, but we figured you needed the freedom. Your father wanted to believe that if you did this, it would fix whatever went wrong before. But I knew you wouldn't be able to—,"

Riley can feel her throat aching with the forewarning of tears. She clears it, winding one of the cord bracelets on her wrists between her fingers and pulling. "If you didn't trust me, you should've just said so from the get go. If you want to treat me like a baby—,"

"Don't turn this on me," Topanga says with a scoff. She can hear the emotion in her mother's voice, but as it always is with her, it's difficult to tell where the feeling is coming from. The line between love and hate is notoriously thin. "You know exactly why we have to treat you this way. You should know better than anyone!"

Riley closes her eyes, chewing her lip to keep from breaking. Topanga is right, she knows. She knows exactly why they have to treat her like she's fragile, why it's so difficult to trust her on her own. It's all because of choices she made, decisions that she's still trying to unpack and make up for in her own head.

But right now, she doesn't want to think about that. She wants to go back to feeling light, and discovering something new, and if she has to do that with or without their help, then that's fine.

She's pulling her bracelet so tightly it's cutting off her circulation. She releases it, inhaling a deep breath.

"I'm just telling you how it is," she states, hating how her voice still shakes despite her resolve. "I'm going to be later than expected. If you want to pull your funding, that's fine, I'll figure it out on my own. Wouldn't be the first time I had to work out a tough situation on my own."

"Riley Erica—," Topanga pauses when the sound of a power drill revs behind her, causing Riley to jump and whip around towards the open garage where other cars are being repaired. "What was that? Where are you?"

"Nothing."

"Are you… did something happen?" She can hear the concern laced through her question, but it's hard to separate from the dissatisfaction. "Is everything—?"

"I have to go. I'll see you when I see you."

"Riley. Riley, don't you dare hang up this phone—,"

She doesn't let her finish the warning. Riley ends the call with a frantic flourish, thrust back into the soundscape of the warm summer wind and machinery saving the mechanical life of stranded vehicles. When her mom immediately attempts to call her back she declines the call, shutting off her phone and stuffing it into her pocket.

She may have just made a huge mistake, especially if Topanga decides to follow through on her threat and essentially disown her for the remainder of the trip. If something else happens to Dave like it did the day before, then she's as good as toast.

But she doesn't care. Jade told her to follow her gut, and presently the message is loud and clear that can't she fathom going home so soon. Not yet. Not when she finally thinks she's closer to figuring out what she needs than ever before. That was the whole reason she set out on this odyssey anyway—to figure herself out. To find herself.

She's drawn out of her tizzy when a car honks from around the corner, startling her. She looks up to find Dave careening back into the parking space in front of her, Lucas behind the wheel and giving her a smile as he kills the engine. She doesn't know which one of them she's happier to see.

"He's alive," she says weakly, allowing herself to mirror his smile with everything she's got as he climbs out of the driver's seat.

"I know, it's a miracle. Harley made sure I understood as much before he handed me back the keys. We'll have to be gentle with him if we intend to make it back up the rest of the coast in one piece. Might have to take it slow."

Lucas affectionately pats the roof of the hatchback, before turning his gaze to her. The moment he gets a better look at her his expression shifts instantly, his smile dimming and concern taking over as he hops onto the curb to meet her.

"Hey," he says softly, ignoring the offhand wave she does preemptively. He steps closer and lightly touches her shoulder. "Hey, what's wrong? Did something happen?"

She lets her gaze flit from the concrete to meet his eyes. She's done such a good job of avoiding the gritter subjects of her own personal history, keeping it on the backburner with him so that they can both focus on the things that are good. The things that are easy. But with the way he's looking at her, she wonders if maybe she could tell him. She's always poking him to open up with her, but maybe part of the problem is that she isn't returning the favor.

He knows she's got issues with her mother, their argument before Dave went off the rails made that abundantly clear. And he's always been a good listener, sometimes to her frustration—she's fairly sure that if she elected to tell him, he would listen. He may even understand.

She doesn't want to focus on that now. For now, she wants to keep focusing on the good—the sparkle in his eyes, the couple of leftover cowlicks that even a good combing can't seem to tame on the back of his head, the way that hole in her chest seems to disappear entirely the longer they're together.

As she decided earlier, she wants to spend some time dedicated to the two of them and see what that potential swirling around in the air between them is really supposed to be. The rest of the bullshit, like returning to New York, she's more than happy to put off for a couple more days.

"Nothing," she tells him quietly, offering a light smile and hoping that will be enough. "Taking it slow sounds like a plan to me."

She can tell he wants to ask her more. He wants to, but he also knows what it's like to be on the other side of the interrogation. So he lets the issue drop, accepting her response with a nod and lightly squeezing her shoulder before pulling away.

As they get back into the car, Riley behind the wheel, she's still alight with that restless energy. The conversation with her mother has instilled her with a fistful of spite, and if getting home as efficiently as possible is what they so desperately want her to do then she finds she wants to do everything in her power to stretch out the remainder of the journey.

"Lucas," she says slowly, turning on the engine.

He turns to lock eyes with her, raising an eyebrow interestedly in lieu of responding. That gesture alone steels her resolve, brightening the spite with a bit of mischief to make it feel more like a decision of her own.

She can't help the smirk that creeps onto her face. She tilts her head, mind already thrumming with ideas. "If we're taking it slow… what would you say to a little detour?"


It's about four hours on the road until they hit Virginia, passing the state line just as the sun dips below the horizon. While their hotel isn't much further than that, Riley keeps driving with a set destination in mind and trusting her childhood memories to guide her there. She's not ready to turn her phone back on yet. She isn't sure she'll ever be ready.

Besides, there's something distinctly thrilling about being off the grid. She understands the way Lucas exists more sharply than ever, reveling in the unique quality of only being known to the people she wants to have near her at any given moment. Disappearing off the radar with him sort of feels like freedom, more than she's ever experienced.

With the road signage helping her out, it's not long until she's able to get to Virginia Beach. From there she knows her way to the less populated parts of the coast fairly well, considering how often they used to come down here when they'd visit Uncle Eric for summers. They'd spend some time in D.C. where he works as a senator, then Aunt Morgan and Uncle Josh would come join them and they'd all travel down the state together for a week at the beach.

That being said, she always stayed safely on the popular main stretches. They never deviated off the beaten path, so parking in the darkness down the oceanside and venturing with Lucas into the night to find the fire pits feels like an act of defiance many years in the making. Whenever she'd spot the embers glowing from so far away, she couldn't help but imagine that the young men and women sharing in those bonfire lit nights together had to have been having the most important of conversations. Swapping stories and creating memories they'd never forget, shared only between them and the fire as it crackled into smoke and disappeared into the salty ocean air.

Riley hopes that even a fraction of her romantic childhood idealizations is true. Out there in the shadows of the night, hidden from the rest of the world, she's eager to see what might develop between her and her trusty car companion.

For whatever reason, it's not difficult to find an unclaimed fire pit with no one else around to intrude. Lucas proves himself adept at getting the fire going, evidently another one of those skills he has up his sleeve for reasons she likely doesn't want to know. She decides she doesn't care much either way. The moment it kicks up and he looks up at her with a proud smirk, the way the firelight catches in his green eyes is enough to render any other potential cares extraneous.

Once they've settled down in front of the fire, perched on opposite pieces of driftwood, Riley prompts them back into conversation. She starts out with simple things—the trip thus far, the landmarks they've seen, the stark contrast between an evening spent under the stars in Alabama and a night in the suburbs of North Carolina in the warm company of a friend. She can't help but feel fond over how easy conversation has become between them, a far cry from their first few exchanges when she picked him up on the side of the road.

She can't believe there were stretches of dialogue that went nowhere with him. She can't believe there was a time where she never knew him at all. She has to wonder how different things would've been if he'd been there earlier in her life. If he'd been there from the start.

Better. That much, she knows without a doubt.

Riley bursts into laughter as he finishes up recalling a story about growing up on his grandfather's farm, one of the most vivid recollections about his past she's shared with her. He describes how he accepted a dare from Vanessa to scale the fence of the bull pen belonging to their neighbor McCullough, and that if he managed it successfully then she would go on a date with his friend Zay. But he lost his balance halfway over the top and fell the rest of the way down—and even that was nothing compared to how the bull would've trampled him had it not been for the restraint holding it back.

"Worst part of it is, Vanessa didn't even go on the date," he says, chuckling as Riley attempts to reel in her own laughter. It's not a funny story, objectively, but the way he tells it makes it impossible not to laugh. He holds out his hand, showing her the surface of his palm. "Still have the scar to show for it."

Riley scoots to the edge of her driftwood, reaching out a hand to take his in her own. She handles him delicately, finding the ghost of the scar under his lifeline. She brushes her fingers over the faded hairline of white, far more enthralled by the texture of his skin under her fingertips than the legacy of a failed dare.

The moment lingers, Lucas bending his fingers hesitantly to mirror the touch on her own palm. She lifts her gaze to meet his eyes, but his focus is drawn solely to their hands. He clears his throat, but no words follow the gesture.

"You truly had a far more interesting adolescence than me," she assures him, exhaling a scoff. "Must've been an experience, childhood on the Sundance strip."

That seems to snap him out of his daze. He frowns, retracting his hand and placing it back in his lap. As if he's just remembered it's not supposed to be anywhere near her. "That's one way to put it, yeah."

She wonders if he realizes he's killing her. Part of it is the writer in her, but she can't fathom going another day without getting some sort of clue as to who he is. What it was like growing up, why he left, why he's made it all the way to the opposite end of the country with her without one word about his parents, his home, his dreams whether they're abandoned or not. That ghost he seems to be running from that catches up to him at the most unexpected of times, or what's causing the grief so palpable that even complete strangers can pick up on it despite how he aims to hide it.

Whatever it is that can take him so quickly away from her, regardless of how many miles they travel to escape it.

"You know I'm not trying to push you," she starts tentatively, knowing how badly these conversations have gone in the past. He closes his eyes, as if he knows exactly what she's going to say next. "After everything in the last couple of days, I hope you at least believe that."

For a moment, silence. Then, he nods.

"You're my friend, Lucas." The statement comes out in a crackle like fire, so delicate in its truth that if she says it any louder it might float away with the smoke. "You're my friend, and I care about you. Tell me you know that, too."

Another pause. After a minute, another nod. Hesitant, but affirmative.

Riley swallows her nerves, feeling her heart pound in her throat. She feels volcanic, like they're on the cusp of bubbling over into new and dangerous territory. But she also knows she wants to go there—she has for days. If it means getting to know him fully, she'd let the whole beach smolder away.

"I just want to understand. Anything you can tell me—whatever feels right. It doesn't have to be everything. It… it doesn't even need to be anything, really. Just let me in. Let me understand."

The ocean air absorbs the sentiment, carrying it back out to the sea. Silence permeates their world for a few long moments, perturbed only by the sound of the waves in the distance and the popping of the firewood as it burns itself into embers.

"My grandfather is dead."

Riley lifts her head, pulled from getting lost in the fire to look at him. He keeps his gaze trained out in front of him, beyond the fire and out towards the inky blackness of the water in the distance. He says the statement blankly, like he's trying it out for the first time. Like he's still not convinced of it himself.

"It shouldn't have been a surprise," he continues. "He was old. His health was never the greatest—no one who spends their lives on the strip can boast good health. Asher said it was a heart attack. I still don't get that, really. How someone's heart can be working one day, keeping them alive, and the next it's just not." He swallows, dipping his gaze down to the sand. "But it happens. And he's dead. When you met me, when we ran into each other, I had just… yeah."

Riley frowns. "I'm so sorry."

"It's not even… he was always going to die. Everybody does, after all. But I always thought—I don't know. It wasn't supposed to happen like this."

She nods, wishing she had better words to convey that she understands. That she hears him, that every mixed up emotion he might be feeling over the situation or has been carrying with him in silence for the last couple of weeks is valid and heard and understood.

Two weeks, and he never said a word. She can't imagine, holding all of that inside for so long.

Lucas screws his eyes shut, leaning forward on his elbows. He rubs his hands together anxiously, wringing them for the sake of moving rather than any effort to warm himself up. "The last time I saw him, it wasn't… things didn't go well. Everything had gone so wrong, and I did some things I shouldn't have. I was always disappointing him, but this was so much worse. I couldn't even look at him." He clears his throat, shaking his head. "And that's the last he got of me. He must've hated me."

"I'm sure that's not true—,"

"I wasn't there," he stammers. His voice has taken on that raspy quality again, but this version lacks the warm comfort of waking up safe and well-rested. It's colder, shakier, searching for that warmth but unable to find it even with a fire at arms' reach. "He suffered, and I wasn't there. I didn't get to tell him how sorry—I didn't get to—,"

The sentence remains unfinished, Lucas unable to keep going from how his voice cracks. He hides his head in his hands, letting out an exhale so strained it must be crumbling under the weight of the world.

Riley realizes a second later where the gravelly quality is stemming from. It's the same cause of the way his shoulders are trembling and why he can't bring himself to look at her. Grief finally addressed, manifesting itself in the only tangible form humans really comprehend.

She needs to be close to him. She wants to help him, to help shoulder some of that weight, but she doesn't think she can with so much distance between them. She's always been terrible with words when it truly matters, and her instincts are telling her that words aren't enough. She knows from her own experience that they rarely are.

Following her gut, Riley pushes to her feet and closes the few feet separating them. She cautiously approaches and settles down on the driftwood next to him, scooting closer and gently touching his upper arm.

"I left him behind," Lucas blurts in a huff, dropping his hands from his face. Her chest aches at the tears shimmering in his eyes, the trail of them reflecting the firelight on his cheeks. She wants to wipe them away. "All I know how to do is run, so that's what I did. And he returned the favor. Neither of us got to say goodbye."

She tilts her head, feeling tears prick the corner of her eyes. "Lucas…"

"And it's my fault. He must've hated me. All I left him with was the memory of what I did and how I never came back."

"No," Riley refutes, shaking her head adamantly. She edges closer to him, tightening her grip on his shoulder to get him to hear her. "Lucas, I promise you he didn't."

"How could you know? How could you possibly know that?"

"People aren't thinking about all the ways people wronged them when they're that close to death. At that point, all of that anger and resentment is just too much energy." She waits for him to meet her gaze, rubbing her thumb against the ridge of his collarbone. "Most people want to remember the good things, the things that they loved, and the reasons that they did. Everything else isn't worth it. Believe me."

Lucas holds her gaze, searching her face for the truth. Holding his breath. Obviously wanting to believe her, eyes shining with vulnerability.

Riley knows she doesn't know the whole story. She didn't learn much more than she knew before, and so many pieces to his puzzle still remain a mystery. But she's certain that there's no way his grandfather spent his last moments hating him. No matter what he did, she can't imagine a scenario where he wouldn't be worth forgiving. Where he wouldn't be worth loving, when all the dust has settled and there's nothing left to ponder but how much you're going to miss the treasures you're leaving behind.

Another tear slips down his cheek as he averts his eyes, facing back towards the fire and wiping at his face. Although she still has a million questions, she recognizes how difficult this discussion alone must've been for him. How hard it had to have been for him to let her in this much, how special it is that he gave her even that.

She hopes he knows she appreciates it. That she's grateful for the trust, even more grateful for him, that she's so full to bursting with gratitude towards him she doesn't know what to do with herself. She hasn't since the moment he climbed into her passenger seat and completely turned her world upside down.

For now, she settles for the only language she feels competent in. She closes the remaining distance between them and slides her arm around both his shoulders, bringing up her other hand to gently rub circles into his arm.

He doesn't shy away from the touch, his eyes fluttering closed.

Tentatively, Riley leans forward and rests her chin against his shoulder. It's a moment or two before she feels him actually melt into the embrace, some of the tension in his muscles fading as he lets out a shaky sigh. Heart still pounding her chest, even more pointedly now, Riley presses a kiss into the denim of his jacket before resting her head against his back.

Settling into the quiet, allowing the grief and the tension to be carried away by the ocean breeze into the night with the smoke, like she always dreamt it would.


The ride back to the motel for the night is plaintive in its peace. Riley doesn't fight for conversation, considering she's already taken so much out of him for one evening. The atmosphere is settled, calm, grounded with a new sense of trust she can't remember ever sharing with another person. It's the kind of development that doesn't need commentary.

Still, something electric remains in the air between them. Creating this tension that's always been there to pique her curiosity, only growing more and more difficult to ignore.

When she pulls in front of their row of rooms after retrieving the keys from the front desk, she kills the engine and plunges them into the silence of the night. Although there's nothing stopping them from turning in, neither of them make any moves to leave the car.

"I know that probably wasn't what you wanted from me," Lucas murmurs.

She quirks an eyebrow, tilting her head to look at him. "What do you mean?"

"When you asked for me to tell you something." He's avoiding her gaze, pressing his thumbs into his knuckles in his lap. "I know you were hoping for… something more…"

He shrugs aimlessly, not sure how to articulate it.

"Everything else."

In some ways, he's right. It wasn't what Riley was expecting when she set out to get answers, and he's smart enough to know that without her having to say it. But what he gave her instead was so much more—it was what he needed, too. And she'd rather have that than all the answers in the universe.

She mirrors his shrug, managing a smile despite how heavy the evening has felt. Hoping he'll believe her words when she speaks them.

"It was enough."

Lucas glances at her, searching her again for another hint of dishonesty. No matter how hard he scrutinizes her, he's not going to find any.

"I just know—I know it's been hard to trust me. Without knowing the full story. But you let me come this far anyway, and I really appreciate that." He forces himself to meet her eyes, making sure to hold her gaze as he makes this statement. "Thank you. For believing in me."

She wonders if he realizes it's hardly a difficult task. In a lot of ways, it's the simplest thing she thinks she's ever done. "I will always believe in you."

"Why?" The question slips out before he can stop it, hanging in the air. He swallows, laughing in spite of himself and shaking his head as he locks eyes with her. "Why? You don't even know me."

She squints at him, cocking her head curiously. "You really believe that?"

He opens his mouth to respond, but nothing comes out. The longer they hold each other's gaze, caught in the weight of the query, the more pronounced that electric presence around them seems to become.

Riley feels restless again, blood boiling into adrenaline, but it's not like usual. It's not because of fear. This feeling rests deeper in her stomach, a strange kind of hunger that has nothing to do with her appetite.

Lucas breaks the eye contact, coughing awkwardly and unbuckling his seatbelt. He mumbles something offhand that she doesn't catch as he climbs out of the car, escaping the static and unexplored territory taunting them. Like Pompeii before Mount Vesuvius.

Riley contemplates as Lucas digs around in the trunk to grab their bags, spurred to action where she's frozen with indecision. She twirls her key ring round and round on her lanyard, trying to listen to what Jade advised her and follow her instincts. Wondering if following this insane desire that's sparked to life is an absolute disaster waiting to happen, or if maybe it's exactly what they both need.

More than that, she realizes that she has to return the favor. He was right when he told her that it's far simpler to ask the questions rather than answer them, and while she's been more than happy to share the small details of her life she's never done her part to open up either. He's just given her a indisputable gift by sharing with her what he did, and it's only fair that she return the notion if she ever wants to move forward. If she ever wants to see exactly what the two of them are capable of being, then she needs to put in her fair share as well.

Lucas is already standing outside the room, searching his pocket for the keys. She needs to move now, speak now, before she loses the courage again. She's not going to let this opportunity pass her by. She has to follow her own gospel, and never has there been a clearer moment to do so than right now.

Heart pounding, resolved steeled, and face hot like molten lava, Riley pushes open the door and pulls herself from the vehicle. Ready for the volcano, and whatever beautiful disaster that may follow.


A/N: Yes, it's true! She's here! She's alive! Thank you all so much for your patience as I worked through this chapter here - crazy time in the real world for me right now, but I'm so glad to have gotten the time and creative spark to get this update out. If you're still out there n still reading, you're a real one and I appreciate you.

So... yeah. Long time coming on this chapter. The next chapter is... probably the most important one in terms of... the plot? Sort of? So I'm kind of terrified to try and actually write it fjkdhsgkjsg so we'll see what happens! In any case, happy summer to y'all (or winter time for those of y'all across the globe) and catch you on the flip side (and ideally not five months from now HAHAHA).