Take Me Home | ✔

Chapter Nineteen

p.s. long (to make up for the ungodly wait) and unedited (bc i'm that weird girl who needs to read her chapter in the format before editing it!)

 [ nineteen ] -

        tuesday afternoon - three days until graduation 

    Our misift trio made our way along the side of the road. One glance at our slumping figures and dragging feet either told drivers that we were drunk or hungover, or maybe both. The sun was heavy in the sky now, and it was about elevn o'clock when we finally crossed the imaginary border separating Burkburnett and Wichita Falls. 

   In a lousy attempt, Elliot started to jog. Actually jogging and passing the big, green sign into Wichita with triumph and energy that I clearly did not have. And here I was, wheezing my butt off and choking on the dirt he stirred in his wake. 

    "Stop trudging, Vienna," he called out to me, a good distance away.  

   Eli stared at his dot of a figure against the horizon. "Is he always that---" 

"Yes," I heaved, trying to get some energy back into my limbs. 

   "But I didn't even get to say--" 

   "He's always like that." 

  He just stared at my straight face and shrugged, pulling some earphones out of his pockets and hooking it to his phone. I stared at it tentively, wondering whether or not to ask to make a call, or even who to call. I wasn't sure I was ready to tell my mother the truth about my whereabouts or even talk to Kara about how my mother was handling my disappearance. 

    Eli noticed me and raised an eyebrow. Judging by his creeped expression, I'd been practically drooling over his phone for a while. "Um. Do you need to make a phone call?" 

   He outstretched his hand to me a little reluctantly, but I shook my head. 

      "You sure?" he prodded. 

    "I'm fine." Lies. When all I really wanted to do was see my friends again and feel like I wasn't as far away as I really was, I couldn't face the consequences. 

        "How long has it been since you talked to your family?" he asked. 

   That question struck a chord in me, and it surprised me that it came from a more-or-less stranger. 

    "Not long," I lied, walking briskly now, even if I was seconds away from collapsing right on the side of the highway. "I'll be back in California soon. I assume your dad already told you that we're--" 

    "Stranded?" he finished. "Yeah, he told me. I find it pretty hard to believe that--" 

   "--an idiot like me got left behind?" I counter-finished, "I actually don't find it hard to believe, but yeah, it's just hilarious." 

    Eli tugged at the earphones and said gruffly, "I didn't mean it like that, calm down." 

        "What? I didn't mean it like that," I mocked. 

      "Okay," he just said. "So. How far away is graduation?" 

          "Three or two days. Friday," I replied. 

    "Does that mean we can't have a little fun along the way?" When I gave him a perplexing look, he quickly said, "I mean, I don't have a rush to get to Albuquerque... we could stop by Las Vegas, hit a couple casinos along the way?" 

     "Isn't Las Vegas even farther than New Mexico? I mean, I'm not the best at geography but isn't the city of sin in Arizona?" 

      "Uh, close. It's in Nevada, smart one," he said monotously, scrolling through an endless playlist on his phone. "We could just turn back around. It's Las Vegas. How could you pass that up?"