Smells Like Winter

11: Midnight Drives on the Passenger's Seat

What am I doing?

She tried to stabilise her shaky breath.

Stupid.

Why didn't you just do it? Clarke did it. She's fearless and strong. Why aren't you like her? Why were you such a coward and messed it all up?

Then she unwittingly dove into another bottomless pit of questions.

FROST. Federation of Remedial Organisations and Scientific Testing. What do they have to do with all this? Why are they pushing it so much with the vaccine? That woman... Harper Max... She wanted to speak to my mum about me. What are they going to discuss about me exactly? But she's the Assistant Director of FROST, so she must be important... What the hell?

She couldn't make head nor tail of the tangled ball of yarn her life had become in only one god damn day.

She heard a soft snore. She opened her eyes. Turning back, she saw Logan sleeping like a log, his mouth half open in Sia's lap, slightly drooling. He looked adorable. Sia was also asleep, her head resting against the back of her comfortable leather seat, her curly hair tickling Logan's nose. And Mia was stretching her legs like an aristocratic cat, half-asleep, half-awake, leaning towards Logan a bit, who was in the middle.

Great. It's just me who's overthinking. Stop, Maddy.

"Why so serious?" She started at the sound of his voice, intimidated as hell.

Isn't that supposed to be Joker's line or something?

"Just thinking," she uttered, unwilling to open up about her fears in front of a jerk she truly despised.

"Thinking about how your life is literally falling apart and you can do nothing about it?"

She stared at him.

Is reading minds another hidden talent of his?

"No..." she lied, looking outside the window at the passing scenery.

"You're a terrible liar."

"I'm not lying," she said, but, hearing her own voice, she knew she couldn't even convince the biggest fool on the planet. "Where are we going?"

"Where do you want to go?"

She took a second, then whispered: "Home."

He snorted, and Maddy lifted her eyes on him.

"Why, don't you?"

He remained silent for quite a while, and Maddy stopped waiting for a reply.

"Are you still cold?" he asked suddenly, taking a sideways glance of her palm rubbing her thighs on top of his hoodie.

"No, I'm fine."

"Will you stop lying?" He laughed.

Maddy thought it was the first time she heard or saw him laughing. But then she remembered the first time was when she was walking like a grandma because of her stupid Oxfords.

"Will you just shut up and drive?"

"No. Look, there must a pair of sweatpants-"

"Just what exactly did you do in this car, you perverted womanizer?" she shouted.

He first looked bewildered, then his laugh echoed louder. "I was gonna say there must be a pair of sweatpants to buy somewhere nearby, but I guess my reputation precedes me already."

Her pupils dilated. "Oh." Maddy felt her embarrassment painting her whole face and neck and ears red. She slid her flushed cheeks under the fabric of her -well, his- hoodie, silently wishing to die.