After Fire - Dreamnotfound

Five|The March to the Sea

He glanced to George, immediately grimacing and letting go of his wrist. "Why are you staring, you creep?"

"I'm not," George replied, tearing his eyes away and towards the blur of trees passing by his window. He'd never admit, not even to himself, that he found Clay's voice to be rather alluring. It had a uniqueness to it, even in the small mumbling he was vaguely able to catch. The song itself was upbeat and energetic, yet Clay's version of singing was more somber with a more disheartened tone.

Clay continued to sing along, and George made an effort to avoid eye contact with him. His phone buzzed, and he checked to see it was a message from Wilbur.

Wilbur: GOGY
Wilbur: A WRONG NUMBER TEXTED ME
Wilbur: HOW SHOULD I REPLY

George: just say hi

Wilbur: Hi?
Wilbur: But that's so lame

George: im kind of busy right now. i'll help you later

Wilbur: But this is importanttttt
Wilbur: Tommy won't answer my texts
Wilbur: George stop leaving me on read

"Who's that?" Clay asked, glancing over to George's phone. George turned his phone off.

"Why do you care?"

"I didn't think you had actual friends."

"I have a life, you know."

Clay snickered. "Yeah, okay. And I have my driver's license."

"Whatever," George said as he messaged Wilbur back.

"Wilbur?" Clay said as he glimpsed over George's phone. "Tell him to send a picture of Wilbur Wright."

"Why?"

"Because it'd be funny. He can then send a picture of Orville Wright and say 'why are you flying into my dms? We're brothers!'"

George looked unimpressed. He didn't know who Wilbur or Orville Wright were and, frankly, he didn't care to know either. "That's stupid."

"You're stupid if you don't understand smart humor."

"More like dry humor."

Clay scowled and shook his head before leaning back and singing along to the music once again. The next song began to play. George enjoyed it more than the last one. It was upbeat and pleasant to the ears. He thought about what to tell Wilbur. Whenever he received a wrong number message, he either ignored the message or told the person they texted the wrong number.

The roadtrip drew quiet once again, except this time they weren't depending on the air conditioning to create white noise to balance the silence. Clay hummed along through the rest of the song and into the next one. His singing made the ride less unbearable, but only by a little bit. And, in the end, George did end up telling Wilbur to send a picture of the Wright Brothers just like his host brother had suggested.

***

The Welcome to Georgia sign passed by in a flash, and George had failed to catch it before it was gone. The only reason he knew they were in Georgia was because Clay pointed it out like a hyped up puppy who just watched his owner throw a tennis ball. The road and everything surrounding it looked the same as Florida with the endless road and the grass and trees on either side of them. And it had dawned on George how real this was. This wasn't one of Clay's tricks. They were actually going on a roadtrip, and now that they were in a new state, they couldn't simply go back anymore.

And Clay seemed to realize the same thing at the same time as he looked at the scenery around them. He acted as if he had never seen a tree before despite growing up surrounded by them.