Carolina [h.s]

thirty one

"This place is shitty, how's that for lightly?" Niall says from next to Harry.

It wasn't even something I found myself taking a second look at. The only thing I cared about was if it was just another dead end.

I catch Harry's eye in the rear view mirror before paying attention to the road again. "This guy better be legit, I didn't drive this fucking far for nothing," I complained, tapping my thumbs on the wheel impatiently.

"At least this place is warmer, we were freezing our balls off in New York," Louis adds, trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel like always.

"Yeah so at least if this one goes down the drain and we're homeless again we won't freeze to death." Niall scoff's sarcastically, and my eyebrows raise in agreement.

I pull into one of the three gas stops when we're almost empty, and everyone needs to take a break from the long journey. I head inside with Louis as Harry pumps gas and Niall goes to the bathroom.

Some country song plays on the speaker and the place smells like fried food and cleaning supplies. Louis heads for the drinks while I grab breakfast burritos and a pack of cigarettes. Putting my shit on the counter, the guy at the register is asleep so I have to ring the service bell repeatedly until he finally wakes up.

As he slowly rings me up, a voice calls "Hey," and I look over. A tall girl with bleached blonde hair mixed with blue streaks stands next to me.

"Hi," I cleared my throat, carefully analyzing her.

Her black dress is short and she matches it with a pair of platformed boots. Her eyes are big and brown, and her sunglasses pulled back the hair out of her sun-freckled face. She snaps her gum and curves her lips as I practically stare.

"You dropped these," She holds up my car keys and when I don't move I feel as she takes my hand from my side and hands me the set. With her fingertips buzzing on mine, I nod at her in thanks before leaning away.

"You new around here or something?" Blue tip's continues the conversation even when I say nothing else.

"Kind of," I finally answered, turning to pay the clerk.

"You look like you're just passing through, this place isn't exactly a tourist attraction," Her voice is smooth as she continues to stare at me like I'm some strange creature.

Tipping my sunglasses down back on my nose, I give her a smirk. "I guess we'll have to see," I shrugged, grabbing the plastic bag.

The chum behind the register goes back to sleeping without a care as I make my way out of the door before noticing as the girl follows after me.

Leaning against the wall, she stands close as I pull the carton of cigarettes from the bag and tap the ends on my palm. Lighting up the stick from my mouth, her eyes lock on mine. I look from the heavy eyeliner under her eyes to her black chipped nail polish and then to the tiny hoop in her cartilage.

She holds her posture high and her stare is daring as she says "Can I bum one of those off of you?"

Her confidence makes me snicker as I hand her one and she places it between her lips just as the door to the store opens again.

Behind the ring of the bell a girl a few inches shorter walks out. Her hair is kind of blonde, kind of reddish and her large rounded glasses are the prescription kind but her Kiss band t-shirt is cool.

Her eyes switch between the girl and I as she steps forward carefully. "Ready, Li?" She hands blue tip's a red icee as her plastic bag holds every kind of sweet you can think of.