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I follow her voice into the kitchen where she’s topping off her mug with an almost empty pot. “How many cups have you had?” I ask.
She shrugs. “I don’t know.”
“How long have you been up?”
“A few hours.”
I scan the kitchen. My laptop sits on the kitchen table but I’m at a bad angle to see what webpage she’s on. “What have you been doing?” I ask, leaning forward.
She reaches out and closes it. “Eighteen and a half minutes, Will,” she says, smiling.
Oh, dear God.
“Okay.” I back out of the kitchen. “I’m just gonna take a quick shower.”
“Make it really quick.”
“I will…”
Part of me wants to see where this is going. The other part wants to sneak out the bathroom window. That’s life with Jovie for you. Two extremes, both equally as enticing and terrifying as the other.
I get cleaned up and throw on some clothes, moving fast to keep to her schedule. By the time I’m finished, she’s already standing by the front door with her jacket draped over her arm and her car keys clenched in her fingers.
“You’re one minute late,” she points out.
I pause beside her. “And we’re about to add another thirty seconds onto that.”
She inhales but I silence her with a firm kiss. I feel the tension fall from her shoulders and her lips purse to kiss me back for a few long moments.
“Good morning,” I whisper.
She smiles. “Good morning.”
I open the door for her and she steps outside.
***
We pass three diners before it finally sinks in that we aren’t going to breakfast.
Wherever we’re going, it’s not in Clover. Jovie steers us north on country roads toward Leavenworth, a ten-mile journey that keeps me on the edge of my seat the entire time. Expectation, reality; both just as twisted and blended as recent dreams but there’s no reason to panic just yet.
Jovie turns off the street and parks the car right next to the Leavenworth County courthouse.
“Come with me,” she says, grabbing her wallet and shoving her door open.
I run on auto-pilot, steadily increasing my stride to catch up with her by the entrance.
Jovie opens the door for me and gestures me inside.
I don’t move. “Hey, Jove,” I begin, “why are we going to the county courthouse for breakfast?”
“We’re not,” she says. “I have a quick errand to run first. It’ll only take a minute.”
“You weren’t charged with a crime, were you?”
“Of course not.”
“Are you contesting parking tickets?”
