After he slides into the car, he smiles at me. “Hey. How’s it going?”
Still stung from the conversation with my brother, I nevertheless swallow and attempt a smile. “Okay. You?”
“Brilliant, thanks.”
I pull onto the street to take us away from his building. After navigating a maze of one-way streets to get out of his neighborhood, I feel confident enough to talk without betraying my mood. “Have you heard anything about your car?” I ask, thinking that will be a safe topic.
“Yeah. But I’m useless when it comes to those sorts of things. I only know they have to order a part, and it’ll take at least until Wednesday for them to do the repair. But it’s under warranty, so I won’t have any out-of-pocket expense.”
“That’s good,” I say, concentrating on the other cars as I merge aggressively onto the expressway and cut around the slowpoke in front of me. In my peripheral vision, I see Jude shift in his seat and slowly wrap his hand around the door handle.
I ease off the gas. A little. And I resist the urge to pass the next few cars, because it would require me to cut off some other ones. Normally, I wouldn’t hesitate, but I have a feeling my passenger’s not enjoying the ride.
“Anyway,” he says after a while, “I hear these guys are fantastic in concert. That’s why I jumped on the tickets when I found out they were coming to town.”
“What were you going to do if you couldn’t find anyone to go with you?” I ask what I’ve been wondering all afternoon.
He stomps on an imaginary brake in his floorboard as I come up quickly on the back of the truck in front of us. “Aaahhh… I dunno. I s’pose I would have gone by myself. Or not gone at all.”
“You’d have let the tickets go to waste? You could have at least scalped ’em,” I suggest.
Looking over at me, he says carefully, “That’s illegal, though, right?”
“Yeah? So what? People do it all the time.”
He chuckles. “Well, not foreign people living here on a work visa. If I got caught, I’d be deported.”
“Doubt it,” I say. “But whatever. I guess it doesn’t matter.”
“Right.” After another close call with a car, he asks, “Do you often break the law?”
I laugh. “No! Never!” At his silence, I reconsider. “Well… I guess I do a bit of the time when I’m driving—”
“That’s sort of what I was getting at.”
“Am I making you nervous?” I tease.
“Very.”
While I’m amused, I’m not cruel. I make a conscious effort to drive less aggressively.
He explains, “Part of it is that I’m still not used to sitting on this side of the car and not driving. And I’m constantly worried I’m driving on the wrong side of the road. Plus,” he adds, “I didn’t drive much at all before coming here. Still avoid it whenever possible.”
“I like to drive,” I state, but it sounds more like a dirty confession.
“I can tell.”
“My dad taught me how.” The sentence is out before I even realize I’m going to say it.
Jude loosens his grip on the handle now that we haven’t had any close calls for a few minutes. “Oh? Is he a Formula One driver?”
I smile at the idea. “No. He tried to teach me to be very cautious.”
“So… what? After you were no longer under supervision, you went rogue? A bit of a rebel, are you?”
I don’t want to talk about this, I realize. “Not exactly. But you have to die of something…” My tone effectively shuts down the conversation. All conversation. We drive in silence for a while.
Soon, the stadium looms ahead of us, and I position us to exit the highway.
We park, walk to the gates, and take our place in the line. Jude pulls the tickets from his back pocket, inspecting them. We determine we’re in the wrong line for the section where our seats are and go to the back of the correct line.
After we’ve been standing there a while, not touching, not talking, he says, “I believe these are good seats; at least I thought they were when I bought the tickets.”
The guy in front of him turns around and cranes his neck to read the ticket. “Dude, those are excellent. Trade ya.”
“Ah, no thanks,” Jude answers, taking him seriously.
“I was just kiddin’ anyway, man. Don’t get all worried. There’s really not a bad seat in this place. You’ve never been here before?”
Jude consults me. I shake my head, even though I hate admitting that I’ve lived in the area my whole life, and this is the first time I’ve set foot in Soldier Field. For anything. Much less something as cool as a concert.
“No,” he answers for both of us. “First time. Soldier Field virgins, both of us.”
I avert my face and stare at my shoes, trying not to squirm too much. The line starts moving, funneling us through security and into the stadium. Soon we’re working together to find our seats, but the signs are clear, so it’s not difficult. Before long we’re sitting and waiting for the opening act, a group neither of us has ever heard of, to come out.
He taps his fingers on his knee. I glance at him shyly. He looks down quickly. Then we both look up at each other at the same time and laugh nervously.
“This is a bit odd,” he states matter-of-factly.
“A little,” I agree. “We’re really early. I overestimated how long it would take to get here. Sorry.” Really, I wasn’t expecting Jude to shell out so much money to park as close to the stadium as we did. I’d figured in at least a mile walk from the car.
“Oh. No worries.”
More finger tapping.
I look around at all the people filing in. The crowd is going to be massive. But it still feels like Jude and I are alone. Very alone. And very awkward.
In LFW,
