I shake my head. “I can’t go to Africa tomorrow.” Can I? “What if customs thinks my passport is fake because it’s never been used before? And what about shots? Don’t you need shots or something to leave the country?”
“My cousin works at a clinic. If you need shots, I’m sure he can fit you in tomorrow morning to give them to you. We’ll just book you on an afternoon flight.”
It’s a crazy idea. Obviously, if I was worried about the cost of it before I lost my income, I definitely can’t afford to go now. But I’ve gone about five hours doing the things I’m not supposed to and it seems to be working out pretty damn well.
“Call him,” I say with a drunken shrug.
Elena narrows down the flights and calls out questions to me as she fills in the necessary information. When it’s time to submit, however, she hesitates.
“It’s nonrefundable,” she says, her hands pulling back from the laptop.
Without a word, I plop down next to her and hit the purchase button.
CHAPTER 4
By the time I arrive in Durban, South Africa, it’s been almost forty hours since I’ve last showered. I’ve consumed eighteen coffees, watched six bad movies and two good ones, and read until my eyes began to cross, and my skin has sucked in my foundation in what I can only assume was a desperate attempt to rehydrate itself. Still, I feel better than I did the morning after my slumber party with Elena. The next time I decide to abstain from alcohol, it won’t be because of calories. It will be because of hangovers and inadvisable purchases of cheap flights that involve four layovers before reaching your final destination.
I stop in a restroom before leaving the airport and use the last of my bottled water to brush my teeth. When she got my email, Phoebe offered to make the three-hour drive from St. Lulia to pick me up, and it doesn’t seem fair to reward her generosity by releasing the nuclear bomb that has been living inside my mouth. Despite my stop for hygiene, I beat most of my fellow passengers outside. It seems the majority of them decided to check their luggage and are now being held captive audience to the empty conveyer belt making its slow, creaky loop.
Rather than feeling superior for restricting myself to a carry-on, I’m freaked out imagining what they’ve packed that I’ve failed to bring. I’ve never been out of the country. Maybe they know about things I didn’t realize I needed. Or maybe they just weren’t rip-roaring drunk when they were pulling clothes out of their closets and throwing them gleefully into a bag. By the time I got back from my appointment with Elena’s cousin, I barely had time to find a spot for the malaria tablets he’d given me, much less double-check what had been done the night before.
There’s a cover over the area outside the door I exit, but its shade can’t diminish the brilliance of the day. The air smells different. It’s earthier than in LA, rich and full of possibility. The sun feels closer, and I fumble in my purse for my sunglasses. Once they’re on, I lift my arms above my head and stretch my entire body, trying to restore it to the shape it was before I decided to live in tinfoil cans for two days. My effort is interrupted by a honk from the little brown hatchback that coasts to a stop in front of me.
“Want a ride, gorgeous?” Deiss leans over from the driver’s seat to speak through the open window on the passenger’s side.
I freeze with my hands in the air, too stunned by his unexpected appearance to react appropriately. It’s not just the fact that he’s showed up instead of Phoebe but that he’s shaved off all of his hair. Not only from his head but the beard, too. All that’s left is a dark stubble on his cheeks and a black buzz on his head that I can’t help imagining feels softer than it looks.
The overall effect is . . . shocking. Overwhelming, actually. Without the hair, there’s nothing to distract from his piercing blue eyes and sharp cheekbones. It’s his mouth that’s the real unearthed treasure, though. I stare at it, unable to think.
“Deiss?” My voice comes out breathy.
“At your service.” His lip curls as if in response to the spotlight of my thoughts. He pulls back into his seat and I hear the pop of the ancient car’s trunk.
His disappearance breaks the trance, and I jerk my arms back to my side. They pop back up as if they’ve been spring-loaded, smoothing at my hair and face and clothes like any of it can be fixed. While it’s reassuring that I’ve brushed my teeth, the image I caught in the mirror while doing so was much less comforting. I happen to know for a fact that, beneath these sunglasses, the green of my eyes is so dramatically surrounded by ribbons of red Deiss is likely to break into Christmas carols if he sees them. My hair is limp, hanging down my back like a batch of sunflowers that have been forced to survive in the shade. I really hope I don’t smell, but there’s no way of knowing for sure.