Zoe’s Point of View

Morning light slowly floods the room, filtering through the crooked slits in the curtain. At first, it's just a pale glow, as if the sun feels sorry for waking someone who clearly needs to sleep. But then the light grows, too hot for my sensitive eyes, and everything inside me stumbles awake. His voice is the first thing that reaches me.

Not the light.

Not the pain in my ribs.

Not the bitter taste in my mouth.

Cole's voice.

"I don't owe anyone an explanation." His tone is hard, tense, almost a muffled growl. "I just need a favor. Just one. Seriously."

I freeze in bed, letting my breath come and go slowly as my memories try to reorganize themselves inside my still heavy head. He keeps talking, and each sentence carries that mixture of anger and frustration that only Cole can muster in a single breath.

"I'll be there in four hours max."

More silence. Then a sharp click.

"And don't think that just because I'm asking you this, anything has changed between us."

The phone hangs up violently.

I open my eyes completely. The motel room is steeped in the same atmosphere of abandonment as always—peeling walls, the smell of dampness, cheap furniture. But the sight that weighs most heavily is him. Cole is sitting on the edge of my bed, his back to me, his head down and his shoulders stiff. He looks exhausted. He looks... human. I move a little, and he turns immediately. His blue eyes fall on me as if he were waiting for the slightest movement to approach.

"You're awake." His smile is small, almost pure relief. "Great. Let's get out of this hole. Now."

I would blink if I had the strength.

"Now? Go where?"

He ignores the question. He touches my forehead with the back of his hand, checking for fever the same way he did in the hospital when no one else was looking after me.

"How are you?"

His touch is cold, firm, careful. The opposite of the man who was making threats on the phone seconds ago.

"Cole... what's going on?"

He lets out a sigh so tired it seems to come from places inside him he doesn't often visit. He takes my hands in his—warm, large, completely different from mine.

"You scared me last night." My heart tightens. It's a tone of absolute truth—not exaggeration. "You were burning up, Zoe. I had to put you in the bathtub. With ice.”

The silence weighs heavily, even on me.

I don’t remember everything. Pieces come and go, as if they were recorded with interference. I only know that his fear seems more real than the fever I had.

I give a small nod.

“I’m better now.”

"Good." He presses his lips together, trying to maintain control of something I don't know what it is. "Because we're going to be on the road for a long time."

The word road echoes inside me.

"Cole... I heard you say four hours. That's not Seattle to Alabama."

He freezes. A movement so subtle that I only notice it because I'm looking directly at him.

"We're going to Portland."

"Why?"

He gets up from the bed without looking at me. He starts gathering clothes, shoving everything into his backpack as if to silence his own discomfort.

"An acquaintance will give us shelter."

An acquaintance.

"Who exactly?"

He takes a deep breath, zips up his backpack, and finally looks at me.

"Someone who owes me a favor."

Nothing about Cole is ever clearly explained. It's as if there are always closed doors between him and the world—and I can only hear the echo of what's on the other side. He approaches me again, but now his tone is more impatient, as if he wants to end the conversation.

“I’m going to take a shower. You should eat.” He points to a paper bag. “We’re leaving in an hour.”

Cole enters the bathroom and slams the door shut. I swallow the strange feeling in my throat and get up slowly, ignoring the sharp pain in my ribs. I sit down at the table, open the bag of food, and force myself to eat, even though I'm not hungry. I don't know what awaits me in Portland — I only know that I depend on him. And that scares me more than any fever.

Forty minutes later, we're leaving. Cole leads the way, carrying the backpack, and I follow, still shaky. I hope he goes to the motorcycle—my stomach churns at the thought of the ride. But he stops next to a car.

I stop too.

"Where did you get this car?"

He opens the passenger door.

"Get in." I get in, because my body simply obeys before my head even decides anything. He leans over me to fasten my seatbelt. His closeness fills me with warmth—not just physical warmth, but something deeper. Something that takes my breath away. The click of the seatbelt sounds too loud. He doesn't move away immediately. His fingers move up, touch my hair, tuck a strand behind my ear. He smiles softly and murmurs, "You're beautiful." I have no reaction. I have a silent meltdown inside. He finally moves away, walks around the car. "I stole it."

I would blink if I could.

"What? What did you steal?"

"The car."

He gets in, starts the engine with the jumper cables. As if it were normal.

"STOP!"

He laughs. He just laughs.

"Relax, Zoe. Trust me." It's scary how a sentence from him can be so reassuring and so disturbing at the same time.

We drive for hours, and between a stop at a diner and another bite of the sandwich I share with him while he drives, something changes. Light. Simple. Real. We laugh. Sitting in a stolen car, fleeing death, heading to a house he clearly doesn't love — we laugh. He tells me stories about his childhood, about his father, about the workshop, about the day he accidentally bathed in oil. I laugh so hard my ribs beg for mercy. And that's when I realize: Cole is someone who should never have been kind. But he is. Intensely.

And that disarms me.

When our laughter subsides, I notice the change in mood. The way he looks ahead, staring at the road as if he can predict the future. Finally, he says:

"You'll be fully recovered by the time we get there. And from there... I'll take you far away from Seattle. To wherever you want to be free."

My heart flutters as if he has pulled something inside me. But there is something that disturbs me. Something that forms in my throat before I can stop it.

"Cole... that person in Portland. She might not like you being with me. She might... not understand."

He frowns, genuinely confused.

“Why wouldn’t my mother like you being with me?”

The silence that falls between us is so heavy it almost knocks me over. I stare at him, paralyzed.

“Did you call your mother an acquaintance?”

Cole’s expression closes. The air changes. The whole car seems to get smaller, colder.

“She’s an acquaintance.” Even looking at the road, I can see he’s far away. Far from me, far from here, far from anywhere safe. "She was my mother once. Today... she's just someone I used to know." His tone is so harsh that it seems to break the air. "We're staying there because there's nowhere else. That's all."

And the rest of the trip is just silence.

Silence — and everything he didn't say.