Virgin Lips

23. From Cinderella to Jay Z

"Did you take everything?"

I rolled my eyes. "Yes, for the hundredth time, yes, I did ..." I sighed, to which he chuckled.

"Hey, I'm just trying to be careful."

"Why do we need to use the car?" I asked, still confused as to why couldn't we just fly to Connecticut but had to wake up super early to load the car, and then drive all the way to Woodbury.

"Because it takes longer." Ben chuckled. "We'd have to fly to Boston then from Boston go to Connecticut, how is that worth it?"

"Fine, fine." I raised my hands in mock surrender. "You don't need to lecture me."

He laughed as he finally closed the trunk after having placed in there his equipment as well as our suitcases. "You need to travel more, JoJo."

"I wish." I sighed, getting into the car. I don't know much about cars, but Ben's seemed pretty cozy, and I liked that it was navy blue, my favorite color. He joined me in the car a moment later, and we both fastened our seatbelts in silence for a moment.

"Have faith in your dreams," he claimed as he started the car, "and one day your rainbow will come smiling thru; no matter how hard your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true."

I furrowed my eyebrows, staring at him. "Cinderella, really?"

He laughed, shrugging. "It does the trick."

"I didn't know you were into old fairy tales."

"I'm not," he started driving, "but it's one of Elle's favorites."

"Elle?" Who's Elle now? I don't think he's ever mentioned a girl with that name. He did say he has brothers, but he never mentioned a sister.

Ben glanced at me, a bit flushed. "Oh, uh ... my friend. We casually saw each other again when I went back home for my mom's birthday."

I nodded in understanding. Seems he has a lot of female friends. Valerie, Elle ... I've never really heard him talk about male friends. Then again, he doesn't talk much about his life in Nebraska, just about the stuff in New York. It's as if he were deliberately keeping that side of him hidden. Is he ashamed of it? Maybe there's something in his past that he's not particularly proud of?

I took the chance to stare at Ben for a long minute while he focused on the road. Does he look like someone that's hiding a secret? He's pretty open about everything, the only dodging is related to his life in Nebraska, like I said. But I can't see what could he be hiding. I mean, after all this time and seeing how we opened up, I'm mostly surprised he still hasn't told me a word about the person he's always on the phone with when he's at home, but I can't really demand he tells me, can I? Especially not when I didn't tell him about Jeremy either.

Speaking of Jeremy, he was bummed when I told him I couldn't go to the Berkshires with him, but he was happy I found an opportunity that would allow me to leave the diner. He said, and I quote: "that place doesn't deserve you, the sooner you run away, the quicker you can start cleansing your soul from the stench of that hellhole". He's pretty poetic at times, I like it.

So, yeah, he was disappointed that we wouldn't get away for the weekend and that I even had to leave for about a week, but he was happy for me. In the end, it's 12 thousand dollars. I don't think I've ever seen all that money all together.

"I ... didn't thank you for this opportunity." I murmured, biting on my lip.

"Huh?" Ben answered distractedly, focused fully on the road. He didn't even have time to shave, the stubble was becoming a beard, and his glasses seemed thick as ever. Did he ever look so, I don't know, normal? I mean your regular cute nerd that doesn't care about how he looks. I can't tell whether he was always like that or it's just that it's been so long and I almost forgot the odd mix of handsome and sweet that Ben is. "You're staring at me." He chuckled.