A moment before that moment, she would be free as a bird, unhitched and unclaimed. Then the moment—a ring, a kiss, an official declaration. And then the moment after, lost to all other men, she would be jealously guarded, prettily distant, mapped and properly documented, with a certificate and everything. All in just a few moments, just past Exit 221.
He thought of how she would think of him in that middle moment. She would blink her eye just so and a little blue tear would drop and dry in an instant, but that tear would be for him. No one else would see it—not the lavishly dressed guests, not the photographer in her small business suit, not their fawning parents, now crying, now smiling, now crying and smiling at once. And not her husband, tall, blond, irresponsibly muscular, for he would close his eyes and draw her in and crush her soul into his. She would be all his, and all not Darby’s.
He would not allow it.
The car was his mother’s and it was new. There was no thump thump bang like his rusty Datsun. No, mother’s car fairly flew between the painted lines, and in the driving rain and deep darkness, his headlights reached out and warded off his darker dreams. The winter before, she had been all his, wrapped up in his scarf, making snow angels, baking cookies, wearing his mittens. He had held back her hair when she threw up, just like in the movies. Was the favorite of her little sister, the receiver of Mom-made cookies, and the Only Boy Who Dad Ever Liked.
And then: the drive-in! There was one newly built on the edge of town, the only one in the whole world, it seemed. “The drive-in, Darby!” Oh, yes, the drive-in. He remembered like he was there. He rolled through the tollbooth in his Datsun, drifted silently into a far away parking spot, and killed the engine. Before them was an audience of metallic beetles glinting under a silver screen. No one watches a movie at the drive-in! No one! And he turned and looked directly at her mouth while she watched. The ribbon in her hair matched her dress. He thought of tender smooches.
“I can’t hear. Shouldn’t the radio be on?”
He found the muffled static voices on the dial. “Do you want to watch?” he asked.
“Oh yes,” she breathed. The screen was lit large and bright before them. He sat defeated. She teased the ribbon from her curls and draped it with a feminine arm out the window. Clearly, he couldn’t watch the movie. Instead he watched her sidelong and saw the flicker of moving images refracted and painted on her smooth white face. There was a shuffle of gravel and a face appeared at the window at the very tip of that very feminine arm.
“Did you drop this?” There was a man crouched at her eyes, dangling a ribbon.
“Oh! Yes,” she said. Embarrassed.
Darby cleared his throat. “Thank you.”
He handed the ribbon over. She was smiling much too much, he saw, and he felt as far away from them as he did the silver screen.
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