We weren’t perfect, never so by a long shot. Those quiet nights in his beat up El Camino were a testimony to the fluke that we were. The only real thing was that we were never the same. As cliché as it sounds, we came from different worlds. And somewhere, somewhere between that fourth Starbuck’s Mocchiato and the strum of his favorite chords we found a middle ground, a place to call our own.

In the beginning, we’d sit in silence. I’d draw on the dashboard with a sharpie, occasionally looking up. Every time I did he was looking back. He called it the ‘speaking silence’. Because, he said, we spoke through it and that’s why it was so comfortable. If it was a good day, he’d pull out his twelve string. He’s strum the power chords then perhaps sing a song. ‘I wrote that for you’ he said, and I would smile because I knew by the way he said it that he was practicing for some other girl. I knew, but I never did care.

‘McKay’ he’d say ‘McKiddo’ and my lips would tilt, ‘there are some things in this world that are just unexplainable.’ He’d punctuate that thought with a strum on the guitar. ; Might be that somewhere, someone has all the answers,’ his fingers would race along the strings, plucking, caressing, loving. ‘But not here,; the guitar would be discarded, and he’s slip across the seats to grab my chin, to tilt my head so that we made eye contact, ‘no not here, and not now.’ Then he would recede just as quickly as he had come. Drawing the guitar back into his lap, he would pluck a string, remind her that she was, and ever would be, his one true love.

Before the end of the first three months his dashboard was covered; angels, devils, skulls and crosses, they all graced our substitute sky. It was then that we started sitting in the back seat. ‘It’s war’ he’d state, and I would see us going into battle, me armed with a mocchiato and a sharpie, and him holding fast to a sheaf of sheet music and a guitar. Maybe we knew it was futile, maybe we knew from the beginning, but neither of us card. We planned to keep the world at bay for as long as possible. With our dream weaving and our music making, we could shut out anything.

‘Mckiddo?' my lips could never tilt at the possibility of questions. ‘Tell me why you draw.’ I would sigh my relief, and in return he would flinch. ‘Tell me why you play,’ I’d answer. Then would come the considering noise he would make. His fingertips would rub the strings, each in turn, and then he would smirk. The conversation neednt go any further, because he knew, we both knew.