**

I am driving slowly toward Shane’s house.
She’s motionless and soundless on the passenger seat.
Her words, her past weight on us like rocks.
“They got it back…”, she murmurs quietly as soon as I stop in front of her building.
“They got what back?”, I reply absent-mindedly.
“The police. Your car”, she elaborates and I widen my eyes.
“Oh, right. Yeah”.
I sigh and turn on my seat to face her. I rest my elbow on the steer wheel.
“Shane, listen, I’m –“.
“You don’t have to say anything”, she interrupts me immediately, staring at her own lap, “…I…I told you because I wanted to tell you. I wanted to because for a the first time in a long time I wish things were different”.
I try hard to hold back the tears and fight the urge to hug her tightly.
“They can be”, I reply.
“No they can’t”, she states firmly, shaking her head.
“Shane… What happened to you doesn’t mean that you’re incapable of love”.
“Carmen, it means exactly that”, she says stubbornly, avoiding eye-contact, “It doesn’t mean anything else”.
The so dreaded tears are now rolling freely along my cheeks.
“I don’t believe for a fucking second that you can’t love”, I say with my voice cracking.
“I can’t”.
“Stop saying that”.
She blinks her eyes repeatedly, trying to gather her thoughts.
“It’s the only thing I can say to make you understand”, she spells attentively turning her eyes to me, “This may sound corny, but… But you don’t want me…”.
She shakes her head, her eyes glimmering, and chuckles bitterly.
“I…I’m… damaged goods. I’m nothing good”.
I dry my eyes with the back of my hand.
“For Christ’s sake, Shane!”, I exclaim, “We’re all damaged goods!”.
And then, seeing that she’s speechless again, my voice softens.
“I’m wandering around through life with hardly any purpose or goal at all…”, I confess to her, “…I don’t know what I’m doing half the time…”.
She throws me a quick glance and I grab her hand.
“…But I know that I can love…”.
Her fingers entwine with mine, unconsciously.
“…I know that I can love, I know that I can love you, I know that I do love you –“.
“I won’t let you love me”, she states shaking her head firmly.
I watch her with begging eyes.
“Why?”, I moan in a sob.
“I won’t let you love me because…”, her voice cracks, “…Because I love you…”.
I burst out laughing, or crying, or maybe both.
“You love me?”, I ask in a thin voice.
She takes a look outside the window.
“Can I go?”.
“No!”, I exclaim locking the car doors.
She covers her face with her hands, in frustration.
“Do you know how long I have waited for somebody I love to say that they love me back and for me to actually believe them?”, I exclaim hurriedly.
Shane looks like a deer caught in the headlights.
“Shane, if you think you’re getting out of this scar, you’re totally out of your mind!”.
She shakes her head again and swallows.
“It will never work”.
I chuckle through the tears.
“It’s already working… It’s working…”, I sob.
She turns to me and tilts her head, finally noticing, truly noticing my tears.
“I thought… I thought you didn’t cry…”, she croaks.
“I thought you didn’t date”, I reply, still chuckling, “…Surprise, I’m crying… and this… this is very much a date, it’s unconventional, perhaps, but it’s the best date I’ve ever –“.
And she kisses me.
Unexpectedly, and I can’t catch my breath because her lips are on mine and they’re soft and warm and sweet and.
I kiss her back.
And I slowly part my lips and her tongue meets mine and my head starts spinning and I gently touch her cheek, and my fingers linger on her jawline and her hands are cupping my face and our breathes are becoming uneven and shaky and I’m melting all inside and it’s like an electrical shock.
And when I close my eyes and our kiss deepens, and for a second her chest presses against mine so hard that I can feel her heartbeat, Shane abruptly pulls away and she’s crying, and she’s panicking, and I try to grab her but she’s much quicker and stronger than me and she lunges at the car controls and the doors open.
“I can’t!”, she exclaims, her voice cracking, opening the car door and running out before I can do anything, “I can’t!” and she runs away in the darkness and the rain and she doesn’t turn back.
“No!”, I yell, starting to sob again, “Shane, please!”.
But she’s gone.
And I cry all my tears, alone, on the steering wheel.