His Hand

Hallie O’Neill

(originally featured
in issue xxi.i- Autumn)

The drive was boring. Minnesota to Iowa, a straight shot down 35 through nothing but cornfields, nothing but flat land and the occasional wafting of factory stench. Another trek back to campus for the next school year, my usual chauffeur and high school friend Jacob behind the wheel. 

We chatted pleasantly for the first thirty minutes or so, snacking on gummy worms and chocolate covered raisins sent by his mom, the kind of mom who always sends her kid off with snacks, no matter how old he is. He rolled his eyes and we laughed when she called his phone to make sure we were safely on the road. He put her on speaker and I shouted my “hello.”

I looked out the window at the vast fields of corn crop, settling in for the second half of the drive, still another hour and a half to go. Jacob reached for his bottle of soda in the console, bringing it to his lips after twisting off the top. He put the bottle back into the console after taking a sip, but his hand didn’t return to the wheel – it stayed there, on the bottle, over the console.

His fingers then slowly pulled the rest of his hand about a centimeter to the right, just barely touching the edge of my seat. It was a totally awkward place for a hand, and we hadn’t spoken for the last twenty minutes, so maybe he was stretching? Readjusting? Pausing to think about taking another sip of his soda?

It stayed long enough for me to think it was intentional. I wondered why I was so fixated on a mere hand, let alone the hand of my good friend. I breathed in then out; I looked out the window.

Another five minutes passed and I moved my eyeballs down to see the hand one centimeter closer. Time began to feel quite static; I couldn’t focus on anything other than his hand. I had no idea how close we were to the school or what we had been talking about before. I wondered if maybe I had given him the idea that I had feelings for him. I broke up with his best friend earlier that summer, and he also broke up with his long-time high school girlfriend, and he had sent me flirty text messages pretty soon after I became single. It felt odd and inappropriate and very bad-friend of him. Nothing became of these texts, of course – I simply scolded him for it, half-thinking (half-hoping) he was just joking around. That was just his personality, had always been. He liked to flatter people.

I realized how stupid I was to think about it as something flirty. It’s just a hand, he was just readjusting, we’d been in the car a long time. It was cramped. Three hours is a long time to sit still.

I decided to text my brother, shoot him a quick message to clarify that I was acting insane. His hand is just like resting on the seat next to my thigh, is that weird? Am I overreacting?

I mean, that’s sort of weird. Are you guys talking?

No, we’ve been silent for the last like 30 minutes, lol. Should I say something?

Tell him to stop.

I tried to think about what I could possibly say, but everything sounded way too presumptuous in my head. He wasn’t doing anything; what was there to say? He’d think I was a creep if I suggested that he was trying to pull something. We were friends. I wondered if the hand was really moving closer because I couldn’t see it moving, yet there it was almost touching my leg, closer than ever before.

I made myself stiff, hoping the stillness of my thighs would convey disinterest (if, of course, “interest” was the motive for the hand). Stiff as a board except for the quickening beating of my heart. My palms felt sweaty, but I kept them in position, one clutching the other in locked communion around my phone.

With a careful swiftness, his index finger reached out and began to move up and down over the surface of my outer thigh, a friction so slight I almost thought I was imagining it. The finger seemed to tremble as it rubbed up over the seam of my jeans, then exhale as it traced back down over it. Each successful cycle was a nonverbal affirmation, the hand growing more confident and more powerful with each stroke.

He was touching me. Touching me? Did I initiate this? Could I have possibly hinted at it? Why else would he reach out and touch me in silence?

Still I tried to think of precisely the right sentence to say, a sentence that wouldn’t be too harsh but still firm enough to show my discomfort. Another hour in the car together – no matter what I’d say, things would be awkward and we’d have to sit in it. I thought about simply ignoring the hand until we arrived, just pretend it wasn’t there stroking me because Jacob and I were friends and it would be uncomfortable to acknowledge it.

Even still, we were going 80 miles per hour and there was no safe way to jump out of a vehicle moving that fast if I ever needed to do so. I darted my eyes to the lock which was, indeed, pushed down. But wait, are you fucking crazy? Jumping out of a moving vehicle, over a simple misunderstanding? Stop, stop, stop. The beating of my heart pounding frantic and urgent as ever. That’s all it was – a misunderstanding.

But then I thought that if the hand was already touching my thigh, there were just a few more options of where it could go next.

“Hey, can you please stop?”

My voice cracked with my request and he jumped, yanking his hand back and situating himself forward. The Toyota in front of us suddenly braked and it was almost too late, but Jacob slammed his foot down and the tires screamed as our bodies flew forward and hunched over the restraints of our seatbelts. He turned the wheel to the left and we stopped just in time, pausing for a moment before following the Toyota as it accelerated again.

“Fuck, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I replied too quickly, feeling mortified and somehow responsible for our near-crash.

We sat in silence for the remainder of the ride, me not daring to look anywhere but outside my passenger window, only moving to check my phone to recount the number of minutes until I could get out of the car. As we approached campus, I tried to bookend the trip with a casual conversation like we’d usually have, asking him about what he’d make for dinner that night and thanking him for giving me a ride. I offered him some money for gas, which he profusely declined, but I had a ten-dollar bill in my pocket that my mom made me promise to give to him, so I placed it in one of the cup holders before opening my door to get out. He popped open the trunk for me and I grabbed my bags, waving as I trudged up the sidewalk to my dorm.

I told my roommates about Jacob’s hand and their faces wrinkled up in confused disgust. He’d hung out with us a few times before, and it seemed out of character, they said. Random. I felt stupid for overanalyzing the situation – probably just pulling a move now that we’re both single, just taking a chance just in case. Maybe he was shy, didn’t know how to initiate that first step.

“Well, I’m glad you’re okay,” one of them said.

I quickly laughed it off and dismissed it as a slightly creepy, very unlike Jacob moment. “Duh I’m okay, it’s not a big deal,” I scoffed. “Just weird.”

Hours later as I crawled into bed for the night, I remembered how his hand lingered on my seat for so long, him not feeling the need to say a thing and me spending what seemed like hours wondering if I was truly imagining things. His name popped up on my phone.

Hey, I’m sorry about today. It won’t happen again.

“Today”? Was that today? I felt my heart picking up speed like it did in his car, quickening fastest when he stroked my outer thigh slowly as if he owned it, as if he knew he could grab it inside the comfort and safety of his own vehicle without me knowing how to stop him.

It’s not a big deal, don’t worry about it! Thanks again for the ride.