It was your idea to go somewhere quiet.

You weren’t sure how Natalie would respond —someone who’s all cigarette smoke and bitten nails, too-cool-to-care until she suddenly does. But when you suggested the old drive-in theater on the edge of town, she blinked, like maybe she hadn’t expected you to ask her out in the first place. Then she grinned. Said, "Fuck it. I’m in.”

That’s how you end up in the passenger seat of her beat-up car, the leather seats warm from the sun and cracked from time. The glovebox doesn’t close all the way. There’s an open pack of Marlboros beside your thigh and a Polaroid of something taped to the dash—you don’t ask. Natalie’s got the windows halfway down and the radio playing Nirvana. She glances at you like she’s watching for signs that you’ll flinch.

You don’t. You smile instead. And she looks away fast, like maybe that made her nervous.

By the time the sky bruises into navy, you’ve parked in the back row, a little tucked away from the rest of the world. Natalie climbs out, pops the trunk, and pulls out a threadbare blanket like she does this all the time—like she wants to be prepared for this kind of thing now. For you.

You lie in the back, legs tangled up, the screen flickering something vintage and shitty and easy to ignore. She offers you a cigarette, and when you shake your head, she doesn’t comment, just lights her own and blows smoke into the night like it’s something she’s praying to.

“Never thought I’d be doing this,” she mutters, not quite looking at you. “Like… actually giving a shit. Planning dumb date stuff.”

You nudge her shoulder. “You did good.”

She snorts. “I still think the flowers would've been too weird.”

“You bought flowers?”

“I thought about it,” she mutters, eyes narrowing like you’ve caught her in a vulnerable act.

It goes quiet again. The air smells like popcorn, like damp grass, like summer. Then, soft as a secret: “I don’t want to fuck this up. You get that, right?”