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Post by mickey on Aug 31, 2006 7:19:15 GMT -5
Well. This was awesome. They were looking at him like he was some kind of alien. Mickey knew for a fact that he was not. (He'd taken the Quizilla test in high school between writing cases. Debate class past the first two weeks, he'd found, was more a forum for open discovery of everything in the universe than it was Time To Write Your Cases. That was for the ten minutes before you started your rounds.)
"Uhhh..."
He stuck his hands, with minor difficulty, in his pockets and leaned against the car again, this time against the driver's side window. The car was so flat he probably could've sat on it without too much effort, but he didn't. One did not just go around sitting on Lamborghinis.
"I'm Dani. This is Simon. You're... looking for a place to stay?"
"Mickey," he said. "Yeah, I am." The tiny pause between this statement and his next would be all most people would need to determine that Dani's unspoken question was heard, understood and correct in its assumption. "Nice to meet you two."
"And yeah, a lift'd be awesome."
Simon - Mickey had a bizarre, though thankfully brief, mental image of the Saturday Night Live skit, but with this guy in the bath instead - voiced his agreement, but they both looked like they thought he'd, like, drive them off and kill them in a ditch somewhere. Or maybe he was Interrupting Something.
Naaaah.
Too bad if, against all fate, he was. Mickey was officially sick of the heat. Literally. He didn't know if he was going to be able to eat dinner tonight.
"Uh ... will we ... fit in there?"
Mickey shrugged. "Yeah," he said. "Sorta. It's a two-seater, so Dani, you'll have to sit on someone - I mean, unless you want to, dude - but they're big seats and it's only a mile, right?"
Rule Number 957: Make Every Other Option Seem Stupid. Most people will follow you blindly for fear of looking like idiots.
In this case, they would look like idiots. Mickey'd get there anyway and they could die of heatstroke.
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Post by danielle on Aug 31, 2006 7:46:00 GMT -5
Squinting at the car when Simon asked Mickey the question, Dani came to the same conclusion as the newcomer just before he voiced it. She looked from Mickey to Simon and back to Mickey, not sure how it was going to be resolved when Mickey shrugged and spoke.
Dani shrugged right back. She had no reason to be embarrassed about sitting on someone's lap, although she didn't know either of them particularly well.
Still, it wasn't like lap-sitting was particularly racy, was it?
Was it?
"Can you drive with someone on your lap?" She assumed that Mickey would be driving no matter what. Not a chance she'd let a complete stranger drive if that was her car. And yeah, it was only a mile, but surely he'd still need to see.
Shrugging again, she looked at Simon. "It's all good, Simon can deal with being a seat for a while... Can't you?" Dani wasn't particularly heavy or anything, either.
She looked between the two boys, hoping that this would all be sorted out quickly. By which she meant that she was hoping to get into the car and the air conditioning before she started to sweat too much, cause that would make her feel self concious.
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Post by Simon Burkett on Aug 31, 2006 9:30:58 GMT -5
He couldn't see any way out of this.
Either he had to refuse and look like an asshole or accept and endure ten minutes of Dani sitting on his lap in those shorts. Just the thought of it made him weak at the knees.
He blushed furiously.
"Uh ... yeah, you can ... sit on my lap."
He glanced at Mickey.
"Thanks ... thanks for the lift ... it will be good to ... get out of the heat."
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Post by mickey on Aug 31, 2006 17:25:58 GMT -5
They certainly seemed... uncertain. There was much glancing back and forth, at least on Dani's behalf.
Also, was it just him or was 'Dani' a name you expected from a sorority girl, not some Native chick? Didn't they all usually get named Starshine and Two Bears Screwing or something?
"Can you drive with someone on your lap?"
"Unfortunately not," Mickey said. "Not unless you're a small dog. Or a baby. I couldn't see over a real person, though."
Babies were not real people. They were like kittens, but more boring, less charming, and requiring a hell of a lot more work. So more like nitroglycerin, really.
"It's all good, Simon can deal with being a seat for a while... Can't you?"
Simon looked like he was about to explode. Mickey couldn't stop a twitch of a smile from rising to his lips.
"Uh ... yeah, you can ... sit on my lap."
"Thanks ... thanks for the lift ... it will be good to ... get out of the heat."
Mickey gave Simon a slightly strange look. Did he have a speech impediment or something?
Yes, and she's got great legs.
Oh, subconscious. You so funny.
"No problem," Mickey said. "C'mon, then, it's too fricking hot out here to stand around all day."
He trotted around to the other side of the car and opened the passenger's side door before he crossed back to his own side, opening the door and sliding all the way down into the low-seated car in one smooth movement. It had taken a lot of practice. In a similar unified motion, he stuck his key into the ignition and turned it, flicked down the radio from the eardrum-shattering level it had been before, and jacked up the AC. Thankfully, Lamborghinis were too classy to do that blast-of-hot-air thing most cars did. It had some sort of internal flash-freezy thing that solved that little problem.
Maybe, for the sake of the environment, he should've gotten a Civic. But did a Civic automatically adjust its air conditioner? He thought not.
The engine purred like a happy kitten. Absentmindedly, Mickey stroked the steering wheel.
"So, like, just down there?" he asked, pointing down the Generic Country Lane. "No weird narrow signless streets I have to find my way down or anything?"
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Post by Simon Burkett on Sept 1, 2006 3:38:37 GMT -5
Simon ditched his bags in the narrow space in the back and then slid into the soft, comfortable seat. It lay so far back it was almost like a dentists chair, only more comfortable and less terrifying. Then he realised that the angle wasn't properly adjusted. A lever pull later and it felt more like an expensive recliner. Which given the car, it probably was.
"Yeah, it's just down there," he'd wondered the same thing himself about the little country lanes, expecting any minute to be tripped by a hidden line of barbed wire before getting dragged off into the woods to be raped and eaten.
Possibly not even in that order.
The back country crazies, and even the worrying little lanes had proven friendlier than expected however and there weren't even that many of them. Rogue's Place was just off the main road.
He admired the interior of the vehicle again.
"This is a nice car," he said faintly enviously. Not that he really wanted one, but it was a nice car.
The cool of the air-con washed over him.
Nice.
He glanced up at Dani with a nervous smile.
"So ... uh ... "
Dude, a guy with enough money to buy THIS car, and confident with it?
Uh huh.
You have NO chance.
Thanks, I needed that.
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Post by danielle on Sept 1, 2006 6:25:50 GMT -5
Smiling at Mickey as he opened the door, Dani waited for Simon to sit down before looking at him a little awkwardly.
What if I'm too heavy?
That's the stupidest thing you've ever thought.
Her cheeks reddening slightly, she ducked down to sit on Simon's legs, not exactly managing the movement gracefully. She ended up kinda falling on him, actually, and she hoped that she hadn't hurt him.
"I'm sorry."
Looking around, she put her bag between her feet and pulled the door shut. Was it a good idea to try to put a seatbelt over both her and Simon? She looked at the seatbelt, looked down at the buckle, realised that she was kinda perched on Simon and that it probably wouldn't work if she stayed like that. She leant back, tugging at the belt, and buckled it around the pair of them. It was force of habit, but it had the effect of keeping her pressed right back against him.
Hoping that she wasn't digging an elbow into Simon's side or anything, she looked at Mickey. "Yup, just up the road. I'll tell you when we get close."
Nice car. Nice air conditioning.
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Post by Simon Burkett on Sept 1, 2006 6:52:16 GMT -5
There had been times in the past when Simon had thought he had died and gone to heaven. Two of them had been in the last forty eight hours. Both of those occasions had been under less than pleasant circumstances though. On the plus side there had been a pretty girl waiting to nurse him back to health.
Dani was sitting on his lap.
She actually weighed very little, but he could still feel the warmth of her body pressed against him in the seat. Her dark hair brushed his face, the faint scent of jasmine tantalising his nostrils.
Sweet Jesus.
Oh baby.
Normally he would have crossed his arms in his lap. That would have meant putting his arms around her. His blush couldn't actually be more severe than it already was and he held his arms at his sides instead, not actually trusting himself to move.
His insides felt like water.
Hot damn.
There was a familiar tingling in his loins.
Oh God no!
Can't help it.
Nononononononono!!
Sorry buddy.
HELL NO!
Involuntary reaction.
Shit! Uh, dung beetles! Cleaning the bathroom! Washing the Car! Being a mutant!
Gonna have to hurry you!
Marlon Brando getting naked!
Ew! Yeah that'll do it!
The colossal struggle of willpower took only a few moments but to Simon it felt like a life time. His pulse raced and he was sure he was sweating despite the air conditioning.
Marlon Brando getting naked!
Now all he had to do was focus on that for the next ten minutes.
There would probably be scarring.
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Post by mickey on Sept 1, 2006 8:22:22 GMT -5
"Yeah, it's just down there."
"Cool," Mickey said vaguely, feeling much better now that the AC was up so high it was making even his normally-immobile hair vibrate in the breeze. No gel, even, he thought despondently. Just natural tenacity.
Sigh.
"This is a nice car."
"Thanks," Mickey said appreciatively. "His name is Sven."
Sven-Göran Eriksson, of course, the manager of the English football team from the World Cup. Not that Mickey was particularly into football, but the car needed a name, a dignified name, and there was nothing more dignified than an old man keeping up traditions.
"So ... uh ... "
Mickey glanced sideways with another smirk to see Dani, somewhat inelegantly, perch on Simon's lap.
Simon looked, again, like he was going to explode, but this time from sheer unadulterated bliss.
"I'm sorry."
Aww. Awkward love. It seemed Fate had decided to be extremely weird today.
Dani dithered for a few moments about the seatbelt and ended up shifting around several times on Simon, which could never be a good thing. Mickey prayed to the general Forces That Were that he could think of something to keep the Perfectly Natural Reaction from... reacting. 'I got a hard-on in your car' could not possibly be the best memory off which to build a life-long and titanium-strong bond of brotherhood. Especially if the anatomical phenomenon in question was not of Mickey's doing.
Simon wasn't really all that bad, was he, after all that? He had nice eyes. The opposite of a Monet. Better up close.
But he was Dani's, and their relationship would be entertaining enough for Mickey not to even consider poaching.
"Yup, just up the road. I'll tell you when we get close."
"Mmkay," Mickey said. "We all situated?"
There might, or might not have been, the slightest trace of an evil glimmer in his eyes when they passed over Simon, who was now sweating.
But either way, Mickey pushed the emergency brake down and checked his mirrors before pulling out into the actual road, the soft suspension making the bumps and potholes in the road almost nonexistant, at least to the occupants of the car. Trees flashed by the windows when he got the car up to the legal clip of 30 miles an hour (ooh, aah), afternoon light filtering through them to turn the road and everything around it a bright green-gold.
"S'pretty out here," Mickey said with some mild surprise. He'd always kind of expected country lanes to look somehow unclean or diseased.
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Post by danielle on Sept 1, 2006 9:05:11 GMT -5
Picking at her fingernails, completely oblivious to the effect she was having on poor Simon, Dani squirmed around to look at Mickey. He was driving, obviously, and had to keep his eyes on the road, but she still felt a bit weird talking to someone that she wasn't looking at.
"It is really pretty. And really hot." She noticed that her shorts had pulled up a little when she'd sat down, but she wasn't going to try pulling them down while she was sitting on Simon. That was, in her mind, a sure recipe for disaster - whereby her complete ineptitude at life would make her elbow out one of his teeth or something, and all she'd be able to do would be stare while he bled everywhere, all over Mickey's car. And then, of course, they'd both think that she was the strangest person ever to walk the face of the earth, and then she'd have to leave.
At least she hadn't unpacked yet.
She noticed how cold the air had started to become, almost like a refridgerator in the small black car. Goosebumps rose on her bare legs, and Dani wondered whether changing out of her jeans had been a good idea or not. She'd had no reason to suspect they'd be getting a lift, though.
Rubbing her legs a couple of times to get rid of the goosebumps, Dani wondered at why the car would be named Sven. Not to mention that it was a he - didn't most people think of their cars as female?
Chewing on the inside of her cheek, she squirmed back around to face the front, peering at the car.
"Sven's pretty."
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Post by Simon Burkett on Sept 1, 2006 10:10:44 GMT -5
Marlon Brando getting naked!
Simon spared a glance out the window from the corner of his eye and realised, yes, it really was rather scenic. While the heat might seem oppressive when you were out in it, it did complement the surrounding country very well. It all just seemed right somehow.
Dani shifting around really wasn't helping matters at all. Her butt was ...
He tried not to think about her butt.
Marlon Brando getting naked!
"So ... uh ... Mickey, " he began somewhat shakily, "how did you find out about Rogue's Place?"
Wriggle, wriggle.
He involuntarily looked down and noticed that her shorts ...
Oh God ...
MARLON BRANDO GETTING NAKED!!
He squeezed his eyes shut, took a long, calming breath and let out a quiet, shuddering sigh.
"And ... where have you come from?"
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Post by mickey on Sept 1, 2006 17:32:15 GMT -5
"It is really pretty. And really hot."
"True that," Mickey said sadly. "I'm seriously going to get heatstroke or something. This is nuts. We should never have settled Mississippi."
Texas, either. Mickey had been to Texas once. As far as he was concerned, it was armadillo country, and the crazy weather was just karmic punishment for the settlers infringing upon the tiny desert animals' territory and running them over on the highway all the time.
Dani continued to squirm. Mickey had to fight a long, hard battle to keep himself from bursting out laughing.
What? Schadenfreude was the best form of humor ever.
He did notice Dani rubbing at her legs, though, and turned the AC down a few clicks, though it was still slightly meat-lockerish in the car. "Sorry," he said. "You can screw with the radio if you want; I'll listen to just about anything. Just mess with whatever you want as long as it's not the wheel, really."
Mickey was pretty free and easy with his car. This was because most people were terrified to touch it and thus never messed it up.
"Sven's pretty."
"Yes," Mickey said, petting the car again. "He is."
Sven also happened to be the name of a completely gorgeous German movie star, after whom the car was secondarily named. That Sven was pretty, too.
"So ... uh ... Mickey. How did you find out about Rogue's Place? And ... where have you come from?"
Mickey spared a moment to send Simon a worried glance. He hoped he wouldn't actually explode, in any sense of the word. Any interpretation would stain the upholstery.
"My cleaning lady in New York had a son that was a - a mutant," Mickey said, still uncomfortable with the word. "He thought about taking the Cure. I'd just kind of felt alone since I... did it... and she got me the place's name and the address and sold me on it. Before that I'm from Copperton - that's in Oregon, weird little resortish town outside Salem. Basically a giant golf course."
The golf course element had been rather nice. Everything else about Copperton had not been.
"I think just about anywhere beats where I grew up," he said. "What about you two?"
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Post by danielle on Sept 2, 2006 3:43:50 GMT -5
"Montana." Dani looked over to Mickey again, finally settling herself down comfortably against Simon's chest. Of course, the car trip was just about over, but at least she'd stopped wriggling.
"Grew up on a reservation, but I left when..." Mickey had spoken openly about the cure, if not overly comfortably, so Dani felt that she could do the same. It was odd seeing the different reactions that people had.
"Well, I travelled around a lot after it happened." She didn't really want to start talking about the fact that she completely unable to win at life, even though both of them had probably figured it out by now. It was just a bit of an odd thing to actually say out loud.
"Ended up not far from here, one of the ladies I worked with told me about it." She shrugged lightly, then realised that she'd just about cracked Simon in the jaw with her shoulder.
"Oh! Sorry! I didn't mean..." She looked back out the window in an attempt to stop rambling, and as a result, possibly manage to sound like a normal human being.
As if that'll ever happen.
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Post by Simon Burkett on Sept 2, 2006 5:26:04 GMT -5
Now that Dani had settled down things became a little easier. Only a little. He still had to contend with her body pressed against his, the soft warmth of her body seeping through his clothing, the scent of her ...
Marlon Brando getting naked!
Almost had you that time.
Oh shut up.
"Boston," Simon said, "though I was at college in New York when I ... had to leave." The thought of his mutation and the subsequent time on the streets was still an extremely uncomfortable subject and probably always would be.
"After the cure ... I just sort of drifted until I ended up here in Caldecott County. A woman at the store in town pointed me to Rogue's Place, Marie ... the girl who runs the house, thinks the locals have got pretty good at spotting ... people like us."
He'd nearly said ex-mutants and he didn't like to think of himself that way.
Then Dani nearly hit him in the face.
"Th ... that's ok," he said with a small smile. Getting smacked in the face was the least of his worries right now.
The big house hoved into view through the trees and Simon pointed it out through the wind-screen.
"There it is."
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Post by mickey on Sept 2, 2006 8:40:38 GMT -5
"Montana."Mickey realized abruptly that he had no idea where Montana even was. Should've gone for that GED once he'd gotten fixed. Or at least paid attention in Geography in - what, the sixth grade? Would've done him good. Especially when he'd got lost and ended up in Indiana on the way here. That had been fun. "Grew up on a reservation, but I left when... Well, I travelled around a lot after it happened. Ended up not far from here, one of the ladies I worked with told me about it." "Cool," Mickey said. "Which tribe?" He wondered if she did crazy Indian dances or had an animal familiar. (Should've paid attention in World Cultures as well.) "Boston. Though I was at college in New York when I ... had to leave."Simon's must've been one of the more physically apparent mutations. "Know how that goes," he said vaguely, though of course he'd left high school, not college, and he'd just had to be a homebody for a few years. "After the cure ... I just sort of drifted until I ended up here in Caldecott County. A woman at the store in town pointed me to Rogue's Place, Marie ... the girl who runs the house, thinks the locals have got pretty good at spotting ... people like us.""So they just sort of - don't care?" Mickey glanced back at Simon in time to see him take one in the jaw. Ow. "Oh! Sorry! I didn't mean..."
"Th ... that's ok."Either they'd end up married or they'd end up dismembering each other, Mickey thought. And they'd only end up dismembering each other in the path towards marraige."There it is."It was big, like he'd expected, but not the sort of big he was used to. Even in New York - at least the parts he'd lived in, like a little bit of upstate cut out and stuck into the City - all the big houses had existed almost solely to advertise their size. Maybe it was because this place was older, but somehow it looked like it was big because it was supposed to be, not because its owners wanted to prove to their new neighbors that they had enough money to make it so. "Nice," he said appreciatively, pulling the car smoothly up onto the gravel drive, which crunched, just like they always did in movies. "Home again home again. Here, lemme get your door." He turned off the ignition and performed the smooth entrance motion in reverse. It had taken him weeks to avoid smacking his head against the doorframe. He had actually practiced it one Saturday when he'd had nothing better to do. He trotted around the car and pulled Dani and Simon's door open, though he didn't offer his hand to her to help her out, like he was probably supposed to. They could excuse his touching thing, he supposed, if he'd given them a ride home. "So what," Mickey said, "Do I just waltz in and say 'hey, where's my room?'" [Exeunt to Rogue's Place]
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Post by danielle on Sept 2, 2006 10:59:09 GMT -5
Though Mickey opened the door for her, he didn't extend a hand to help her out. Which left Dani looking slightly awkward at the prospect of trying to perform a reverse of how she'd gotten in.
That, of course, having been more of a falling into Simon's lap than a nice smooth manoeuvre. She unbuckled the seat belt, swivelled around and looked at him, sitting with her feet out the door.
"I'm sorry in advance."
Oh god, this isn't going to be good.
She kinda put her arms on either side of him to push herself out of the seat, reaching for the ground with her toes and twisting as she did it. Somehow, she managed to stay upright and get herself out of the seat without any injury to Simon, and she grinned in triumph and straightened up.
And she smacked her head.
"Oh, fuck ME!"
She brought one hand to her head, rubbing the bump that had already formed with a wince.
Blushing furiously, she bent down to retrieve her bag from the floor, turning back to Mickey with gritted teeth.
"I'm Cheyenne. And yeah, that's pretty much what I did."
Rubbing her head, she hoped that Simon would have an easier time of it than her.
[Exit Dani]
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Post by Simon Burkett on Sept 2, 2006 16:43:16 GMT -5
Simon endured further wiggling with the sort of stoic resolve demonstrated by the most hardcore of celibate monks. At least externally anyway. Internally things were a different story.
Nearly there, he said to himself; in just a few more moments Dani would be off his lap and he could stop thinking about -
Marlon Brando getting naked.
He gave Dani a little smile at her pre-emptive apology and then she was lifting herself off of him. He closed his eyes for a second and gave silent thanks for the forbearance of the powers that be and any deities that might be passing for granting him the strength not to embarrass himself beyond belief.
Then he opened his eyes to a perfect view down Dani's tank-top as she leaned over him to escape the vehicle.
Oh momma!
Oh momma!
The earlier tingling in his loins from earlier returned with a vengeance and he swallowed hard. Then she whacked her head on the roof of the car.
Simon winced in sympathy; that was really going to smart.
Oh momma!
Shut up!
"Oh, fuck ME!"
She asked for it!
Shut. Up.
He edged himself sideways until he could swing a leg out and set foot on the ground. Then, with deliberate caution swung his head past the roof and extracted himself from the car. There was clearly some sort of trick to it that needed to be mastered.
He gave Dani a sympathetic look as she stood there rubbing her head and hoped that it didn't hurt too much.
"I pretty much just showed up on the doorstep and knocked, Marie takes in people from all over the place by the looks of it. Rooms are getting pretty tight though, you'll probably have to share."
Then stepped forward and fell over his own laces.
[Exit Simon]
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