Page 56 of Cruise Control

“That's a lie if I ever heard one,” he told her. She shook her head.

“No, it’s the truth. Nothing is wrong. I just feel so relaxed here, you know? Like we’re in a cocoon,” she tried to explain. “I was standing here, thinking how nice this has all been, and how amazing all that was, and then thinking about what comes next ...” her voice trailed off. Parker’s heart beat a little faster.

“And what comes next, Paige?” he pressed, taking another drag. She shrugged her shoulders.

“We can’t stay here forever – I’m sure your uncle wants his home back at some point. And you have your own life to get back to at some point. And me ... I’ll just hit the road,” she told him, her voice light. He frowned at the back of her head.

“That’s it? That’s what you want to happen next? You just want to ... leave me?” he asked, putting his cigarette between his lips and stepping back from her. She finally turned around and faced him.

“I'm not leaving you, Parker. No one is leaving anyone, not right now. Eventually, though, we’re both gonna go our separate ways. Until then, we can stay together,” she pointed out.

Parker swallowed thickly. He guessed it was better than her telling him “thanks, the sex was very nice, but I’ve gotta go,” and walking out the door. But he still didn’t like it. It was very open ended. Very on her terms. He wanted to tell her it wasn’t good enough, that he wanted her to be with him, towanthim.

They could work something out – she didn’t have to stay in Seattle. He could travel with her for a while, and maybe later they could pick a place together. He didn’t care. And hell, maybe they would kill each other after the first two months, but he wanted to try. He thought they deserved a try. But he couldn’t say any of that, because he still hadn’t told her the whole truth about his past. She may want to walk out the door after that.

“Come back to bed with me,” he said suddenly, leaning around her to grind out his cigarette on the rail.

“What did you have in mind?” she asked playfully, her voice low.

Parker smirked and reached out and grabbed her by the zipper. She stepped forward and he worked the zipper down almost to her belly button. She was indeed naked underneath, but he left the light jacket mostly closed, still covering her breasts. He would save that for later. He leaned forward and placed a kiss in the center of her breast-bone. She sucked in a gasp of air, and he lightly traced his tongue from her center to the hollow of her throat. Then he stood upright and grinned down at her.

“Talking, you dirty minded pervert,” he joked, yanking her zipper back up abruptly. Her eyes flared wide open.

“Parker!” she hissed and he laughed, grabbing the drawstrings of the hoodie and leading her back into the bedroom.

“When we first started cruising together, I really hated that you used my full name; drove me nuts. But you know, now that I've heard you moaning it, it doesn’t seem so bad,” he teased.

“God, you're such a boy.”

He laughed some more and let go of the drawstrings.

He climbed into the bed while Paige walked around to the other side. She shrugged out of his hoodie and when she crawled into bed, naked, he nearly lost all brain function. By the time she laid down on her stomach next to him, under the covers with her arms tucked beneath her chest, he was wondering if talking was over rated.

“This had better be good,” she grumbled at him, laying her head flat on the mattress and looking over at him. He took a deep breath and clasped his hands behind his head.

“I wanna tell you why I’m not in college anymore,” he replied. She was quiet for a long time.

“Okay. I’m all ears,” she said softly. He took another deep breath.

“When my parents got divorced, it was ugly. I was twelve. My mom won custody, which was complete bullshit. Pen and I wanted to go with my dad and she knew it. He'd moved to Seattle to take a job. I didn’t take it well. I started getting in trouble, starting fights, trashing the schools I went to – you were right, you know, I did go to a private school. But I got kicked out. And out of the one after that. When I was fifteen, she didn’t know what to do with me, so she sent me to live with my uncle Richie for a summer,” he said quickly.

“Wow, Parker, I had no idea. Why didn’t she just send you to your dad?” Paige asked quietly.

“Not to sound like a horrible person, but my mom is kind of ... how would you put it?A fucking bitch. But oh well, because turns out it was the best thing ever. We spent most of the time in Austin, and a month here in Galveston. He's such a cool guy, Paige, nothing like my mom. He let my dad fly down to visit whenever he wanted – they'd stayed friends, Richie was my dad’s stockbroker. We all used to just hang out and run around Texas together. Back then, at that age, it had seemed like the coolest thing ever. Still is, really.

“I spent every summer after that with Uncle Richie. When I had to go back to New York, she just put me into public school. She never really paid attention to Pen, though. She even finally sent her to live with our dad when Pen was twelve. We were like best friends, so I was pissed. Pissed that I didn’t get to go, pissed that she'd just written off Pen like that, pissed that Pen hadn't fought to stay, or fought for me to come with her. It’s even sadder because Pen is really amazing. She’s a classically trained cellist. She was a sophomore in high school and was getting offers to go to University of Michigan and USC, lots of places, it was incredible. I, however, was still rebelling. My mother wanted me to go to NYU, but I didn’t want to. I took a couple years off after high school, loafed around. Finally, she offered to pay for Pen to go to college in New York when the time came – as long I was going to school, too. So I signed up. Let her tell me what to do. Must be why I let you boss me around so much, I’ve been trained,” he tried to joke. Paige glared at him.

“Not funny.”

He glanced at her, surprised at the vitriol in her voice, and cleared his throat.

“Well, Pen came to New York and went to school there. It was all stupid, cause I had transferred to Trinity long before she moved home. Connecticut just kinda calmed me down. Got me away from my mom. But I could take the train and visit Pen all the time, or drive down on the weekends. For a while, it was pretty great. I was so fucking stupid. I should’ve told her to go back to Washington. Or Oregon. DC. London. Anywhere. There was no reason for her to be in New York,” he said through gritted teeth. Paige blinked and pulled a pillow under her head.

“Why? I mean, if you liked being close to each other,” she pointed out. Parker brought his hands around his head and dug his fists into his eyes.

“Because it feels like what happened was my fault.”

“What happened?” Paige whispered. Parker took a deep breath, lacing his fingers together over his eyes.

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