Just close your eyes

The sun is going down

You'll be alright

No one can hurt you now

Come morning light

You and I'll be safe and sound

'Safe & Sound' by Taylor Swift (feat. The Civil Wars

She liked Cheetos. Not the regular kind, but the puffy ones. He'd discovered this about her one day about a month after they drove off together. She hadn't said a word in that time. In the beginning, he'd attempted to engage her, but anytime his voice infiltrated the air around them, she would hunker down further into herself, shoulders slumped, her slim frame pressed against the door. He gave up trying when the sound of her quite tears reached his ears.

They drove aimlessly at first. He didn't even stop the first day. Considering they hadn't slept in almost 72 hours, he thought he was holding it together-for the both of them-fairly well. It couldn't last. Around sunrise the following morning, he found them a cheap motel in some shithole town near the ocean. The waves crashing on the beach and the smell of the ocean assaulted his sense when he stepped from the car. He glanced at his passenger, but her gaze was straight ahead and her eyes were unfocused. Seth rented a room, and drove them around to the back of the motel. He was worried he was going to have to carry her inside or something, but as soon as he stopped, Kate had her seatbelt off and was pushing open the door, shutting it quietly behind her. She looked to him for direction, the first direct eye contact they'd had since the Titty Twister.

Her eyes were red rimmed, swollen, and desolate, he noted with a clench of his gut. He had put that look there. It was his fault she was in this position to begin with, knowledge that had slowly been eating away at him. Apologies seemed pointless, almost cruel. So he pointed towards the door closest to them, and she made her way to it. He unlocked the door, propping it open for her to precede him. It wasn't the worst room he'd ever stayed in, and the bed looked, if not luxurious, at least inviting. It took him a moment to realize there was only the one bed. Clearly his attempts to communicate with the night clerk had failed.

Kate, for her part, did not seem fazed by this turn of events. She'd come to a halt in the middle of the room, and now just stood there, seemingly unsure of what to do next. He's about to tell her to get in the shower and get cleaned up, when she lets out a bone-weary sigh. Then she turns towards the bed.

Seth watches as she sits on the bed, well more like collapse onto it. He watches her struggle with her shoes, and then give up when the task proves too much for her. Without a thought to what he was doing, he made his way towards he. He knelt down on front of her, and removed the shoes she'd been struggling with. He looked up to find her eyes on him. Not saying a word, he stands and helps her lay down on the bed. She curls onto her side, facing the wall behind him.

He goes about getting himself situated the. There's no sofa in the room, which means he's sleeping next to her. No way was he sleeping on the floor after the last few days. Kate put up no protests when he laid down beside her a few minutes later. The only sound in the tiny room is the hum of the ancient AC in the window. It takes him far longer to fall asleep than it should, mostly because the person lying next to him hasn't done so either. He can hear her labored breathing, no doubt trying to keep from crying yet again. The cheap mattress shifts every time she does, and finally he's had enough. He tells himself it's more for his benefit than anything. He needs sleep, and her restlessness is keeping him up.

He turned towards her, settling himself against her back, wrapped his arm around her, and settled it on top of where she had hers clutched against her chest. She had frozen at the feel of his body against hers, and she didn't let herself really relax until he spoke.

"I know you're hurting Kate. I am too. This is my fault, all of it. And tomorrow we can deal with it. You can call me a bastard, you can hit me, hell, you can kill me if you want. If you feel up to it, you can tell me what happened to you down there, or I can you fill you in on the shit that happened to me. Or, you can keep silent and we move on to the next town and see if you feel like talking then. But right now, I need to sleep. We both do. The door is locked, we're hundreds of miles from that fucking place, and I just…I can't anymore, okay?" He said all this in an even, quite tone, the only break in his voice at the end.

It started with her legs. They'd been pulled up towards her chest, and she slowly lowered them until they ran parallel to his. She relaxed her shoulders, and moved her head until it rested on the musty pillow. She brought one of her arms down until she could grip the hand of the arm slung around her. She slows hear breathing down and then lets her body finally melt into the bed.

When he felt her relax, and heard her soft snores a few minutes later, he wasted no time following her into the abyss, allowing the exhaustion to drag him under. He awoke hours later to find they'd migrated in their sleep. He now lay on his back, with her head on his shoulder, and her arm around his midsection. He was drowsy and disoriented, and for a moment forgot where he was. He saw the dark hair, and the foreign bed, and thought maybe he'd had one too may last night, and found himself a bedmate. He wondered what trouble Richie might have got up to-and then his world came crashing down all over again. Suddenly it was all too much. He disentangled himself from Kate, careful not to wake her, and staggered to the door. He had just enough sanity left to grab the key off the table, and not slam the door behind him.

The sun was high in the sky, indicating they'd only been asleep about 7 or 8 hours. No one was outside, which was good because he may well have killed anyone he came across. His mind was buzzing, images from the last few days swirling in his mind; Vanessa, Carlos, Jacob, the she-bitch…Richie. The thought of his brother tore a sob from his throat. His fist met the side of the building before he realized what was happening. He slammed his first into the wall until he couldn't feel it anymore, and his knuckles were torn open, blood and flesh slick on the wall. He fell to his knees, and let the tears come. His body shook with the effort to keep from screaming out at the injustice of it all. He didn't want to frighten Kate.

Kate. The thought of her sobered him instantly. He'd left her alone. Granted she was 10 feet away, but he felt the shame of abandoning her to wallow in his misery. He toke deep breath and a second to collect himself, then he was on his feet. He entered the motel room to find she'd moved to his side of the bed, the pillow he'd been using clutched to her chest. He went to the tiny bathroom to rinse and assess the damage to his hand. It burned like hell when he ran it under the faucet, but he managed to clean out most of the debris. He splashed his face and relieved his bladder before wrapping his injured hand in a washrag. He pulled open the door to find Kate standing in front of him.

She glanced from his face down to his hand and then back to his face again. There was a question in her eyes, but when he said nothing, she dropped them back down. She stepped aside to allow him by, and then entered and shut the bathroom door behind her. Seth resettled himself on the bed, and waited for Kate to reemerge. He didn't have to wait long. She'd cleaned up a bit, her face and neck no longer caked in blood. The light from the bathroom illuminated her from behind. She looked almost ethereal. Then the light went out and the room plunged back into darkness and he heard her move across the floor and settle down next to him. They didn't move next to each other like they had earlier, but instead kept to their respective sides. After a few moments, they both drifted back off to sleep.

It was full dark by the time they roused themselves again. He asked her if she felt like talking. She shook her head no. And so it went. They drove for a while, found a motel, rested for a day or two, and then started all over again. She never said anything when he asked her if she was ready to talk, just shook her head no, and off they'd go. One night, after they'd been on the road for about 36 hours, and they'd settled into another motel room, he made some noise about heading across the street and grabbing them a few things. Before he left, he asked if she needed anything. He wasn't expecting an actual answer; she hadn't said shit to him in weeks. Turning towards the door the sound of her voice almost gave him a heart attack.

"Cheetos, please." Her voice sounded hoarse, no doubt from disuse. His head whipped around to find her looking at him. Her eyes were alert, and a tiny smile graced her lips. He's not sure why, but his throat tightens at the look on her face. He's been riding next to a ghost for the past month, and it looked like she might finally be ready to join him in the land of the living. He returns her small smile with grin and chuckle of his own.

"Cheetos. You got it princess. Anything else?"

"Can you get the puffy kind, if they have 'em? And maybe something to drink?"

"No problem. Come lock the door behind me."

She follows him to the door, and he waits on the other side after she shuts it behind him, the lock tumbling into place. He starts across the parking lot, the corner store his destination. There's lightness to his steps that had been missing, as if the weight of their sins no longer bogged him down. Seth's not stupid-he knows there are things they still need to discuss. And Kate needed to figure out if she was staying with him, or if they would go their own separate ways.

But Seth wasn't going to worry about that right now. Right now, he owed a lady a bag of Cheetos and a drink. Come hell or high water-or goddamn fucking culebras, he was going to deliver.

an: hello! if you're reading this, i hope you enjoyed my little thing here. i've been a bit obsessed with kate and seth since the original film came out, and i was always sad she didn't get to leave with him. thankfully, the series avoided this blunder. i plan to continue this as a sort of series, and the rating will go up at some point (i have to write them together, there is no getting around it). thanks for reading!