Arya walked through the store, eyeing the lines of snacks as she tried to decide what to buy. Really, she didn't need more of anything to eat, but she didn't want to go back out to where Sansa waited with her Taylor Swift, and her pink car, and her constant nagging about Arya's feet on the dashboard. Eventually she'd have to, though. Hiding in this convenience store wouldn't work forever, because sooner or later Sansa would get tired of waiting for her and would come to find where she'd run off to. With a sigh, Arya grabbed a bag of candy, then another, then another, and headed to the cash register.
The cashier gave a tired smile, one that Arya didn't return as she handed over the cash, then grabbed all three bags of candy and walked out the door. It never failed to make her cringe whenever she saw Sansa's car, all bright, and pink and like something Barbie and her friends would ride to the beach in. And there she was, her sister, singing along to the bouncy beat of one of Swift's more upbeat songs. Well, that was better than the sad ones, because at least it meant Sansa wasn't on the verge of crying while driving. Arya had never known what to do when her sister started crying.
Opening the door, Arya threw the bags of candy into the middle of the car, between her seat and Sansa's. That earned her a glare, which she ignored as she slid into the seat, buckling her seat belt in place. As if to annoy her, Sansa turned the music up louder and Arya rolled her eyes, turning her face to look out the window as the car pulled out of the parking lot. They were only halfway to The Twins, and the trip had already begun to felt like an eternity. Not caring if she made Sansa mad, she reached over and turned the music off, savoring the silence that was sure to be short lived.
Startled, Sansa turned to glare at her sister who only rolled her eyes in response. "Arya!" Sansa cried in exasperation, "I was listening to that!" Arya turned back to stare out the window, ignoring her sister. Sansa fumed quietly. She'd never wanted Arya to come on this trip with her, but mother had insisted. Take your sister with you, she said. It will be fun, she said. They were only half way to The Twins and Sansa was on the verge of strangling Ayra with the seatbelt.
Turning her eyes back to the road, Sansa let her mind drift to her beloved Joffrey. Joffrey Baratheon, the son of Cersei Lannister, a ridiculously wealthy heiress and ex-marine CMC Robert Baratheon, had been Sansa's boyfriend since she was thirteen, and she just knew they were going to get married one day. A smile formed on her lips as she thought of his handsome face and golden hair. She was so in love with him.
The thought of completely ignoring Sansa was tempting, but the way she'd said I was listening to that, as if she were the only person in the car that mattered, irritated Arya. A thousand biting remarks came to her, and she rejected them all, mostly because if she was going to be stuck in this car with Princess Sansa, she'd rather not start a war between them that would last the entire way to King's Landing. Especially when they were already somewhat at war with each other, considering that Arya couldn't do anything right, and she'd already said plenty of things that weren't exactly nice to her sister.
When she turned back to look at Sansa, the first thing Arya noticed was the smile. That stupid smile that only reared it's ugly head when Sansa was thinking about him. For the life of her, Arya couldn't see what her sister saw in Joffrey. He was rude, not even close to being attractive, and had an unhealthy opinion of himself in terms of entitlement. Truthfully, all Arya wanted to do was punch him every time she saw him, and every time he opened his mouth, she wanted to sew his lips closed so she wouldn't have to hear his voice. But that, of course, would only get her in a kind of trouble she wasn't sure she wanted.
"Don't you have anything other than Taylor Swift?" Arya asked, even though she wanted to ask if Sansa was thinking of her disgusting dreamboat.
Sansa sighed. "If you insist on listening to something else, I suppose I can put on some Ed Sheeran or Adele. I didn't pack anything else, because I wasn't expecting mother to force your company on this drive." Leaving Arya to make her choice, Sansa looked into the rear vision mirror to check on her pug-dog, Lady. Her eyes widened as she noted that Lady was asleep on Arya's Bob Marley hoodie. Shit.
Checking the sideview mirror, Sansa flicked on her indicator lights and pulled into a rest area. She parked under a tree and climbed out of the car, walking around to open the back door. "Lady, to me." Lady's plump little body wriggled joyously out of the car and she immediately ran to the grass, flopping onto her back and waving her stumpy little legs in the air.
Sansa laughed at her dog's antics. Lady loved car rides, but she loved goofing off almost as much. Casting a quick look at Arya, Sansa grabbed the hoodie and shoved it in her purse. "I'm going to the restroom, keep an eye on Lady." She hurried across the carpark into the public restroom, gagging as she entered. Seven hells, the stench was almost unbearable.
Taking Arya's hoodie from her purse, she shook it out, removing all the little hairs that Lady had left behind. Sansa sniffed it, wrinkling her nose. Ick. She wasn't sure whether it smelled bad because of Lady or because Arya never remembered to wash her clothes. Either way, it smelled disgusting. Luckily, Sansa was always prepared with a spray bottle of Febreze in her purse.
Ed Sheeran or Adele. Neither option appealed to Arya more than the other, and she wrinkled her nose at the idea. Still, she grabbed the CDs from where Sansa kept them, shuffling the cases back and forth, reading the song titles to see which sounded the least annoying. She hadn't even noticed that Sansa had parked the car until she opened her door, and even then, Arya only gave her a brief glance as she told Lady to get out. She'd gone to the restroom at the store she'd bought the candy in, so she didn't need to use it again so soon. But then Sansa called out to her to watch Lady and Arya sighed, tossing an Ed Sheeran CD onto Sansa's seat before carelessly letting the others drop onto the floor.
Lady was rolling around in the grass when Arya stepped out of the car, content as could be it seemed. She doubted the pug would have run away, even if left unattended. Sansa had her trained very well in that respect, and Arya wasn't sure she'd ever met a more obedient dog in her entire life. Still, she didn't tend to like Lady all that much. Not because there was anything wrong with her, but because she was so small. Arya prefered big dogs, dogs that you could go running with and they wouldn't tire easily, or dogs that you could pet the head of while you walked, not having to bend down in order to do so.
But Lady was sweet, that much was true. The moment Arya came in the dog's line of sight, Lady was up, running toward her on her little legs, looking up at her with such big, sweet eyes that Arya found herself kneeling down and scratching the dog behind the ears. Sure, she might not like her, but she liked dogs. And anyway, it was probably just her projecting her feelings for Sansa onto the dog, which wasn't necessarily fair. As her thoughts turned to her sister, she glanced toward the building she'd disappeared into, wondering how long she was going to take. Sansa was of the variety of girl who took longer than others, because she had to check herself in the mirror, or whatever it was girls like her did.
"But if I kissed you, will your mouth read this truth? Darling, how I miss you…" Sansa sang quietly to herself as she sprayed Arya's hoodie with a liberal amount of Febreze. Hopefully Arya wouldn't notice the smell, although if she did, even she would have to admit that Febreze smelled a lot better than dog and sweat. Sansa laid the hoodie on the bench-seat to air, and turned to the mirror. She stifled a scream as she took in her reflection.
Gods, her hair was frightful! Most of it had come loose from the bun she'd put it in earlier that day and it had frizzed out everywhere. But alas, Sansa was once again prepared, with a hair brush and elastics in her purse along with half her bathroom counter. She brushed her hair out, and tied it into a long braid. She wasn't particularly fond of braids, but it was easier to have her hair out of the way while she was driving. The last thing she needed was to total another car.
After stashing all her things, and Arya's hoodie, back in her purse, Sansa washed her face with cold water from the tap, and headed back to the car. As she exited the restroom, she noticed Arya petting Lady on the grass. She bit her lip and smiled. It was rare that Arya showed any affection to the small dog.
Lady noticed Sansa before Arya did, and the dog zipped away from her, running as fast as she could on her tiny legs toward the person she loved most in the world. Despite her feelings toward both creatures, Arya did envy that. She'd always wanted a dog, but every time she'd broached the subject with her parents, whom she still lived with, they always told her she wasn't responsible enough for one yet, and that neither of them were going to shoulder the responsibility of having to care for her dog. Plus, it didn't help that she wanted a big dog. A real dog. Not a tiny thing like Lady. Her mother always said it was easier to care for smaller dogs, they needed less tending than larger ones, but Arya didn't want one like Lady.
She watched Lady and Sansa, noting that yes, her sister's hair was different. Braided neatly, unlike the braids Arya usually did, which always seemed to come apart on her as the day progressed. But then, Arya had never cared much about her hair, usually having it pulled up and out of her face since she'd let it grow long again. Sansa, on the other hand, Arya felt could go an entire day with her hair looking perfectly fine. She'd seen it, though she was sure Sansa would disagree. Personally, she'd thought her sister's hair had looked fine the way it was, messy in a cute way, but of course Sansa didn't like that kind of look.
"You hungry for real food?" she called out to Sansa, because all Arya had been eating all day was junk food. Candy. Cookies. Ice cream bars whenever they stopped and the convenience store had the ones she liked. It had made her stomach start to feel a little sick, and though she wasn't technically hungry, she thought that maybe something a bit more substantial might make her feel less ill.
Sansa lifted Lady into her arms as the pug ran to her, and cradled her against her chest. Lady licked her face happily, causing Sansa to grimace. She carried the dog back to the car, setting her down on her special doggy blanket on the backseat. Lady looked up at her with soulful eyes and Sansa sighed. "No, Lady. You stay on the blanket, you're not supposed to lay on peoples clothing." Ignoring the sad look on her dogs face, Sansa surreptitiously slipped Arya's hoodie into her sisters large overnight bag.
Closing the door, she walked around to the front of the car and climbed into the drivers seat. "Where do you want to eat? I don't care as long as they have lemoncakes." Sansa frowned as something sharp jabbed into her thigh. "What the…?" She got out of the car and looked down at her seat. "Arya, why is my Ed Sheeran CD on my seat? I swear to the Old Gods, if it's damaged I will kill you."
Arya was in the process of getting into the car again, while trying to think of somewhere to eat, when Sansa asked about the CD. Frowning at her, Arya shifted her legs so that Sansa might not see the other CDs on the floor near her feet. She hadn't stepped on them at least, so she doubted they were damaged at all. And she hadn't thrown the other one very hard either, it had been a toss, a gentle toss, even. It wasn't like she'd thrown Lady around. Unless Sansa had broken it when she'd sat down, and that couldn't be considered Arya's fault.
"You told me to pick a CD," she told Sansa. "I picked."
Reaching over, Arya took the case from Sansa, setting it in her lap as she flipped it open before pressing the eject button on the CD player. Switching out CDs she waited for Sansa to get back into her seat, neatly putting the case, with the now wrong CD in it, back where she'd originally gotten them. Hopefully it wouldn't be noticed that the rest of them were still missing. Sansa was already in an irritable mood, so Arya wasn't exactly looking forward to hearing it when her sister did realise she hadn't treated her precious CDs as kindly as Sansa wanted them to be.
"I don't really care where we eat either," Arya admitted with a shrug. "First place we see is fine by me."
Sansa got back behind the wheel and yawned. She was exhausted. They'd been driving for two days and she just wanted a hot shower and a good nights rest. Hopefully they'd find that at Moat Cailin.