Disclaimer: Again, they're not mine.
Author's note: Hey, looks like I wrote more. There might—MIGHT be another chapter if I feel like it. Enjoy.
Suddenly he's twenty-six years old again and a responsible adult. He tries to blot out what Shelby said, and after a few minutes of insufferable silence he insists that he should drive her home, lest she cause an accident; she accepts because she knows he's right and knows that he won't take no for an answer. In the parking lot, they kiss under a streetlamp, but it's more like she fell onto his mouth when overcome by a wave of intoxicated dizziness.
She tastes like alcohol and cigarettes, even though he hadn't seen her smoking; but with all of the smoke sifting around inside the bar, it isn't too surprising.
He pushes the kiss out of his mind and holds her hair back when she vomits next to his car. Just like any good boyfriend would, only he's not her boyfriend and not a very good person. He slings her arm over his shoulder and helps her stumble into the passenger seat, buckling her seatbelt. When he starts the car, the digital clock on the center console reads 2:28 AM, and she's already half-asleep. It's only after her eyes droop shut that he realizes he still needs to know where she lives.
Tentative, he doesn't want to wake her, so he drives until he finds a motel; it is seedy like the bar, but this time he doesn't mind because he's in that kind of mood and he doesn't have that much money. He wants to live an artsy television romance, where two old lovers reunite in a sleazy hotel, rediscovering the beauty of the love they once shared. Still, it probably won't happen like that, or at all, because Shelby is drunk and the suit he's wearing isn't his, and they're not sixteen anymore.
He drags her through the door and slips off Shelby's shoes, laying her on the bed, the one closest to the window. The shades are cracked open an inch or two, and the floodlights in the parking lot send a beam of light slicing through her midsection. From where he sits on the bed opposite, facing her, the same beam of light cuts his head and chest in half, ending somewhere on the wall behind him. He turns on the television, volume on mute, and leans back with his hands against the bed as light flicks across the screen. The comforter is clammy and even damp under his fingers, but maybe that's just because his palms have been sweating since he saw her at the bar. He realizes that the entire room smells like mold, and when he tilts his head toward the ceiling, there are water stains.
The air feels too thin. He reaches into his jacket pocket and lights a cigarette, wanting to fill the room with smoke so the smell of mold can dissipate. It would make the room seem even seedier, like in all those movies. Nothing happens in a clean hotel room, and Scott wants something to happen, even if he's not sure what.
As the cloud of carbon dioxide thickens floats over her, Shelby wakes as if from the dead. She half-sits up, propped on her elbow, and her face is illuminated in blue from the television screen. In the poor light and smoky haze, she looks sixteen again, and his breath catches in his throat. He coughs out a swear and wipes his bleary eyes with his sleeve, and by the time his eyes focus again the light from the screen had changed and she looks very much twenty-six.
"Could I have a smoke?"
He mutters a yes and reaches across the beds, across the void between them to hand her a cigarette. She pulls out a lighter from her pocket and he discovers that she must be a smoker. It seems seditious at first, and then he remembers that they are no longer rebellious teens, but burnt-out adults.
He wonders what it would be like to kiss her now.
"Hangover's a bitch," she mumbles with her lips around the cigarette. She takes a drag and exhales, the smoke from her cigarette mingling with the smoke from his. "Where are we?"
"The Pines Motel. I didn't know where you live, and you passed out." His voice has a twinge of guilt, as if he's let her down . . . again.
"Oh—I don't live here," she says. She says it as if even the idea that she did would be a mistake. "I'm visiting a business partner."
He pauses, soaking in the new information and feeling stupid for all of the assumptions he'd made about her when they were in the bar. "So you're on a business trip . . . drunk?"
"No," she looks flustered, "It's not a business trip, per se. I'm visiting a partner."
From the sound of her voice, she expects him to understand. But, sadly, he's never been very good at understanding her, and so he decides not to pry and just leave it alone. "Oh."
A void of silence descends between them. The distance from his bed to hers seems to widen to an infinite amount. He glances at the silent television, and there's a man on the screen who's grinning and moving his mouth wordlessly.
"I should get going. I have a meeting in Seattle tomorrow . . . " he glances at the clock. "I mean today." In two long strides he's at the door, fumbling with the latch because for some reason his hands are shaking and suddenly all he can think about is kissing her.
She lunges across the bed to catch his wrist. Her skin on his has the same dizzying effect as before, and the light from the television dances on the wall. He glances at her and her face is a mixture of confusion and desperation and hope; he wonders whether she's drunk or sober, and if he would allow himself to kiss her either way.
"Don't—" her voice falters.
Don't . . . what? He wants her to say don't go, but he wants her to finish her sentence just as much.
Her eyes flick around the room and she looks scared for a moment, as if she hadn't meant to say it. "Don't . . . forget your keys," she finishes lamely, her shoulders sagging.
Defeated but playing along, he gazes around the room. His car keys are on the nightstand next to his bed. "Oh—thanks." His voice is listless and he moves to get them, but she leans across the bed and grabs them before he can. Standing, she's less than a foot away when she slips the keys into his open palm, which is, by the way, sweating again. The keys feel cool and comforting.
She inhales sharp and fast, as if she were about to say something, but before any words can come out she leans forward and kisses him.
He can't figure out how it happened, but he finds himself kissing her back; the keys are sliding out of his hand and landing between their feet. He's unsure if he should allow this of himself. But he's not the one deciding that, because her hands are so tight around his arms that he couldn't pull away if he wanted to.
The room is hazy and smoky and the television is on mute. She's only in her socks and he has to bend his knees to accomodate her, but he doesn't want to pull away, regardless.