Nick paced nervously in the lobby of the Tangiers Hotel. He was beginning to rethink the whole idea of getting into a hot tub with Sara. He didn't want to make things uncomfortable between Sara and himself, but he didn't want to miss out on a chance to really get to know her.
His ringing cell phone interrupted his racing thoughts. "Hello."
"Hey, Nick," Greg said from the other end of the connection, "How's the ballet thing going?"
"It's actually okay. I'm doing better than I thought I would."
"Oh?" Greg sounded amused, which made Nick wince. "So are you graceful and everything?"
"Well I'm doing okay at the barre work. That's really most of what we've been doing. The instructors want us to have good control and form before we begin learning choreography. We'll start learning steps tomorrow."
"So is Sara any good?"
"Yeah, she is. It's actually surprising. She catches on way faster than everyone else in the class. She's a natural."
Sara walked up behind Nick and heard this last statement. She smiled at the thought that Nick was proud of her.
"Soooo," Greg said and giggled excitedly, "How does Sara look in a leotard?"
Sara grabbed the cell phone from Nick's hand and put it up to her own ear. "How do I look? Don't be silly, Greg. I look gorgeous. Would you expect any less? Now my question for you is why do you talk so damn loud into the phone? I could hear you from five feet away from Nick! Haven't you ever heard of a six-inch voice? You don't hold the phone more than six inches away from your mouth, do you?"
Greg laughed nervously from the other end of the connection and Nick snickered under his breath. Sara's comments were sometimes cutting, but they were often true.
"You know," Sara said to Nick, "There is nothing that is much more annoying than a person who screams just because they're talking into a phone. It can be deafening." She directed her speech back into the cellular phone's microphone. "Anyway, Greg, we don't have time to talk to you. Somewhere there is a cheap motel with a hot tub room that is calling our names and we're going to try to figure out where the voice is coming from. You can bother Nick later." She pulled the phone away from her ear and hit the "end" button. Nick could only shake his head as she returned the phone to him.
"Sara," he said, "Why did you have to go and do a thing like that? Now Greg's going to go spreading it all around the lab when he goes on shift tonight and then Ecklie will find out and we will really be in trouble."
"Nick, you've got to stop worrying. We'll be fine. We can justify our trip by calling it an exercise in building trust."
"How so?" Nick's tone of voice made his incredulity obvious.
"Well, there are a lot of sexual connotations to both cheap motels and hot tubs, right?"
"Yeah." He still did not sound as though he were buying into Sara's thinking.
"We're trusting one another to have the proper intentions going into this thing."
"I guess you're right about that." He trailed off for a moment. "And once we get to the place, you'll really find yourself hoping that you can trust me."
"Oh?" Sara put on a mock-inquisitive smirk. Then she widened her mouth into a grin. "Is the motel really bad?"
"You'll find out when we get there," Nick said in a teasing tone. He led the way toward his truck and pulled out his keys. "It wasn't the cheapest motel that I called, but for reasons that I'm sure will become known to you later, I had to choose it over all of the others." He opened the passenger door and Sara climbed inside. He went to the driver's side and entered.
"Nick, I hate being left in suspense! You must tell me before I implode!"
Nick smiled as he started the engine. "Sara, I only want to preserve for you the experience of finding out about this motel in person. I know that it has to be better than stumbling over it in a phone book or hearing about it from someone else."
"Fine, whatever," Sara said as she turned on the radio. Country music blared through the speakers. She looked over to Nick, her forehead wrinkled with disgust, only to find that he was singing along. She quickly changed the station to one that played rock music.
"…your faith! It's real!" sang a scratchy voice. Sara rolled her eyes.
"I cannot escape that new Foo Fighters song, I swear!" She turned down the volume and thought that she should answer the question that was raised in Nick's eyes. "Their newest single is kind of annoying and you hear it every thirty minutes. I like them as a band and I enjoy nearly all of their other songs and at the end of the day, I will probably buy their newest CD, but I feel that the world would be a better place if they had decided not to record this song. It's too dumbed-down, I think. I'm really glad that they're still successful and everything, but I really just dislike this particular song."
"I think it's kind of catchy." He tapped on the steering wheel in time with the music.
"Yeah. Well. Nick," Sara said choppily, "You like country and, therefore, cannot be expected to have taste in music."
"Have you never heard the phrase, 'don't mess with Texas?'"
"Have you never heard the phrase, 'kiss my ass?'"
"Sara, I don't want to have to kill you and go to hell over a difference of opinion about a song, but I'll do it if you make me."
"Oh, Nick. Shut your flappin' yapper!" Sara looked around at the scenery they were passing. "Is this place outside of the city? How much longer do I have to put up with you in a car?"
"We'll be there soon enough, sunshine."
Sara shot him a cold stare. She actually like it when he used a pet name, but she thought it more flirty to play as though it angered her.
"And when we get there," Nick said, "You'll forget all about our little differences."
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Author's Note: About the Foo Fighters thing...I had to write a little of myself into Sara's character and that darn song was playing when I turned on MTV-2 while writing the beginning of this chapter. I just needed to express my frustration about it in a public forum. It did make for some snazzy banter, though.
WX