Where Did the Time Go? Chapter 2: Part II, a kim possible fanfic

Where Did the Time Go

Chapter 2

"Come on, Ron, get your head in the game." Kim said as she dragged him around the used car lot by the hand.

Ron's free hand found its way to its usual spot on the back of his neck. At least he had a real reason for rubbing it this time instead of just covering up some embarrassment. "Sorry, KP. It's just my neck is really, really stiff. I think I slept on it funny"

"Serves you right, sleeping on a couch like that." She said, stopping in front of another snow-covered car. She started scraping the powdery stuff away with her mittenned hands, trying to see inside.

"Hey, you were there too."

"Yeah, but I had a nice soft pillow." She patted his tummy. "You could have always gotten up and gone home to your nice soft bed. Besides, you could have laid down and used a pillow. I wouldn't have minded."

"You know, if your parents trust us so well, why can't we just go upstairs and sleep in your bed when I stay over. I used to sleep in a sleeping bag on the floor."

"Well, one, back then you were twelve and just my best friend and they knew you could be trusted just fine and two, it just doesn't work that way. I don't think Daddy even likes you being alone with me in my bedroom these days."

"He didn't say anything about it." He shrugged his shoulders, thinking they were actually well past this by now.

"No, but watch what happens if we go up there together and close the doors. He'd be knocking inside of five seconds and wandering back and forth to the attic tower all the time, just to keep an eye on us. Can you imagine what he would think about us sleeping together in my bed. Besides, there isn't room for both of us there."

"Hey, we've spent the night in my bed and it's smaller." He protested.

"Well, that's different. In my own bed I like to spread out a little more. I like my space."

Ron just shook his head. "I think we've done more on that couch than we ever did in my bed."

"Shhhh." She held he finger up to her lips. "Let's try to keep some secrets to ourselves."

"Okay, okay." He looked in the window she was trying to see through. "I don't think this is the best day of the year to go car shopping." The entire lot looked more like a forest of car shaped snow mounds. You almost couldn't tell what color most of them were.

Kim wiped a pile of snow off the hood of a light gray hatchback. "You need a car, don't you? Unless you really want to shell out three grand to get your bike fixed." She knew it was too late for that. He'd already sold the wreck for scrap. They had a nice dinner on what he made off of it.

"Nope, can't afford that right now, especially the way the insurance was going to go up after I crashed it." He'd known the tires were getting bad on his motorcycle. The rear finally failed and he was lucky it was just the bike that took the brunt of the crash. That and his leather jacket.

"That's not going to help with the car sitch either." She said. "Here, some guy wants three-hundred for this one." She dusted most of the remaining snow from it. The paint looked pretty good, as did the dark red interior, at least what they could see from the outside.

Ron's nose turned up in disgust. "Kim, you couldn't pay me three hundred to take that car. It's a Chevy Chevette, probably one of the least cool cars ever made. It's so uncool it's negative cool. If you parked this car beside a Corvette it'd suck so much cool out of the air you'd think the Stingray was a Camry or something boring like that."

"So, you're saying, it's not the car a normal guy would drive?"

"Well, no…and don't try to play me with 'never be normal.' That thing's got loser mobile written all over it." He said, holding his finger and thumb to his forehead in the shape of an L. "The only people who drive cars like that are…"

"Broke students who either drive the uncool car or walk." Kim said, her hands on her hips. "Ron, if you need to, I can help you with the price."

"No Kim, that's not the issue. I need a car that makes a statement, one that says 'I have arrived.'"

"Oy, Ron! We're talking about basic transportation to get us to and from school, something that will get us there warm and dry. You're not dressing it up to take to the Prom with you."

"Uh, Kim, check the Calendar. The Prom is just four and a half months away. If I have something like this now, we're going to be showing up in it. I want to roll in style, not…why is there writing on the door that says 'Swamp Rat?'" He pointed to the hand-painted script right over the driver's side door.

"I dunno." She said, buffing it with her sleeve. "I think that's just model paint. Should come off easily enough."

Ron just looked at her with wide-eyed wonder. "KP, you're acting like you've already decided I'm going to buy this car. We don't even know if it runs."

She gave him a sidelong glance. "I do know what's best for you." She said. "Look, it's already got a luggage rack, we could convert that into a bike carrier. You said you wanted to go up to Mount Middleton this summer and try out that weird downhill bike we've got."

He pulled his fleece cap off and took a comb out of his pocket and started slicking down his hair. "Hmm, maybe I could call in a favor and go see François for some more Pomme Le Goop. Then I'll get me some fierce new clothes. Oh, and I'll go work my Dad over to free up my trust fund, then I can go all blow-happy with the money and get all big-heady."

"Are you done yet, tangent boy?" Kim had her arms crossed, tapping her foot, though the effect was lost in four inches of snow.

"No. I'm just making a point. Every time you say you know what's good for me, something bad happens."

Kim was actually flabbergasted. "Okay, outside of the haircut, name one?"

"I, uh, well, uh."

"Okay, I know eating better is good for you, so I weaned you off the crap in the caf. Now, tell me you're not healthier than you have been in your life. I know that helping you with your schoolwork is what's good for you and you've got the best grades of your life."

"But KP, this is a car. It's the other part of that rite of passage thing I was telling you about."

"Okay, Ron, don't buy this particular car. We need something and I don't think I can take another five months of walking to and from school every single day."

Ron stared at her for a moment. "You got spoiled!"

Kim looked shocked "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean. Once I got the bike, you got used to being chauffeured around instead of walking like we've done our whole lives. We only live two miles from the school, it's not going to kill us walking it."

Kim started walking around the car, trying each of the four door handles. The very last one, on the passenger's side opened for her. She reached into the back and unlocked the door there, climbing into the back seat.

"KP, what are you doing?" Ron asked, looking around the parking lot. Being only the second day of the new year and the banks being closed since the official holiday was on a Sunday, the lot was actually closed, so there wasn't anyone around to push them for a sale. Still, he wasn't quite sure what she was up to.

She unlocked the door on his side and opened it, pulling him in by his jacket front.

"Wow, it's actually colder in this car than it is outside." He said, watching his breath freeze. He noticed the snow was already building up on the windshield. It was really coming down again, to the point the first day back at school was in danger of being canceled. That was saying a lot for a community that normally knew how to deal with winter precip.

He blew another cloud of breath as a mitten covered hand reached behind his head and pulled him forward. Kim's lips met his as her other hand traveled up his thigh. Suddenly he found he wasn't very cold at all. In fact, things were heating up quite nicely in the tiny old Chevy.

Kim finally came up for air, though her hand stayed dangerously high on his lap. "See, isn't that nicer than making out on the back of that old bike."

"S'ha, though I think there's only barely much more room back here. I think you could park this whole car in the back seat of Mom's."

Kim grinned at him. "I like the back seat of your Mom's car, but I like this too. It's cozy." She ran a fingertip down the curve of his nose, tapping his lip. She considered his lips a couple moments more before leaning into another kiss.

"So, what you're telling me is that the hottest girl in school thinks this car is sexy and she'd do anything for it's driver."

"I don't know about 'anything.'" She laughed. "but I can think of a few things I might consider." She crossed one leg over his, her hand gripping his waist. "Honestly, Ron. If this car runs okay it's the only one you can afford that isn't going to spike your insurance. Besides, we don't have to take it to the Prom. If we have to, we'll rent a limo or something, or we can all pile into Felix' van."

"I don't know about that. I think Monique has called dibs on that, especially the part behind his chair lift, if you know what I mean." To emphasize his point, Ron put his hand as high as he dared on Kim's thigh.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "What exactly has Felix been telling you about what happens on their dates?"

"What has Monique been telling you?" He asked right back.

"That's between me and Mon." She said easily.

"I have veys of making you talk." Ron said in a silly accent. He reached around her waist and started nibbling on her right ear.

"Quit that." She giggled, though she was canting her head to give him a little easier access. Finally he gave her a kiss on the cheek and leaned back in his seat again.

"Actually, when I got back he clammed up pretty tight about what was going on. My guess, since they're still together is he's gone into 'gentlemen don't kiss and tell' mode, meaning he's got something to tell that he isn't telling. Am I right?"

Kim grinned at him and nodded. "I think Mon's planning to get a hotel room or something. Both of them will be eighteen by then, so they can do that." She looked him right in the eye. "Kinda sucks having summer birthdays sometimes, doesn't it?"

"Yeah. That means if we want to do something this summer, we're pretty much going to have to wait until late. I don't think Mom and Dad are going to go for another joint vacation like that. Sure, they like your folks just fine but they like doing their own thing."

"There's another reason you need a car, Honey. We can take trips. Think about it, every once in a while driving up to the ski lodge, getting us a room, not doing a lot of actual skiing." She touched her forehead to his. "They've got rooms with hot tubs too, you know."

"You know, after Japan, hot tubs kind of lose their appeal."

"Except in a private hot tub it's just you and me…and nothing else." She said, lowering her head so she was looking up at him demurely. She reached up under his jacket front and tugged his belt buckle back and forth. Not enough for it to come undone, just to make a point. "We could run up there just for some private study time. You know, like when you need to study hard." She leaned in for another kiss, keeping her fingers just inside the top of his pants.

"I really wish tomorrow wasn't a school day tomorrow." Kim said. "I could go for some more snow-night cuddling in your treehouse, though much more cuddling like that and we'll be fighting Mon and 'Lix for the back of his van." She pulled her mittens off and then started pulling Ron's gloves off, twining her fingers with his as they kissed.

"One thing is pretty certain." He said. "Your parents wouldn't be worried about the two of us doing too much in the back of a car like this."

"Oh, why do you say that?" She managed to slip her leg up over his lap, straddling him in the tight confines of the back seat. Her head was actually touching the headliner. She unzipped her jacket and put his hands where they wouldn't possibly get cold.

"Oh, did we forget something today?" He asked, grinning from ear to ear while Kim did her best to convince him to buy the car. He'd already made up his mind, at least as long as it ran. Maybe if Motor Ed broke out they'd roll up in this thing and he'd laugh so hard they could take him down without a fight.

The next day, right after school there were there again. The weather had flip-flopped again, going all the way up in to the fifties. The sun was out and by mid-afternoon a lot of the snow was nothing more than gray slush on the side of the roads or patches of white sitting in the shadows.

The old Chevy did actually run though neither of them had noticed it had a manual tranny.

Ron nearly choked when Kim made a joke about 'driving a stick.' If things had gotten any hotter during the snowstorm, he would have felt obliged to buy the car whether it ran or not. Still, by the end of the afternoon he was the proud owner of yet another vehicle that was older than he was and ran far better than it looked.

They didn't explore the back seat any more that night, though. It was Tuesday and Ron's parents always went to Denver on some mysterious errand each week. Somehow he had the strange notion his father did that to give them some private time at home but he couldn't really imagining his mother going along with something like that. One of these days he was going to find out exactly what they were doing. They had even taken to staying overnight lately, though they weren't planning on doing that this time. Besides, they had homework to get done and that always came before any other kind of fun.

It was very nice to have a reward waiting for their schoolwork's completion.

A/N - I know there are those out there screaming at Ron saying "Don't Do It! It's a Chevette! Well, I know it's about the lamest car ever, but I owned one of those things and I drove it two hundred thousand miles (my parents bought it new in 1980 and it was passed on to me when I got my license. It took me through High School and College and lived well into my marraige before some kid ran a redlight and t-boned it.) It's not as cool as Ron's late bike, but hey, he needs a ride!