Cross Country – Part III
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Kim craned her neck so she could follow the truck in the right rearview mirror as their SUV sped down the ramp of the interchange. For a few heartbeats she held her breath, half expecting the rig to race right up onto their bumper, smashing into them. She finally let that breath out when she realized it wasn't getting any closer. Still the mere fact it was still right behind her was bothering her much more than she cared to admit. Even being off the bad guy's collective radars for some years, there were still some people out there who would want some harm to come to her.
In the past, the possibility they were being followed wouldn't have upset her quite as much. Even without most of the funky gadgets she employed during her teen hero days, she knew she could be a force to be reckoned with. Having Ron by her side, she would feel almost invulnerable. Even a few months earlier she would have actually welcomed a little bit of real action. Though her lifestyle as a jet-setting teen adventurer was years behind her, she actually found herself craving some real excitement for a change.
That wasn't the case that morning, not with her son, her sister-in-law and her foster child with her, not to mention her as yet unborn daughter. There was simply too much at stake. Even considering Amethyst could mimic her mother's powers to some extent, they would be in danger. So far the child had very little training in using her purple glow as an offensive weapon and, if she had anything to say in the matter, she wouldn't, at least until she was old enough to make that kind of decision for herself.
The off-ramp ended at a traffic light, opening onto a four-lane highway peppered with gas stations and fast food places. The welcome sombrero shaped roof was visible about a quarter mile away from them. Kim almost bit her lip when the traffic light caught them, making her almost wish Ron's driving hadn't improved and he would take the chance of running the yellow.
Glancing back nervously she could see the ubiquitous silhouette of a large busted woman in the center of the truck's grille. The driver was still hidden behind tinted windows, the late-morning sun glinting off them just so she couldn't see anything but the reflection of the sun in the glass.
It's just some guy in a work shirt, waiting for the light to change she kept telling herself as they waited their own turn at the light. The Semi stopped some ten feet behind them, then crept forward a couple inches with a jerk. Despite the cool air pouring from the vents of the SUV, Kim could feel sweat beading on her forehead. If it were not for her condition…
…then what? How many times did this sort of thing happen to motorists. Big Rigs were the lifeblood of the economy. It was the only truly efficient way of moving goods around the nation. Trains couldn't do it, ships couldn't do it. It was trucks, moving loads one at a time in forty to fifty foot trailers, sometimes even pulling two.
From their vantage point at the bottom of the ramp she could finally make out that the truck was pulling a tanker, probably delivering gasoline to one of the many stations scattered near the interstate. She forced herself to relax, thinking it was only coincidence the driver had to pull off at the same exit she had picked.
Her heart nearly jumped out her throat when the rig suddenly jerked a couple feet closer to her. Then she realized they were moving once more. The light had finally changed, letting them onto the crossroads. The truck, slowly made to follow them, taking a little more time to get up to speed than the four powerful electric motors of their own vehicle did. The final test came when Ron turned into the parking lot at Bueno Nacho.
"Ron, park us around back."
"Something wrong KP?"
"Dunno, just do it."
He pulled into a space that was probably normally only used by the staff, if they ever followed the policy of leaving the prime spaces for the customers. He was about to reach for the door handle when Kim laid a hand on his shoulder from her seat behind him.
Slowly the truck reached the entrance of the little Tex-Mex eatery. Time seemed to crawl by as first the cab, then the long, silver tank slid by. Kim finally let out a huge breath as it passed them by, heading on up the road and disappearing around a bend.
"What's wrong, Kim?" Ron undid his seatbelt and turned to look at his wife.
"I…I think it's just nerves…and hormones and my back teeth are floating." She responded nervously. "Okay, girls, who has to go to the lady's room with me?"
"No thanks. Just want me a Naco!" Ammie thrust both fists in the air, mimicking a touchdown signal.
"Ron, you take care of the kids." She hastily climbed out the side door, sprinting toward the building.
"Okay, Ammie wants a Naco. GJ, CJ, what do you guys want?" He asked, pretty much knowing what was coming.
"Wanna lil' nino meal with a toy." His son shouted, still not quite able to properly pronounce niño.
"They don't have much that's Kosher, do they, Ron?" CJ asked, probably for the hundredth time.
"Ceeg, I'm as Jewish as you are, and I've eaten this stuff most of my life. It's not going to kill you."
"Rabbi says that deciding to live by the laws of our culture is a personal decision, and I don't think there is a single thing in there I can eat."
He rolled his eyes. At just a few weeks shy of turning nine, his little sister could already speak Hebrew better than him and could quote scriptures constantly. Other than that, she really didn't seem to be very religious, so he suspected it was a sort of childhood rebellion thing, though he couldn't say anything about it since, in a way, she was right and he wasn't supposed to be eating those things himself. "How about a taco salad with no meat or cheese on it?"
"Whatever." She said flatly, sitting back in her seat and folding her arms over her chest.
Ron almost said something. He utterly hated the word, but was in too good a mood otherwise to get into correcting his little sister during what amounted to a family vacation.
"Daddy, how come we aren't 'sposed to eat meat with cheese?" GJ asked.
"Because…wait a minute, you don't eat Kosher." His son went to both temple services and church services with them. At some point in his life he would be ready to decide which faith he was going to follow, his mother's or his father's, but at four, he was still completely enamored with all the same greasy foods Ron craved.
"That's what CJ told me." He said, mimicking his mother's pout.
"You want a lil' niños meal or not?"
"Duh." He crossed his arms, copying his aunt's gesture.
"Can't we go inside? I want to see Ned."
"Uh, GJ, Ned doesn't work at this one."
"But I want a Choco-Naco!" his pout turned into a scowl. "Ned always gives me a Choco-Naco with it."
Ron just shook his head. Sure, the long-time manager of the restaurant closest to where they lived liked to slip the boy the sugary treat behind his back, but it really didn't matter except for the fact he didn't want the child hopped up on the sweets. It was going to be bad enough in the enclosed space of the SUV once they all had the spicy foods in them. Ned wasn't getting away with anything since part of the deal Ron's father made with the corporation many years ago was lifetime free food for him and his family, a benefit that survived his leaving their employ several years earlier. It also seemed a little funny that he created the ice-cream and cinnamon crisp filled desert treat himself during his tenure as the Tri-City district manager.
Kim opened the door and climbed back into the front seat. "Not quite sure I want to eat here now." She said with a slight growl. "I so wish you were still a DM. You'd eat them alive for the way the place looks."
"That bad?"
"Ferociously bad. Do you have any idea how hard it is to hover like this." She put a hand on her belly. "It's like they don't even care."
"I don't even know whose district this is any more. Come on, there's a Burger Prince up the road." He restarted the motors and got ready to pull out.
"I don't want a burger." Ammie protested. "I wanted a Naco!"
"And I want my salad." CJ chimed in.
Not wanting to be left out, GJ started whining about his meal, though he was mostly concerned about not getting the toy that came with the Lil' Niño's meal. Pretty soon, the cacophony of three whining kids was too much for the two adults. Ron put his forehead down on the steering wheel, while Kim turned around and shot them all the "Mommy Glare." The girls instantly shut up, but GJ just started wailing.
"Okay, we'll hit the drive through." Ron gave in, backing the SUV out of its space.
"No, we won't." Kim said resolutely.
"But KP…"
"No buts. We're not going to teach little Gene that whining is going to get him his way. Besides, I don't want to eat anything from this place and I'm ferociously hungry. Just go down to the burger place and get them all something and they can like it."
"Okay, you win. Just don't look back there."
"Why not?" She asked, a little crossly. Kim never got her answer. Slightly tweaked that her husband was about to give in, as well as her ordeal in the lady's room, she simply turned and looked.
It was known far and wide that the women of the Possible family had a certain power. None were quite as well versed in the uses of that power as Kim and her Mom. It came as a surprise, then when her son spontaneously started using it himself, proving that males were capable of it as well.
Ron had tried the Puppy Dog Pout on occasions himself, though with less-than-impressive results. GJ, however, could fire off one with at least as much power as Kim, possibly rivaling the one true master of the pout, Anne Credible Possible. His chocolate brown eyes got as big as saucers and his bottom lip stuck out, all while sinking his little head down between his shoulders and cocking his head to one side.
"Gene, please believe me. That place back there is nasty. Remember what we told you about germs?"
"Don't care. I want my chim-rio."
Kim tried looking away, but found she couldn't. A horn blared outside, wanting past their large vehicle, which was still sitting in the middle of the lot. That was enough to break the spell, even for a moment. "I said no, Gene. We'll get you a Chimirito when we get home. Ned keeps his store sparkling clean. These people obviously don't care about their little girl's room, so that means they don't care about the food."
"I WANT MY CHIM-RIO!" He screamed.
Kim finally broke eye contact with him. "Pull back into the space, Ron."
"But?" He looked at his wife, then put it in gear and followed her instructions.
She unbuckled her seatbelt and turned around. "That's quite enough of that young man. I know what's best for you, even if you don't."
"Oh no." Ron said under his breath. Twelve years later and she still hadn't broken herself from saying that.
"I said we're not eating here and that is final."
"Then why did you have me park?" Ron asked.
"Just going to take care of something first." Kim opened a panel in the middle of the dash and used a small scroll-wheel to select an item on the small screen located there. Finding what she wanted, she pressed the button just below the wheel.
The outside of the SUV started changing. The nearly-black green finish of the vehicle shimmered slightly, changing to a bright metallic silver. It was a capability that her PT Cruiser had. Years ago they rescued a scientist who had built a self-driving SUV named S.A.D.I. Wade had incorporated several of 'her' features in the new vehicle, one of which was the ability to change the color of its exterior, either to a number of pre-sets, or it could be adjusted manually.
"I'm still a little worried about that truck, so if he sees a silver Glissade pull out, maybe he won't think it's us."
Ron nodded. "Not that many of these around these parts, but sounds like a badical idea." He put it in gear once more and pulled out, ignoring the whines and pouts coming from the center seats. He gave his son one more glance in the mirror before they started down the road to the burger joint.
He didn't mention the fact he really wanted a Naco himself, despite Kim's judgment of the place's hygiene.
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Kim sat down on the bed, letting her shoulders slump. At any moment she expected one of the kids to start pounding on their door, even though they were supposed to be going to sleep. GJ at least had been easy to deal with. They all sat in the main area of their hotel room watching a movie on the Mouse Ears channel and he was asleep long before the end. The way the girls were dragging, maybe they were asleep as well. Sleep seemed like such a blessed thing, even though she had dozed her way through most of their day-long drive. Riding in a car, even one as comfortable as the new SUV, was tiring in its own right. Yet sleep would have to wait for other things.
Her second pregnancy was playing out pretty much just like the first. In a way that scared her, considering the tough time she had the final month with little Gene. She was supposed to get a c-section, but the labor took them all by surprise and she ended up giving birth naturally. Granted, it lasted some eight grueling hours, but that was only the grand finale of a month of problems she hadn't been expecting. She spent the last three weeks in bed almost constantly, with her Mom hanging over her to make certain she followed her obstetrician's orders.
That wasn't what she was thinking of as she reclined on the edge of the bed. For perhaps the first month after she found out she was pregnant the last time, she couldn't get enough of Ron. She would come home from classes and drag him either upstairs or into the den. Sometimes they didn't even get that far if Amethyst's mother was visiting and they had the large townhouse to themselves.
Then, as if somebody flipped a switch, her libido crashed. Ron never complained, but she was sure it hurt him to go from feast to famine like that overnight. Then about five and a half months along, her drive came back gangbusters. Following a particularly nasty nightmare, she took him to the bedroom and even called in sick for him the next day though it wasn't all spent in his arms considering she still had to take care of Amethyst, who was not quite four at the time. Up until her health started declining at the end, they kept up a pretty substantial pace.
Then it was almost two months after GJ was born before she was comfortable being with him again.
Hoping the kids really were settled down, she slipped out of her simple travel clothes and into a sheer nightie while Ron finished up in the bathroom. A smile crept over her lips when he came out. He was still in his boxers, but he was otherwise ready, having just shaved. He knew better than to try growing his Vandyke back with her hormones primed to go off at any time.
She lay back on the bed, smiling softly at him as he crossed the room. Sometimes she felt like she was as big as a whale, but when she was lying in the bed, waiting for her man, she felt like pure woman…most of the time.
"Do you think I'm still sexy?" She asked, pulling herself up to the pillows.
Ron lay down beside her, tracing circles on her belly. "What do you mean still? You've never stopped being sexy."
Kim rolled partially onto her side. "I'm being serious here, Ron. I know I've gained a little more weight this time around, and it was ferociously hard losing it after Gene came." He started to open his mouth, but she held a single finger up in the air. "If you say there's more of me to love, then I'm going to show you just how much kung fu I can still do like this."
"Wasn't gonna say that." He pouted. "But it's true. You're as sexy to me now as you were the first time you kissed me."
"Liar." She said with a smile, taking the hand that was lovingly stroking her midsection.
"So not the drama, KP. Look at your Mom. She had the three of you and she's always been skinny as a rail. She's skinnier than you when you're not preggers. I swear, Mom P doesn't have much of a backside."
Kim raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying I've got a big butt or something?" She squeezed his hand just a little harder than their traditional 'hand-hug.'
"No, you've just got much more muscular legs." He shifted positions slightly and put his free hand on the aforementioned body part.
"Good save." She leaned over toward him and kissed him gently on the lips.
Ron rolled back onto his back, keeping his hand clasped with hers. "Think we're gonna call it quits after Jean Anne comes?"
She rolled onto her back, looking at the ceiling. "I don't know, Ronnie. We're just twenty-seven. We've got a lot of life ahead of us to be making that kind of decision yet."
"Yeah, but we've effectively got three kids already. I've got a hard enough time telling people CJ is my sister and not our daughter. One guy even got after her for calling me by my name instead of 'Dad.'"
"You're kidding me."
"Nope. Strange little family we've got here. All three of them call us something different."
She kept staring at the stucco ceiling of the hotel room. "Think we're doing the right thing letting Amethyst call us Aunt and Uncle?"
Ron just shrugged. "Probably for the best, especially since we don't want her growing up thinking we're her real parents." He remembered quite clearly when the old woman took them aside and explained to them that it was critically important, no matter how close they were to the child, she must never forget who her parents really were, even though one of them was technically her step-father. Still, they really did think of her as their own child. "We better get some sleep. We've got a lot of ground to cover tomorrow."
A little wicked smile crossed Kim's rounded face. "You know what it takes for me to get a good night's sleep, don't you?"
He clicked out the light. "One dose of the Stoppable Deep Sleep potion, coming right up."
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The rig pulled to a stop in the parking lot of the cheap motor court accross from the clean, new chain hotel across the highway. The driver nodded to himself as he watched the lights go off in one particular room that matched the notes he clutched in his large hand. Satisfied, he climbed out of the cab, grinning.
Tomorrow, it would begin.
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