A/N: Okay...so...I'm not a big fan of being patient when I want my characters to make out...which makes writing a bit difficult at times. :) Forcing a slow build when your head is screaming 'kiss her!' gets difficult. Thank you to everyone who reviewed. You guys are seriously amazing. The thought and time you put into your reviews is something I appreciate more than I can put in words. I just hope you keep enjoying what I put out for ya to read. Onto chapter five!
Chapter Five
It wasn't something Johnny planned on doing - asking the new girl to go grab a bite to eat. He'd been looking for a quick way out of an uncomfortable conversation. The idea presented itself and was out before he could think twice about it.
The only thing that stunned him more than the fact that he had asked was the fact that Karina had accepted. She'd made a quick call to Mrs. Noodleman to let her know she'd be home late and together, they'd made their way out of the darkened theater.
"What d'ya feel like eating?" he asked, catching her hand when she reached out blindly in the darkness and almost lost her footing on the stairs.
"I don't even know where to begin with that," she said with a small laugh. "I'm good with anything as long as there are carbs involved."
It wasn't until they were in the alley that he relinquished his hold somewhat regretfully, telling himself he'd only helped her out because he had manners and that's what good guys with manners did - they held a girl's hand to keep her from tripping and didn't let go until they had to if said girl made no move to do the same thing. So what if it made him feel a little warmer than usual.
With the heater and radio on low, he backed out of the alley and onto the main road, heading towards the part of town where most of the fast food joints were located. After talking himself out of the idea last night, he was definitely craving cheap junk food.
Karina sat quietly beside him, hands in her lap, her gaze out the window taking in the surroundings. Even in her silence, she intrigued him. There was just something about her - something that kept drawing him to her. Sure, she was different, but there was more to it than that. Or, at least, that's what his nagging thoughts kept trying to push past the innocent excuses he kept feeding himself when it came to how she made him feel.
When she'd sat beside him at the piano, his heart had slammed against his ribcage and he kept thinking about how much smaller than him she was, how soft the skin on her hands looked, what it would feel like if she just...laid her head on his shoulder and sat listening to him.
He tightened his grip on the steering wheel, making a pitiful attempt to curb his thoughts but that quiet voice that kept trying to be heard over the excuses was become far more persistent and hard to ignore.
Derailed thoughts were not something he was used to. Especially not on this level. Despite his somewhat criminal background, he was pretty simplistic. Large crowds made him anxious, he was never truly sure of much of anything that he was doing and he enjoyed the peace when nothing was happening.
Maybe it was part of growing up with a criminal for a father. His dad was always busy plotting the next heist, always lining up every minute to the moment that it would take place, catching Johnny up in the action regardless of how much he resisted or how many excuses he would come up with. It had always made life feel chaotic - something Johnny didn't like in the slightest but was helpless to stop.
Rarely was it ever a "do nothing" kind of day when his dad was around. Johnny took the moments here and there, coveting what little time he had to just sit still and do nothing but sing to no one or dream about what a life not shrouded in crime would be like.
With his father in prison, life had slowed down and the chaos had ebbed.
Then Karina showed up.
She brought with her a new kind of inconsistent chaos full of questions and curiosity and it was right back to that derailed train of thought again. Though this time, it was much more welcome and entirely new.
He glanced at Karina, smiling at the enthralled look on her face.
"Don't get out much, do you?"
She shook her head. "Not nearly as much as I'd like to. And when I go out with Nana, we don't do a whole lot. I've never been to this part of the city. I didn't even know it was this big."
Johnny pulled into the drive through of one of his favorite fast food joints and up to the speaker, shifting the truck into first gear.
"Thanks for choosing the Side Stop, what can I get you?" came a crackling, bored voice.
"Yeah, I'll take a number five with large fries and a banana milkshake," Johnny said automatically, knowing exactly what he wanted.
"Is that all?"
"No, hang on." He glanced expectantly at Karina. "Take a look."
"Did you seriously just say fries?" she muttered, leaning over and staring wide-eyed at the menu. "Fried food! My night has been officially made! Um...okay, okay...everything fried."
Johnny choked on a laugh. "I don't think that's an option."
"Well, it should be. Um, I'll have a...number two...large fries...a chocolate milkshake...aaaaand that's it."
"Total at the window."
Karina sat back and Johnny pulled forward, feeling highly amused. They picked up their food and Johnny set it between them. "I'm takin' it fries were a thing where you're from?" he asked as they headed out of town.
"A staple food," she said, reaching into one of the bags, grabbing a fry and popping it in her mouth. She rolled her eyes in bliss as she chewed and something about it struck him as sad. How long had she been stuck in a box to miss things the way she did? First coffee...now fries.
What the hell happened to you?
"Where are we going?"
Her question snapped him out of his thoughts. "Oh, uh - out of the city a bit. Not too far. That okay?"
He caught the shy smile out of the corner of his eye and felt that pleasant twist in his stomach. "Sure. I trust you."
The need to protect doubled with her quiet statement, so much so that he almost reached out to take her hand again but managed to stop himself. She wasn't falling down stairs or needing any kind of saving at the moment. Holding her hand after knowing her for a day probably wouldn't go over too well.
He drove out of the city about a mile and a half before turning up a scenic byway. "I used to come up here a lot before I got busy with the theater an' all," he explained as he followed the winding road uphill through thick trees that blocked out the moon.
"When you used to hide bodies of unsuspecting women?" she teased.
He shot her a quick grin before turning onto an overgrown path. "Naturally."
He pulled into a small clearing on the hillside and parked the truck facing the treeline before killing the engine. They got out, food in hand, and Johnny circled around back, putting down the tailgate and easily climbing into the truck bed. After putting down the food, he turned and offered his hand, helping Karina up.
"I can see the appeal," she murmured, looking out at the twinkling city.
From where they were, it was nothing more than a blanket of lights sprawling over the landscape, spread out for several miles before gradually tapering off into dark countryside. The noise of the traffic was minimal, giving it an odd sort of peace that he always took comfort in.
Karina looked up at him, her gaze thoughtful. "I'm guessing you didn't just come out here for the fun of it."
Johnny sat down towards the cab, resting his back against it and she joined him. The truck bed didn't offer much room so her arm and hip were pressed against his, though she didn't seem to mind. She unloaded the bags of food, handing him his before settling in on her fries with a ravenous look.
He hesitated for a moment, not entirely sure what all to tell her. No one at the theater really knew what had happened to his dad. They knew there was a little drama mixed up in his home life, but no one questioned him on it and he didn't feel a need to say much of anything. "I came out here to get away from my dad, mostly. I love him but there were a lot of things we didn't exactly...agree on."
"Every time you talk about him, you seem kind of sad," she remarked quietly.
Johnny ducked his head. He could feel the shame creeping up his neck, the same shame that always plagued him when he thought about the role he'd played in his family's numerous robberies and the deeper shame that came when he thought about the day he'd failed to be there when they needed him. "I guess."
Karina nudged him. "Want to make a deal?"
"What kinda deal?" he asked, regarding her skeptically.
"Really? You're going to give me that look after I just met you yesterday and willingly let you drive me out to the middle of nowhere, no questions asked?"
She tossed a fry at him and he laughed. "Right, okay...what's your deal?"
"I think we can both agree," she started, crossing her legs at the heel and leaning against him slightly, "that we've both seen our fair share of crap throughout our lives and there's no reason we have to actually talk about it. Let's just keep it light, okay? No dark pasts."
She held up her milkshake and he did the same, tapping it to hers. "No dark pasts. Deal."
"Good. So, what do you do at the theater?"
"I'm a...singer," he started. "Not really how it started. See, there was this contest Mr. Moon put on and the prize was this hundred thousand dollars that didn't were all pretty upset when we found out the prize money wasn't real but...Mr. Moon loved that theater. He was doin' what he could ta save it. Probably woulda done the same thing."
He thought back to the night he nearly had, sneaking into the theater at night to take the money and get his dad out of prison. It hadn't been one of his finest moments. It hadn't even come close to being one of his "okay" moments. But he thought of it often in the days following the collapse of the theater and remembering that night made it difficult to be angry with Mr. Moon.
"What happened to the winner of the contest then?" Karina asked.
He watched as she popped the top off of her milkshake and dipped a fry in it.
"Well, there wasn't….what are you doin?" he asked, slightly horrified.
"If you've never tried this, you don't know what you're missing," she said, taking a bite of the shake covered fry and grinning. "So good."
Johnny made a face. "I'll take your word for it. And there wasn't a winner."
"There wasn't?"
He shook his head, pulled up a knee and propped his arm on it, food forgotten for the time being. "Mr. Moon called us all outta nowhere. Still not sure why he did it. We pulled together what was left of the theater and-."
"What was left of the theater?" She was watching him avidly, her food also seemingly forgotten. "What happened?"
"Oh, ah….that's a long story. Involves a stage made outta glass, a lot of water and squids. Ends with the theater gettin' completely destroyed and most of us nearly drownin' in the process."
A disbelieving laugh escaped her and her wide eyes went even wider. "Are you serious?"
"Dead serious. It was crazy."
"It sounds crazy." She snagged another fry, this time not bothering to dip it in her shake before taking a bite. "What happened after that?"
"Couple weeks went by. We tried gettin' Mr. Moon outta his slump but he was pretty wrecked after the theater collapsed. Didn't really keep track of each other either. Kept myself busy with the garage and takin' in a few jobs here and there to pay the bills. Then one day Mr. Moon calls and gets us all back together again. No money, no contest...just singin' for anyone who wanted to see it. We spent a good two weeks riggin' up a stage good enough to perform on and then put on a show for the hell of it. None of us expected it to go the way it did. People just kept showin' up." He smiled fondly, remembering the night where he'd poured everything he had into one single performance and how the only thing that had topped that high was his dad showing up after busting out of prison to tell him that he was proud of him. "Always wanted to be a singer...just didn't really believe I could pull it off until I actually did it on that level."
"Are you guys working on a show now?"
Taking a bite of his veggie wrap, Johnny shook his head. "Not really. Mr. Moon's up to somethin'. Not sure what. But now it's just...I dunno...better than sittin' at home alone."
Karina nodded emphatically. "I get that. It's much more comforting to me to be surrounded by sounds and voices than to sit in the quiet all afternoon. Too much time to think."
He almost asked her what she thought about but caught himself. He could imagine that whatever she thought about was definitely off limits with their deal. "You ever perform on a stage?" he asked instead.
"I have, actually. I was in a couple of plays in high school and did dance on the side so a lot of recitals in front of camera-happy parents. Nothing too impressive. I was accepted into a college with an excellent dance program and was in a showcase once but the focus kind of shifted halfway through my sophomore year and I ah...got out of dance. Went a different route."
"What route was that?"
"Public relations," she muttered, not sounding the slightest bit interested in the educational path she'd chosen.
"That's...exciting?"
"No. It really really wasn't. But there's more money in public relations than in the hopes of landing a spot in a dance company so...that's how that went."
She fell quiet and the void between them stretched, making him feel as if she were a million miles away instead of right beside him. They'd traveled unintentionally into her darkness. He'd have to figure a way to pull her out. Something off the wall that would startle a smile out of her.
"I've seen Gunter in gold sequined speedo."
That certainly did it. One minute, she was sipping at her shake, the next she was coughing and laughing. "Oh no! Why?" she managed through her giggles.
"I've asked myself that every day after it happened," he said with mock severity.
"You poor thing!"
"I know. I've thought about getting therapy for it."
He was managing to maintain a straight face, though her eyes sparkling with mirth and her bright smile made it extremely difficult.
"The second recital I was in, I accidentally kicked over a tree and it landed on my dance partner," she said, pulling her wrap from the to-go bag and peeling back the flimsy paper wrapping.
He could feel the grin coming, knew there was no way he'd be able to keep a straight face for long. "They have it coming?"
"As much as I hate to say it….she really did. And the great part was the name of song we were dancing to at the time was Karma."
He laughed then, the sound blending with hers, banishing the darkness that had briefly threatened. Now, he just had to make sure it stayed away.
He lost all track of time as they continued talking into the night, feeling more and more comfortable in her presence as the minutes ticked away into hours. Navigating their way around the darkness of their pasts was a little tricky at first, but they managed, sticking to mundane and mildly humorous topics like favorite movies, music, first high school dances, strangest phone calls from co-workers, autocorrect fails through text messages and eventually a casual trade-off on cell phone numbers. He couldn't really remember the last time he'd laughed so much, even when they'd gotten in a ridiculous argument about the quality of the movie Evil Dead 2. He'd found the entire debate funny enough not to question the fact that they'd both seen a movie that existed in both of their worlds, wherever hers was.
"You have to look past the humor of it and really understand just how masterfully it was carried out," she said, fighting for the quality of the film over the tacky hilarity. "The directors literally made it one of the best cult classic horror movies ever. I don't think I've ever met someone who hasn't seen that movie."
Johnny rolled his eyes and shook his head. "You realize you're tryin' ta convince me that a headless corpse dancin' through the woods equals a quality movie."
She pursed her lips. "Okay, so maybe not that part of the movie...but you have to admit the film has some staying power."
"I'll give you that," he said, tossing his empty shake cup in the bag at his side.
Karina released a content sigh, resting her head back against the glass and staring up at the stars. "I should probably get back before Nana starts to really worry. What time is it, anyway?"
Johnny shoved the sleeve of his leather jacket back and looked down at his watch. "Uh, would you believe 12:30?"
"What?"
He held his watch up for her to see and she released a startled laugh. "Okay, yeah...I need to get back."
"Same here," Johnny said, standing and helping her up. "Gotta open the shop in the morning and get a started on fixin' a head gasket."
They jumped down and Karina stood beside him, wrapping her arms around herself as he put the tailgate back up. Without asking, he shrugged out of his jacket and dropped it over her shoulders, swallowing hard when she looked up at him with a grateful smile, her blue eyes shining even in the dark.
"Thanks."
He shrugged off her gratitude, rubbing the back of his neck. "You looked cold."
They got in the truck and Karina immediately put her feet up on the seat, tucking her legs up to her chest and resting her head on the seat. This time, when his mind threw the word cute at him, he accepted it. Because she was. Curled up on the seat, wrapped up in his jacket that was far too big for her, her eyes tired and a smile playing at the corners of her mouth...she was cute. She was more than cute. He allowed himself to feel that without questioning it, without coming up with any excuses.
Johnny put the truck in reverse, backed out of the spot they'd parked in and started down the hillside. As they pulled out onto the main road, he reached for the dial of the radio, turning the volume up a little when he recognized the song playing. He shot a quick look at Karina, grinning when he saw her asleep, and started to hum along with the radio, then started singing softly, finding the words to the song in his subconscious with no effort.
"You have an amazing voice," Karina said, her quiet voice startling him a little.
"Thought you were sleeping."
She made a small humming sound and shifted in the seat, snuggling further into his coat. "Just resting. You can keep singing, if you want. It's really relaxing."
He waited through the chorus and picked up on the next verse.
"Another aeroplane, another sunny place, I'm lucky I know but I wanna go home-," he sang, fingers tapping the beat against the steering wheel. The city lights blurred past, the streets quiet and slow in the early morning hours. He knew parts of the city were still alive and thriving, caught up in parties, drug deals, cab rides to hotel rooms. He took less traveled streets to avoid them, driving past his garage and onto the richer part where palm trees loomed over private fences. The song he was singing faded into another and another before he pulled up behind Mrs. Noodleman's estate and set the brake.
"Karina," he called softly, reaching out and nudging her lightly.
She opened her eyes slowly, her brows furrowing slightly as she blinked the sleep away and turned her head to look out the windshield.
"Oh hey...we're home," she said groggily, stretching a bit and pushing herself upright.
"You're home," he corrected with a kind smile. "And tired."
She chuckled and nodded. "Yeah, I am. I guess more than I thought I was. Sleep gets a little rough, sometimes."
Johnny dropped his hand to her shoe and gave it a playful shake. "No dark pasts," he reminded her.
She wrapped her arms around her knees, her hand brushing his and causing a pleasant shock of sensation to travel the length of his spine. "No dark pasts," she murmured.
The sat, staring at one another for a bit, lost in the moment and finally Johnny moved away. "Come on, I'll walk ya up."
They got out and he waited for her, offering his arm for support which she gratefully took, leaning tiredly against him as they went up the walkway and to the backdoor.
"What time you want me to swing by tomorrow?" he asked.
Karina yawned, waving a hand at him dismissively. "You really don't have to-."
"Let you walk to the theater, I know," he repeated his statement from earlier with a grin. "We've been over this already. What time?"
"After lunch work okay?" she asked, giving in with a roll of her eyes.
"Works for me."
They stopped on the landing at the door and she shrugged out of his jacket, handing it back to him. Just as he took it, she caught him completely by surprise, throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly.
"Thank you so much for everything, Johnny," she said in a voice so soft he barely heard it. "As great as Nana's been, this is honestly the happiest I've been since waking up here."
He stumbled clumsily over the moment, lifting his arm and dropping it once before wrapping it carefully around her waist and hugging her back. "Glad I could help."
Karina stepped back, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear and smiling up at him. "See you tomorrow."
He swore he caught the faintest darkening of her cheeks but she turned away and was inside before he knew for sure that's what he was seeing. He stood where he was for a while, his jacket dangling from his loose grip, the feel of her arms around him lingering.
Happiest she's ever been, he thought as he slid his jacket back on. He was immediately surrounded by her unique scent and with a smile, he hopped off the landing and walked to his truck, whistling the tune he'd been singing earlier and anticipating tomorrow.
