They're cruising down a deserted gravel road when something pops, jerking the car wildly to the left and causing Jamie to overcorrect. Dani would swear they're up on two wheels at one point, but Jamie manages to stop the car on the side of the road before they roll sideways into the ditch.
Now, the wisdom to take this route had been imparted to them by an old man standing behind the unevenly crooked counter inside a gas station that had seen better days. "Shortcut," he'd said. "Shave an hour off your trip."
"Cheers, mate." Jamie had inclined her head to show appreciation, snatched up the junk food she'd just purchased along with a tank full of gas, and exited the establishment with Dani on her heels.
"We're not actually going to take his directions, right?" Dani asked, clipping her seatbelt into place and looking at Jamie with wide eyes.
"It'll save us an hour!" Jamie turned the key in the ignition and, after a moment, the beater that they'd purchased two weeks ago for almost half the asking price - Dani, it turned out, had a way with second-hand car salesmen - coughed and sputtered to life.
"Jamie." Reaching out, Dani wrapped her hand around Jamie's knee and gripped tightly, eyes boring a hole into the side of her face. "I know you're new to America, but you-you've seen a horror movie before right?"
"Yes," Jamie drawled, drawing the word out as she exited back onto the main road.
"Okay, so then you must know that this is how ninety percent of them start." Dani scratched the nail of her index finger back and forth against the material of Jamie's jeans, entirely unaware of the movement.
"Didn't have you pegged as a horror fan, Poppins." Jamie glanced askance at her. "Don't worry." Flashed Dani a smile and patted the top of her hand. "I'll keep you safe. Promise."
Then….
"Oh god, I hope this thing has a spare," Dani groans as she opens the passenger side door and steps out of the vehicle, moving around to the trunk. "I need the key!" she calls out, poking the tip of her finger against the rusty metal keyhole as Jamie approaches and hands it over. Dani grins in thanks and slides the key into place. With a grating clicking sound, the trunk pops open and Dani lifts the mat in the back, breathing out a sigh of relief when she sees that there is, in fact, a spare tire and a jack tucked away under it. The tire looks like it has seen better days. "Well, at least it's something."
"Yeah." Jamie blows out a breath, scratching at the back of her head. "Just one problem, though." Dani looks at her. "I don't, exactly, know how to change a tire."
Dani stares.
Turns her body until she's leaning back against the car and stares at Jamie, blinking slowly.
"You… don't know how to change a tire?" Dani could not possibly sound more incredulous if she tried.
"I do not."
"But…" Dani blinks some more. "But you know how to do everything!"
"Flattered you think so, but no." Jamie lifts a hand to rub at her forehead. "I wasn't the one taking 'em off cars. Just the lookout." She sighs. "Don't know how to skip and can't change a tire."
"You don't know how to skip?!" Dani practically explodes, horrified, hands going out to grab the edge of the trunk on either side of her body as if she's stopping herself from lunging forward to immediately teach Jamie how.
"Should maybe focus on the more pressing problem, yeah?" Jamie gestures to the deflated rubber, then puts her hands on her hips and looks both ways along the stretch of dirt road they'd been so recently travelling on. "Shit. Right, I'm gonna have to walk back to the gas station. Maybe that old codger has a phone he'll let me use." She looks back to Dani. "You stay with the car and I'll be back in…" she glances at her watch, then up at the sun, then shrugs with a shake of her head. "Who the fuck knows how long. If someone drives past, try and flag them down. But if they look skeevy get back in and lock the doors."
"Jamie?" Dani cuts in quickly, before Jamie can take off running. "I know how to change a tire."
The silence that passes in the aftermath of Dani's admission is comedically long. So much so that Dani half expects to spy a tumbleweed rolling by or a cricket to chirp its way inside Jamie's gaping mouth.
"You- what?" The pitch of Jamie's voice spikes on the question. "How in the hell do you know how to change a tire?" Jamie blurts, then immediately realises she's said something very wrong.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Dani frowns at Jamie, feigning offence, before turning her back on her and lugging the tire up and out of the trunk.
"I- nothin', I just," Jamie splutters behind her and Dani allows herself a small smile as she leans the spare tire against the car before schooling her features back into place. "I didn't expect, I just thought-"
"That the only thing I might know how to change is a diaper?" Dani drops the jack into the dirt and rounds on Jamie, raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms over her chest. Jamie's eyes widen.
"No! No, no. That's not-" Jamie reaches out, then thinks better of it and balls her hand into a fist instead, slowly extending her forefinger and giving it a single, stiff shake. Frustrated, but not with Dani. "I didn't mean it like that."
Dani can see that Jamie is about to start berating herself and decides to cut her some slack.
"I'm kidding," Dani says, rolling her eyes. Jamie drops her hand back to side and straightens. "You definitely deserved that, though." Dani retreats back to her side of the car and reaches into the glovebox. She pulls out a bright pink scrunchie and ties her hair back, then shrugs out of the denim jacket she's wearing. She's got a simple pastel-pink tee shirt on underneath; not something she'll worry about getting dirty.
"You, Miss Clayton," Jamie's eyes are narrowed when Dani turns back to her, "are a piece of work."
Dani chuckles brightly and then shoos Jamie aside so that she can kneel in front of the flat.
"How exactly were you planning on keeping me safe if you can't even change a tire?" Dani, smile lopsided and still growing, looks up at her girlfriend - a word she and Jamie had discussed using not a week before, and oh, how thrilling it felt just to think it.
"Don't need to know how to change a tire to twat someone," Jamie points out. She looks pouty now and Dani finds that she has to look away, lest she be distracted by wanting to kiss such things out of existence. "Really though, how'd you know?"
"I'll have you know there are probably quite a few things I know that you don't. Could teach you a thing or two," Dani quips, while jacking up the car.
"That right?" Jamie's tone is borderline lecherous and Dani has to make a concentrated effort to keep her attention focused on the task at hand. "Promises, promises, Poppins."
They work in silence for a bit then, Jamie either watching Dani or helping by doing as she's told. They've almost got the tire off when Dani goes back to Jamie's question.
"My, um… it-it was Eddie," Dani tells her, voice soft. "Eddie taught me how. He said it was an essential life skill." Her smile is small as she explains, feeling, perhaps for the first time, a distinct lack of guilt while talking about him.
Seeing Dani's smile, Jamie decides to go with her gut on this one.
"Yeah?" She's sitting in the dirt next to the car and leans forward a bit to bump her elbow into Dani's arm. "Can just imagine a young Dani Clayton trying not to get mucked up learning how to do that."
"At least I learned," Dani shoots back, a sly grin spreading across her face. "I can't believe you don't know how to change a tire."
"Yeah, yeah, give it a rest, would you?" Jamie gives her a playful shove. "What else did he teach you? Or you him. You were mates a long time, yeah?" Jamie already knows the answer to the latter, but this is the first time since meeting Dani that it seems like she wants to talk about Edmund. "Best mates. Probably did everything together."
Jamie can't say she's ever had a best friend. She certainly didn't while she was growing up, was barely in one place long enough to make an acquaintance. Looking back, she thinks that maybe Tamara was the closest thing she had to one and god, isn't that sad? Your bloody psychologist being your only friend.
Bly had been a new start for Jamie in many ways and as much as she wasn't really looking to make friends, Owen managed to weasel his way in. With his kind eyes and warm smile, and god awful puns. And Hannah. Intelligent, elegant, beautiful Hannah, all quick wit and easy conversation. Making friends didn't come naturally to Jamie and so she was lucky to have come across two people who were willing to make the effort when she didn't really know how.
And then Dani Clayton had speed-walked into her life and Jamie found herself actively wanting to get to know another person. Which was entirely new territory altogether.
"Yeah." Dani's voice breaks her reverie and brings Jamie back to the conversation. "We did. I taught him how to ride a bike. I learned from my dad before he… before he died." Dani's hands continue to work steadily as she speaks. "Eddie taught me how to do tricks with a yo-yo. He was really good. Taught me how to braid hair, too."
"Really?" Jamie laughs and Dani nods with a chuckle.
"His mom showed him how. I think she was always sad that she never had a daughter. She was so happy when we…" Dani pauses, swallowing, and shakes her head as though the act itself will realign her thoughts. "We learned how to swim together one summer. He tried to show off by jumping from the high dive," Dani's mouth curves into a smile that crinkles the corners of her eyes as she remembers, "but he ended up doing the biggest belly flop into the water. He swore for days that his ribs were broken."
Jamie lets out a ribbon of quiet laughter, please to see Dani reminiscing fondly for a change. The sight makes warmth bloom inside her chest.
"He was my first friend. First best friend. He'll always mean a lot to me because of that."
"Course." Jamie rests her hand on Dani's arm and brushes her thumb back and forth over her skin. She's not sure what else to say, can't really relate, but wants to make sure Dani knows that she's listening. That she cares.
"Okay," Dani exhales after a moment, "help me get this thing off."
They get rid of the flat and Jamie is left to sit back and watch Dani put her unanticipated skills to work. Her eyes follow every twist of Dani's wrist, each bend of a knuckle and clench of her fingers. Dani knows she's watching, keeps catching glimpses of two different coloured eyes glancing sidelong at her before returning to the tire.
By the time Dani is finished, she's managed to streak her forehead and cheek with grease or dirt, or something of the like, and when she slaps her hands against her knees and bounces happily to her feet, Jamie can only gaze up at her appreciatively.
"Impressive." Jamie lets out a low whistle as she stands and, very blatantly, eyes Dani up.
Dani raises her eyebrows, a smile creeping across her lips, "Oh yeah?"
Jamie hums in the affirmative, shoves one hand into the pocket of her jacket and runs the fingers of the other through her hair as she blows out a breath.
"Bit sexy, if I'm honest." Jamie's eyes don't leave Dani's face, which visibly brightens at her words, and a dirt-smudged hand pulls at the hem of Jamie's shirt, tugging her closer. Dani bites at the inside of her cheek as Jamie makes sure that their bodies collide a little harder than is strictly necessary, her fingers automatically curling around Dani's waist.
And it's the middle of the day, but they hadn't passed a single vehicle before the tire decided to explode and no one has driven by since they stopped.
"You uh," Dani stalls, eyes flicking away briefly as her fingers tighten around Jamie's shirt and a blush begins to dust her cheeks. And Jamie steels herself, because she knows what that look means. Knows it's a warning. "You like watching me use my hands, huh?"
There it is. That flash of desire behind Dani's eyes, the pleasant flipping of Jamie's stomach.
"Oh," Jamie says, her voice an octave or two lower than normal. Then, matter-of-fact, "Yeah. I do." She leans in to teasingly brush her lips over Dani's and feels a warm hand splay across her lower back, pressing into the muscles there.
"Well," Dani murmurs against Jamie's mouth, a confident smirk lifting one corner of her own. "If you think me getting that tire off was impressive…" she trails off, leaning back just enough for Jamie to be able to see as she rolls her lips together before pressing them into a thin line that her lingering smirk threatens to unravel. Then she's snaking her hand downward to boldly grab a handful of Jamie's backside and give it a squeeze. The action pulls a surprised, though not at all displeased, undignified squeak from Jamie that makes Dani giggle before she whispers her next words. "Why don't you slide on into the back seat and I'll show you what else I'm good at getting off."