February 13, 2010

Alex Russo looked at Dean Moriarty in disbelief. "This?" she asked, holding her right hand up. "This is your idea of a Valentine's Day present? Really?"

"Hey - that's good work there." Dean nodded toward her hand, which was holding a pair of bookends. "I got an A for those."

"Yeeeaaaah…." Alex looked at them again. They were pretty, sure - polished, stained a dark brown, lacquered. But…. "I thought you were going to stop giving me stuff you made in shop as presents?"

"That's not all there is, though," Dean said then, ignoring the question. He turned his head, said, "Estevez. Give Russo her other presents."

One of Dean's crew stepped forward, holding out a rectangular candy box about as big as Alex's hands put together, and a small bouquet. Not of roses, but of mixed wildflowers, several of them already wilting badly. Alex looked at it with mild distaste, then gave Estevez an obviously faked smile. "Thanks," she said, without taking them, then took Dean by the arm and started to pull him along.

He didn't move, just looked at her hand, then at her, frowning in confusion. Alex sighed. "Can we talk over here for a minute?"

"Sure. Over here, people," he said, jerking his head as he began to walk. The crew nodded as a group and began to follow, and Alex rolled her eyes. "Just us. You and me."

"Oh, sure." Dean held up a hand, said, "Guys, hang back." More nods answered, and the crew withdrew a bit.

Why the heck did he bring them in the first place? When Dean asked me out for ice cream, I didn't think he'd be bringing the whole crew. Aloud, she said, "Really, Dean? This is your idea of a Valentine's date?"

Dean lowered his head, took Alex's hands. She smiled a little at that. "Come on, Russo. You know I've gotta be outta town tomorrow. An' with all the money I've been puttin' into the car, I didn't have much money to get you anything." He brought a hand up, gave Alex's chin a little push with his thumb and forefinger as he smiled at her. "You know I'd get you somethin' better if I could."

"Yeah, well…." Alex took a step back and folder her arms, tilted her head toward the crew. "What about them?"

Dean frowned. "What about them?"

Rolling her eyes, Alex said, "Why did you have to bring them? I wanted to spend time with you, not with the whole gang. And really - what was that with the candy and flowers?" She unfolded her arms to throw her hands up in the air, saying, "You couldn't hand them to my yourself? You've got to have someone else do it?"

"Eyyy… don't be like that." Dean gave her a hurt look. "I wanted to spend some time with the guys too, before I left town. And there's only so many hours in the day, you know?"

"And you can't reserve a few of them for just me? For Valentine's Day?" Alex shook her head, then held her hands up, palm out. "You know what? Date's over. I'll see you later."

She walked away then, ignoring Dean's call of "Russo!" He called again, saying "You forgot your flowers and candy!" then started after her, but Alex ducked around a corner, and by the time Dean got there, she'd vanished.

Three blocks away, Alex was fuming, walking quickly with her upper lip pulled up in a snarl. Dean was a nice enough guy, and cute, and funny sometimes - but he didn't seem to have a romantic bone in his body. You'd think his guys would help him out, maybe say something to let him know that giving bookends to his famous-for-hating-books girlfriend might not be the best idea.

And if he was set on giving her something this lame, he could have at least given her some kind of stupidly romantic line to go with it. "They're a matched set, just like us," say. Or maybe, "They support things, like I always want to support you." That would've at least made it a little better.

Well, after this performance, Dean wasn't going to get off easily. Not that there's any getting off happening anyway. That was another thing - it'd been her idea to take things slow, sure, and at first she'd thought that Dean was being really nice and going along with it - but now they'd been dating off and on for well over a year, and he still hadn't made any moves. At least Riley kept trying to grope my boobs. Dean's supposed to be a bit of a player - he had that whole Dean's corner thing. Why hasn't he made any moves? She frowned deeply, wondering, Does he have some other girl on the side or something? He'd better not -

Alex's phone made a two-tone ding, and she pulled it out, looked at it.

Sry u didn't like prsents. still on 4 nxt sat?

Alex stared at the message for a moment, then shook her head. How stupid could he be? Did Dean really think now was a good time to ask her about their date next weekend? Quickly, she texted back a simple 'No'. A moment later, her phone started buzzing again, this time with Dean calling. She stuck it back into her purse.

No. Not talking to you right now. Not until I'm in a better mood. Turning the corner, Alex saw the Sub Station ahead, and then she grinned. And I know just how to get into a better mood...

"Hey there." Alex let the door swing closed behind her, set her purse down, then moved to the couch, leaned across the back of it, over Justin's shoulder, and pointed to the right. "You see that thing over there?"

"What?" Justin turned to look, and Alex grabbed the remote from his lap, then jumped away as she changed the channel.

Justin simply rolled his eyes, then turned and looked at Alex. The two of them simply stared at each other for a few seconds, until Alex made a frustrated growl. "Oh, it's no fun if you don't fight me for it!"

She raised her hand to throw the remote at him, but Justin grinned, then suddenly jumped over the back of the couch and grabbed for it, prompting a squeal from Alex as she jumped away. Grinning, he went down into a low stance, arms out, then shifted side-to-side. Alex faked toward the stairs, but Justin was ready for that: he started to follow, then turned as she did and lunged toward her, prompting another squeal as she jumped toward the kitchen, then ran around the other side of the kitchen island.

"You know I'm faster than you," Justin said, again dropping down into his prepared stance.

"Yeah? Well..." Alex took off running, as fast as she could, managed to get to the couch and throw herself onto it, yelling, "Base!" as she did.

Then Justin was on top of her, putting one arm under her to grab her shoulder and keep her from getting away again. "Can't declare a base once we've started," he said chidingly.

"Ahh!" Alex put the remote under her, holding on tightly with her right hand. Justin's right went under her as well, seeking for it, and she thrashed, trying to get out from under him, but he was bigger, stronger, and heavier, and Alex was getting nowhere.

So she did what any girl in her position would. Twisting, she reached with her left arm, got it against Justin's side, and began to tickle. Immediately, he started to squirm - and then he moved his arms, began to tickle her sides in return. "Hey, hey, ah!" Alex wriggled, and both of them fell off the couch onto the floor.

As they slipped off, Justin immediately tried to roll, bringing them so he landed on the bottom, not wanting to hurt Alex. She repaid him by turning over and scrambling up onto him. She mounted his stomach, pinning one arm to his side with her leg, reaching to tickle that side. Justin tried to curl that way, protecting that side, and Alex went for his armpit, grinned as she put her fingers there, knowing she had Justin now.

Sure enough, in moments he was laughing and squirming under her, and Alex was taunting him, saying, "Got you now! Think you can pin me, huh?" while beside them, the remote lay on the couch, forgotten.

Justin tried to bring his arms up to push Alex's away, but he was laughing too hard now, and she could move down to his sides, which were almost as ticklish. Gritting his teeth, Justin did his best to stop laughing, then grabbed onto Alex's sides and began to tickle her in return. His effort was rewarded as she yelped and tried to pull back.

She started to stand up off of him, and Justin moved quickly, grabbing Alex as she tried to turn around to get away from him. "Who's got who?" he asked, wrapping his left arm around her waist, sliding his other hand under the hem of her shirt to begin tickling her belly.

"Nooo!" Alex called out, squirming, but it was a happy sound, and she started laughing almost immediately. "No fair!" she got out after a second, "No tickling under clothes!"

"All's fair in love and war," Justin responded, grinning again now that he had the advantage. Looking for a way out of his grip, Alex tried dropping down, putting her arms up.

She expected this tactic to get her free, but hadn't thought about the fact that the last time she'd tried it, she'd been two years younger, and not quite so… developed. Compounding things, the shoes she'd worn on her date had slick soles, and her feet slid forward suddenly as she tried to drop.

Alex also hadn't thought about where Justin's hand was, and the result was that her shirt was suddenly pulled up, exposing her bra, and Justin found his arm against his sister's breasts, his left hand cupping her on the right side. He blushed immediately, saying, "I -" and starting to let go.

"Don't drop me!" Alex cried out then, putting her arms over Justin's as she tried to get her feet back under her. Justin blinked, then moved his right arm down, looking for something he could grab onto to pull her up. His hand found purchase, and he pulled up, got Alex onto her feet.

"Are you okay?" he asked then, not letting go yet.

Alex nodded. "Yeah," she said after a moment, and then she blushed as well, said, "Umm... you can let go now." It was only then that Justin realized where his hand had found purchase, and he let go of his sister's torso and her inner thigh at the same time, blushing an even deeper red than before.

Quickly, Alex pulled her shirt back down - and then she turned to Justin, grinned, and said, "Well, looks like I won that one."

"You - wait, what?" Justin shook his head, said, "I had you there, and you know it!"

With a twinkle in her eye, Alex said, "Maybe you did, maybe you didn't. But there's something you missed."

Crossing his arms, Justin said, "Well, maybe I missed something... or maybe you missed something." His grin grew a little, and he said, "Maybe you should go up to your room and check."

"My room? My - what did you do!" Alex took a step forward, glaring at her brother, but he just kept grinning and shook his head.

"You'll have to see. You might want to hurry, though."

They watched each other for three ticks of the wall clock, Justin's grey-green eyes meeting Alex's brown, and then Alex took off up the stairs, running for her room.