AN: I'm updating again now because…Well, because I want to. And because I'm not feeling well, and perhaps the comments I get will make me feel better. (Yes, that was a not so thinly veiled hint :D) Villana, I'm glad the whole 'out of control' aspect of what they're doing comes across. I'm not sure she loves him exactly, but she certainly does have stronger feelings for him than he does for her. Or at least, it seems that way, doesn't it:D Now, dear readers, of course they can't figure things out too soon or there would stop being a wild ride of a story to write, wouldn't there. You gotta remember that this is two years before the movie, so both of them are fairly young. And both of them are the most stubborn person most of their friends know so that's gonna cause problems. And neither of them is a 'mushy' sort of person, and that means they don't deal with their feelings all that well. Anyway, keep reading and I'll keep writing you guys. Ya'll rock! Always, T. And messed up my upload again and I'm not fighting with the formatting for the next hour, so the spacing is very odd. Sorry.
The Funeral of a Good Girl
By – TempestRaces
Chapter Twenty Four – Of Romantic Languages and Honeyed Words
"Vince not comin'?" Leon asked. He decided that in this case it would obviously be best to pretend he hadn't heard a thing, right along with her.
"Naw. He's not feelin' good," she lied.
"He's just too lazy to get up this early," Jesse grumbled, catching onto the same thing as Leon had, that it was a subject better left alone.
"That too," Tempest agreed, still with a smile pinned to her face. "I'm hungry! Let's go."
"You got no arguments here," Leon said, grinning. "I could eat a horse."
"Maybe you could stick to a pig, seeing as how that's where bacon and ham and sausage come from."
"Ok Gorgeous, I could eat a pig."
"Ok, let's go find somewhere that'll grill you one up."
"I know where we gotta go," Jesse spoke up and named his favourite grease ball diner.
"Yeah, true that!" Leon responded. "They have the best pancakes there."
"Pancakes?" Tempest asked, as her interest in this establishment rose.
"Yeah, pancakes. The best fuckin' pancakes you ever had. Ever."
"Why are we still standing in the house then? Let's get a move on," she shoved Leon and Jesse toward the stairs.
"Well, someone musta done somethin' to work up one hell of an appetite last night," Leon teased.
"Shut up," Tempest and Jesse retorted at the same time.
"Sides, don't hate on me 'cause I got lucky and you didn't," Tempest said as she wrapped an arm around Leon's neck.
"Who says I didn't?"
"Ok, well, I guess you might have. But if you did, it looks like she went home early. So unless you kept her up for two hours, you didn't get as lucky as I did."
"T, that totally counts as an over share."
"Yeah cuz, I didn't need the info, or the mental picture."
"I'm not the one who brought up the source of my appetite."
"Just shut up and get outta this house," Leon said, breaking her hold on his neck and shoving her toward the stairs.
She tripped over the first one, landing on her knee and palms. "Jesus H. Christ!" she roared. "That fuckin' hurt." She rubbed her wrist.
"Shit! I'm sorry!" Leon rushed over to where she had sat down on the stairs. "I didn't think you'd trip."
"I didn't think I'd trip either, or I wouldn't have," she teased. She didn't want Leon to feel bad about things, or think it was his fault she'd fallen.
"You ok?" He took hold of the arm she was rubbing and felt around her wrist. "Does that hurt?"
"A little. I'm fine, I swear."
He twisted her wrist another way. "What about that?"
"A little bit." She rolled her eyes. "I'm really ok Leon. We'll just take someone else's car so I can give the arm a break and I'll be fine by supper, ok? Shit, it isn't like I never hurt myself before. You see these scarred up knuckles?"
"I don't care what you do to yourself Gorgeous, but I tripped you this time."
"No, you pushed me and then I tripped over my own feet. I'm klutzy to begin with."
"No you ain't," Jesse broke in.
Tempest glared back at him. "Yes, I am," she said, careful to accent yes, hoping Jesse would take the hint.
"No you're not."
"Jesse! I should be deaf from all the inner ear shit I went through as a kid. My balance ain't the best. I'm lucky I can hear."
"If you're that sure you're gonna live, let's get a move on!" Leon helped her up off her seat on the stairs. "I don't wanna miss breakfast!" He really didn't want to stick around long enough for Vince to get his temper under control enough to leave his room, take one look at 'Trouble' and lose it again, either.
"Alright already. You'd think you didn't just almost cripple me on the stairs."
"You said you was ok."
"And I am, but damn! Don't push me again. What part of my klutzy nature didn't you pick up the first time you almost pushed me up the stairs?" She started up the stairs. "Whose ride are we takin'?"
"Well, I wouldn't be caught dead in the Jetta, so your options are Skyline or Skyline."
"Hey!" Jesse said. "There's nothing wrong with the Jetta." He was quick to defend his car's honour.
"Other than the whole couldn't get out of its own way thing it's got goin' on," Tempest teased as she pushed out the back door. "But we can take my car, if one of you wants to drive."
"I'll do it!" Jesse volunteered. "I'll drive it."
"Ok, ok, you can drive. Don't wet yourself already," she laughed, tossing him the keys.
He caught them and rushed the older of the two Skylines, opening the driver's door and sliding onto the driver's seat. Leon got in the back and Tempest took shotgun. Once they were under way Tempest turned the radio on. The CD player kicked in with 'Black Dog' by Led Zeppelin.
"No shit. You like Zeppelin?" Leon asked.
"Yeah. I like all kinds of music. Pretty much all I don't do is classical. And opera."
"Ok, I take back what I said about you being safe from my advances. Marry me," Leon teased. "You drive the perfect car, have the perfect taste in music. I think you're the woman for me. How 'bout it, Gorgeous? Vegas ain't that far a drive."
"Aw, maybe next year Leo. I think Dom'd be pissy we missed races on the same day that he got me as a permanent fixture in his life."
"Sure would about sum up as the worst day of his year," Jesse agreed with a laugh. "You can't take Dom not liking you too personal. Dom rarely likes anyone."
"Oh, on the contrary. I'm not taking it personal, unless you count all the personal pleasure I'm taking in enforcing his opinion of me." She grinned slyly. "Pushing him to new heights of anger amuses me to no end."
"I'm glad you're only here two weeks then. If you were around longer one of you would end up dead. And by times I have a hard time thinking I'd be able to bet on Dom being the one still left standing when the smoke cleared." Leon grinned.
"I guess it would depend on long or short range combat. I would be willing to bet I'd win long range, but he could likely take me in hand to hand." She smirked.
"I don't know what we'd have done without Dom," Jesse mused, turning serious. "We had no where else to go."
"How'd you two meet up, anyway?" Tempest asked, finally letting her curiosity get the better of her.
"I was gassing up the Jetta at a Chevron in New Mexico on the night I decided to run away from home, and Leon was gassing up the Skyline at the same one. We started to talk cars, and talked for hours off to the side of the parking lot. It turned out we both had no where to go, and didn't want to find a place anywhere near Santa Fe either. So we decided to take off together for Los Angeles. We both figured that there would be lots of opportunities for us here. We met Dom at races shortly after we got into town, and the rest is history."
"He's kinda like a Chihuahua puppy," Leon started with a smirk. "Cute but otherwise useless and helpless. Great for attracting chicks and not much else."
"Except for tunin' that fussy car of yours to the point where you beat Dom your first race out and secured us a place to live."
"Ok, except for pickin' up chicks and tuning engines. Otherwise, you're useful as a bag a'hammers, and not half as smart."
"Shut up," Jesse said, but laughed as he said it.
"It almost makes me jealous!" Tempest admitted. "We use to be close like that, and we still mostly are, but not like we use to be."
"We use to be six, T. 'Sides, all you have to do to fix it is move down here. Be just you'n me again."
"Hey!"
"And Leon, of course," Jesse conceded.
"Of course," Tempest added with a smile. "But you'd have to worry. Leon's interest isn't totally plutonic. He told me so this morning."
"Hey! My exact words were if you weren't Jesse's cousin, you'd be in trouble showin' up in my room alone and jumping on top of me."
"Is that why you screamed?" Jesse asked.
"Yeah, she landed right on my gut from being fully airborne. And I didn't scream, I roared. Like a man."
"But, then you asked me to marry you 'cause I like Zeppelin, 'member?"
"But you turned me down. 'Bout broke my heart."
"The same way it'd break mine when my husband of two days got his neck snapped by his former best friend?"
"Just like that, yeah." Leon grinned. "We could always run away, back to Canada. He'd never find us."
"You'd have to give up the Skyline over me Leo. She's too new to be legal in Canada."
"Ok, deal's off. Sorry Gorgeous, I've known my car longer than you."
"I can do things for you that a Skyline can't," she said, turning in her seat to face Leon and cocking a brow his way.
"What part of you're like a sister to me is so hard for you, and you," Jesse said, turning to Leon after he'd addressed Tempest, "to understand? Damn, I don't want to think of you and any guy in that way. You're still six in my mind. Well, a six year old who can drink and go to raves with me, but in a guy/girl way, you're too young for those kinds of activities."
"I guess you got right lucky that it's my room that shares a wall with the Coyote then," Leon smirked.
Jesse groaned as Tempest fought a blush and didn't quite win. "Yeah, well I had to listen to both of you doin' those things on Wednesday night, so we're even."
"You were asleep!" Leon sputtered.
"Not right away I wasn't. And I woke up several times to go be sick. And not just because I had too much to drink, I might add. It's unnerving to hear someone you know makin' those noises."
"Tell me about it," Leon fervently agreed.
"Well, that's one worry you won't have on this front anymore," she reminded. "C'est fini."
"What does that mean?" Jesse asked.
"It's finished, in French."
"You know French?" Leon asked. "I retract my retraction. Marry me. And then talk French to me."
"I don't speak French. Well, not really. I learned it all through school, but not enough, or well enough to have conversations. I just know the odd phrase."
"I see. But you could pretty much shit me, and just string together all the French words you know and I'd never know you weren't talkin' French to me. Not like I know a word of it."
"J'aim la anana."
"What did you say?"
"I think I said I love the pineapple, but I could be wrong."
Jesse and Leon burst out laughing as they pulled up to the diner. They got a booth and sat down. Tempest slid into one side, assuming Jesse would either slide in with her, or share with Leon on the other side. She was surprised when Leon slid in beside her and left Jesse to hold down the other side on his own. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "So, any further thought given on the commute to Vegas yet, Gorgeous?"
"I thought you decided your car was more important to you than a young marriage to me, and I decided I liked you better alive than beaten to a pulp."
"Then I found out you could talk foreign languages and I started to rethink my position."
"Desidero versare il miele sul vostro corpo e leccarlo fuori," she crooned breathlessly, looking up at Leon and forcing a look of besottedness to her face.
"Do I want to know what you just said? And that sure didn't sound like French."
"It was Italian, and no, you don't want to know what I said. At the very least, Jesse really doesn't want to know what I said."
"She said she wants to pour honey on your body and lick it off," a dark man with an evil smirk on his face told them from the booth behind where they were sitting.
"Thanks mister," she growled. "In a city this big there had to be a dude that speaks Italian right there."
Leon laughed for a moment. When he had himself under control he answered. "That could be arranged later, if you're sure it's what you want," he said, leering down at Tempest playfully. "I mean, who would I be to prevent you from doing something you really wanna do? I'll try my hardest to let you do things to my person with honey. It'll be a real hardship, but I'll tough it out. It's all just part of helping you have the best vacation possible."
"You'd have to tough out the beating you'd get after the fact if you-know-who caught wind of it."
"You're gonna really hurt my pride if you keep on sayin' I couldn't hold my own in this fight that's gonna happen when we get married, T. I might not be as big as him, but I can keep up."
She laughed at Leon's assurance and picked up a menu. As she was looking it over, an idea popped into her head. A crazy, loony, but ultimately wicked idea for a practical joke. "Isn't Vegas only like four hours from here? At the speed limit?"