The car ride to the Ashcroft house wasn't as long as Lauren had thought, which was good.
It was good because those few minutes in the car were the longest she and Karma had been around each other since this whole… whatever this was… had started, without being in a closet and without touching each other. Specifically, without kissing each other. Lauren wanted to see how long they could last and she thought the drive was a good test.
After all, if they couldn't be in each other's presence without locking lips, how would this ever be anything more than closet rendezvous and dirty texts?
And yes, Lauren had officially given up any effort at all to pretend that there wasn't at least some desire, on her part, for this to be something… else. She was stubborn and prideful and hated giving in on anything. But she wasn't stupid. And after the day they'd had, with the 'stay' kiss and the 'I'm not breaking up with you and you better be staying with me' text, she'd have to be stupid to think there wasn't something more than kissing going on here.
She had no fucking idea what that was, but let's cross one bridge at a time, right?
So, it was good that the ride wasn't as long as Lauren had thought because she was pretty sure if it was even one minute longer, she would have lost her mind.
Lauren's car was small. Her father subscribed to some silly rule that the car should mirror the person. "You're still a little one, Show Pony," he'd said to her when he took her car shopping and refused to look at anything bigger than a VW Bug. "No sense getting more car than you can handle."
Bruce had four accidents in the two years before they moved to Austin. Lauren wasn't so sure it was her 'handling' he should have been so worried about.
All that aside, she'd ended up with a small (a 'little one') car and, normally, that wasn't an issue for her. It got her from Point A to Point B and, on the few occasions when she had to give Amy a ride, the taller girl just has to slide the seat back. No big deal.
Karma, on the other hand? That was a big deal. A very big deal, Lauren discovered quickly.
Unlike Amy, who seemed to sink into the seat and disappear into the upholstery, Karma was, for lack of a better way of putting it, everywhere. Her flowery skirt kept finding its way onto the gear shift. Her perfume (which Lauren had totally not bought a bottle of at the store the other day, not even a small bottle that she could easily hide but would be handy if she, you know, needed it) seemed to replace all the air in the car, no matter how high Lauren ran the AC.
And her arm…
Fuck all, her arm.
There was only one arm rest between the two seats and while Lauren didn't normally use it (she was driving after all) she did, sometimes, let her arm settle there when she took a hand off the wheel at traffic lights.
Apparently, Austin had decided the stretch of city streets between Hester and the Ashcroft house needed to be the single most traffic-lighted span in the whole fucking city!
Lauren was tense and growing more so by the minute. So when she hit the first traffic light and found herself third in line at a just-changed-to-red, behind a minivan and a Miata, she tried, as best she could, to relax. She leaned back in her seat and let her elbow drop onto the arm rest.
Where it, promptly, made direct contact with Karma's arm.
She'd heard, for years, from one after another in a parade of Bruce's girlfriends / wives / can't-we-get-this-one-out-of-heres about electricity. Apparently, her father's touch was (ugh) electric. Lauren had never understood what in the frilly hell that meant.
Until that moment.
It wasn't much like a shock. It wasn't like Karma had rubbed her bare feet back and forth over the floor mat until she was a walking power station. But it still sent a shiver up Lauren's spine and she snatched her elbow back so fast she inadvertently slammed her hand into the wheel, honking her horn at the Miata and causing her to curse out loud.
"Motherfucker!"
(Of all the curses, Lauren had to admit, that was her favorite.)
"You OK?" Karma asked. She leaned forward, sending another wave of perfume washing over Lauren. The driver of the Miata stuck his hand out the window to flip them off and Karma (Karma!) returned the gesture. "Asshole," she muttered. "Is your hand OK?"
She reached over and took Lauren's hand in hers and if the shock to her elbow had been enough to send shivers up her spine, Lauren was pretty sure the feeling of Karma holding her hand (in public!) (in broad daylight!) was enough to send her into some kind of cardiac arrest.
"I'm fine," she said, pulling her hand back and setting it on the wheel. Ten and two, just like Bruce had taught her. "Just banged it is all." Karma stared at her for a minute and Lauren finally lifted her hand from the wheel, wiggling all her fingers to prove her point.
Karma laughed and Lauren wondered when that had become a sound she wanted to hear more often and oh God, she was so incredibly screwed.
And, just to make sure that point was irretrievably made, Lauren's subconscious kicked in and, instead of putting her hand back at 'two' she somehow found herself settling it down on Karma's knee. And not just her knee. No. The bare skin of her knee, just under the edge of the flowery skirt and just what in the hell had possessed her to make her think that was a good idea?
Even if it did feel good. Really good. Like, she never imagined someone could have skin that soft and even with the AC blowing on high, Karma was still so warm good.
Fuck. Just… fuck.
Lauren meant to pull her hand away, really she did. But that became somewhat more difficult (like it would have ever been easy) when Karma covered her hand with one of her own and Lauren was suddenly very glad they seemed to be at the longest red light in recorded history.
"I think it's broken," Karma said. "The light, I mean. Not your hand."
Lauren didn't even consider uttering a sarcastic 'duh' or 'really?' or anything like that.
So screwed.
"And," Karma said, as she peered through the windshield. "I'm pretty sure that's Mrs. Powers from down the street in the van. She's about a hundred and twelve, should have lost her license last century and will not move until that light turns green."
So, in other words, they were stuck. Lauren could think of worse things to be.
The silence settled back in as they waited and Lauren was afraid to break it. That's how this whole thing seemed to work, like they were in a bubble (usually shaped like a janitor's closet) and every movement, every word seemed to be a risk. She wasn't sure what would break the bubble or what might throw them right out of it and right back into the Amy-Liam-Reagan-Shane real world neither of them seemed to like much anymore.
Hell, Lauren thought, even her thoughts were in on it, since every one of them lately (conscious and unconscious) seemed to be focused on finding new ways for Karma to give her the tingles and, really? Did she really just think 'the tingles'?
So fucking screwed.
Eventually, as the light stayed and stayed and stayed red (and Lauren was pretty sure Karma was right about it being broken, but the pause meant she didn't have to move her hand so she wasn't exactly complaining) it was Karma who broke the silence.
"Shane knows."
Lauren noticed (how could she not?) the way Karma gripped her hand a little tighter as she said it, like she was afraid that maybe this was going to be it. This was the sharp pointy thing that burst their bubble.
"I know," Lauren said and she slid her hand out from under Karma's and heard the tiny sharp inhale from the redhead. And then she heard the relieved (yes, relieved) exhale as she plucked Karma's hand from her knee and took it in hers, clasped together in her own lap.
Lauren knew all too well that Shane was on to them. She told Karma how he had cornered her outside her last class and dragged her into a closet (Hester had way too many closets) and demanded answers.
"Tell me everything," he'd said. "Or I'll out the two of you to the entire school."
Shane? Outing someone? That would never…. yeah. Lauren spilled the beans in a hurry.
"What did you say?" Karma asked.
Lauren watched as the Miata driver got out of his car and walked up to the minivan's side window.
"I told him that it was none of his business," Lauren said. She was stubborn, after all. "And then when he started texting Penelope, I fessed up."
Karma nodded even though they both knew that Lauren really hadn't answered her question as 'fessed up' was about as vague as could be.
"Oh," Karma said as she shifted slightly in her seat. "That was probably… smart."
Lauren heard a rumble behind them and glanced in her rear view. The line of cars was getting deeper.
"I told him we were…" Lauren sighed as she remembered the way she had struggled to find the right words for Shane and the pleasure he took in watching her squirm. "I told him we were seeing each other," she said. "You know… romantically or whatever."
Lauren waited for another little gasp or for Karma to pull away or for, well, something. She'd just, basically, defined their relationship (which hadn't been a relationship five minutes ago) to Shane, of all people, and she was sure, so absolutely sure this was it.
This was the sharp pointy thing.
And she was right, if by sharp pointy thing she meant Karma leaning across the seat, cupping her face with one hand and turning her so she could look right in her eyes and then kiss her.
Kiss her.
It was hard and deep and tongue filled and Karma pushed Lauren back, almost pinning her against the door, practically climbing into the driver's seat with her, her hand sliding up under the back of Lauren's shirt, fingernails scraping against skin.
This was new.
Lauren kinda liked it.
(More than kinda)
But then there was that rumble again and a bunch of loud voices yelling from the row of cars behind them. And one very distinctive "What the hell are you doing?" that made them both pull apart.
Karma's eyes grew wide and Lauren was pretty sure her's looked the same. It couldn't be! It just couldn't.
Lauren tipped her head slightly, peering over her shoulder and out the window. She only needed to see a flicker of purple and a flash of a leather jacket. That was all it took.
"Shit," she muttered.
"Fuck," Karma added.
"Reagan," they said at the same time.
Hello sharp pointy thing.