"Damn!"

"Billy?"

"Mac? Did I wake you?" Billy came out of the kitchen and looked guiltily up at the Italian immortal where he was standing on the stairs.

Machiavelli came the rest of the way down the stairs. "No. I got up to go to the bathroom and on my way back I saw your door open. What are you doing?" He padded across the living room, being careful to not trip over the husky, who was sprawled across the floor. The dog made a whimpering noise and started moving his paws. Niccolò petted him a couple of times and the whimpering stopped.

"I couldn't sleep," Billy said, shrugging. He pulled the Italian into the kitchen where a warm wash of light came over both of them. "Whenever I was upset as a kid, my mother would do some baking. I thought I'd try… but as you can see it did not go very well." He gestured to the stove. There were a couple of baking pans, with very flat disks stuck very firmly to them. Billy sucked on one of his fingers which looked like it had been burned.

Machiavelli looked at the pans. "Are they cakes?" he asked uncertainly.

Billy laughed. "Sort of," he admitted, "but not really. They're supposed to be whoopee pies but for some reason, they're sort of-"

"Flat," Machiavelli supplied.

"I don't know why they did that," Billy said, pulling a bowl of filling from the fridge. He began to fill the pies, pressing two pieces together. "Oh well, they seem to taste okay. I guess that's all that matters."

"I like them," Machiavelli told him, stuffing a rather large whoopee pie in his mouth.

Billy stopped filling the treats for a moment to grin at the Italian. "That's not saying much, Mac. One thing I've learned this summer is that you really have a sweet tooth to rival my own."

"So why are you upset?" Niccolò asked curiously. He sat at the table and yawned. Outside it was still fairly dark out, but lighter blue rays were beginning to stain the edges of the sky. He waited patiently for Billy to answer.

Billy slid into the seat next to him. "Oh, I'm not really upset, myself. I just don't like transitioning to new things. That's why I like them to just happen, no thinking." He smiled happily, but there was tired tinge to the corners of his eyes. He took a bite from one of the pies. "Maybe that's why I stay away from people. They tie you down."

"You don't want that?"

Billy shrugged. "It's what I used to think I wanted. But recently I've been thinking otherwise." He looked over at the Italian. "You know, when I picked you up at the airport back when this all started, I was waiting for you and there was all these families. I…" He made a face. "I wondered what they felt like, having someone waiting for them. I think it might make it worth it, being tied down, if it was for the right person."

Machiavelli smiled. He tapped Billy's hand with his right pinky finger. "We always have our big talks late at night. Why do we do that?"

"I don't know. I don't normally talk this much about how I feel." He put his sweet down. "Well, I guess we should get some sleep. You coming up?"

"Mm, in a little bit. I don't think I'm ready quite yet."

"Alright, well I'll see you when the sun's up," Billy yawned. "Don't stay up too long."

"Okay." Machiavelli sat and listened to the sound of Billy's footfalls on the stairs. He could hear the floorboards creak as Billy settled back into his room. Around him, the cabin gurgled. There was a rush of water and the soft sounds of the sleeping animals in the other room. He thought about how lonely it was going to be when he had to go back to his empty townhouse in Paris. It wasn't something he wanted to think about, but still a very real point of time in the future. He sighed.

Getting up, he leaned over the sink to look up at the sky. Already the stars were winking out of existence. The moon lingered, but there was a touch of color on the horizon which beckoned the new day. He could feel his chest tighten, the stress of his numbered days weighing down on him. Scrubbing at his face, he decided that he'd better try to catch a few more hours of sleep before the day officially began. He snagged the tabby as he passed through the living room and brought her up with him.

~MB~

That afternoon found the two immortals making their way around the lake on one of the pathways that had been cut through the forest. Tall trees threw their branches over the path, coating the path in shade. To their right, the ground dipped down quite suddenly and descended into the water. Robins hopped along ahead of them.

"What are you going to miss most about the cabin when we leave?" Machiavelli asked bumping his shoulder against Billy's by accident. He stuck his hands in his pant pockets to have something to do with them.

Billy shrugged. He had to give it a moment's thought before he answered. "I don't know. I had a lot of fun this summer. I liked the swimming a lot," he said, waggling his eyebrows at the Italian. "It's only going to keep getting better."

Machiavelli nodded, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips. Billy always was looking forward; it was what he liked about the American immortal. "I liked when we watched the Shining the first night. Even if it did scare me."

"I knew it scared you!" Billy crowed. He wilted a little at the look on Machiavelli's face. "Ah, right, not the point. Anyways, I liked the whole summer." They came to a fork in the path and the American immortal came to a halt. He looked over at teenager. "Which way do you want to go? If we go to the right, we loop around the lake again. Otherwise, we can head back to the cabin."

"Let's go around again," Machiavelli said. "We can pack afterwards."

The outlaw wandered over to the right. He could hear the high fluting of a thrush somewhere in the area. "You know what I was thinking we could do next week?" He sounded excited. Machiavelli looked at him questioningly. "There's a flying circus place in Minnesota where you can rent an aerobatic plane. We should do that." He nodded eagerly to the Italian's disbelieving look.

"An aerobatic plane? Those planes that do tricks?" But those are scary, he thought. "I guess we could," he said hesitantly. "But we're not going to be doing the flying are we?"

Billy shook his head and the gray eyed immortal felt better. "No, what usually happens is that they have a skilled driver in the back and then up to two passengers can sit in the seat in the front. I've done it a dozen or so times, it's a lot of fun." He touched Machiavelli's shoulder. "Safe, too."

The other immortal expelled some air with relief. "So are we stopping in Minnesota then? Before Philadelphia?"

"We're going to be going through a few states to get to Philly," Billy explained. "There's no reason why we can't make a few stops along the way."

"Which states are we going through?"

Billy scrunched his eyes up. He came to a halt as he seemed to tick off the states in his head. "Well, we've got almost all of Montana to get through, and then we're going through North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and then there's just Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, before we get to Pennsylvania."

"Oh, is that all," Machiavelli asked archly. "Are we going to be on the road for weeks?"

"No, we'll just be driving for most of the day for a couple of days. I looked it up on Google the other day. It takes 29 hours to get from here to Philly. We could technically get there in three days or so, but that wouldn't be much fun would it?" He looked over at Machiavelli as if to gauge his reaction. The Italian shook his head, thinking about how he got headaches every time he was in the car for long periods of time. "Yeah, so I thought we could break it up a bit. Oh, and I've got another house up in Thief River Falls, that's in Minnesota. We can stop there."

Machiavelli nodded. "Whatever it takes to not have to be in the car all day, every day."

"Oh yeah, you get car sick," Billy remembered. "See, I thought it was just Black Hawk's driving that had you ill the first few times. Okay, we'll definitely draw it out over a week. Plenty of stops."

"Do you have an extra bathing suit?" Machiavelli asked suddenly as they rounded another bend in the path. Billy looked a little thrown off, but he nodded. "I wanted to go swimming again before we leave. None of my suits are going to fit though."

"Sure, you can borrow one of mine. But the water might be pretty cold by now, it is September," Billy cautioned.

"Does that mean that you're not going to come with me?"

"Oh, no, I'll follow you in. I just might not stay long." Billy threw an arm around his shoulders. "It'll be fun. Who knows when we can go swimming again?"