A/N: Been a while. I decided to post this. Hope you all get some light from it.
Disclaimer: I don't own CHUCK or its characters. And I'm not making any money from this story.
"Know what I like about fruit?"
Chuck blinked his eyes open from where he'd lounged back on the balcony chair, the sun's rays starting to drift back behind more clouds. "Sugar?"
Sarah giggled. "That's a good answer, but no."
They'd wiped down the chairs once the downpour stopped after about five minutes, and they'd brought the fruit out onto the balcony to "sample the merchandise", as Chuck had labeled it.
The sun dried off most everything over the last hour since they began eating, but now the clouds were returning, which meant more rain, and probably soon. But he wasn't budging until he felt that first big drop slap against his forehead.
"Okay, if not sugar, then what?"
"There are so many different kinds of fruit, and they've got all sorts of different flavors, but then each different fruit has a different kind of vitamin or some other nutrients. Some of them even have fat, you know? They've got, like, fiber and protein and all that. And then others don't have fiber or protein."
Chuck nodded, shutting his eyes again. "Hm. Yeah. That's cool. Vegetables, too."
"Um, we're not talking about vegetables."
He cracked up and held a hand out towards her. "I'm so sorry, you're right. This is a fruit conversation, not a vegetable conversation." He laughed harder when she popped a piece of melon into his fingers. He opened his eyes and looked down at it. "What the heck?"
"Oh, thought you were doing that because you wanted fruit." She grinned with her tongue between her teeth, lolling her head to the side to peer at him.
She looked so supremely relaxed in just her bathing suit and the wrap around her hips. Almost as relaxed as he felt.
And he found himself grinning like an idiot for what had to be the thousandth time since he first got to Hawaii, particularly since he stepped onto that boat.
"What's that look about?" she asked dubiously as he popped the fruit into his mouth. She'd given it to him, after all, so he might as well eat it.
"Don't think I've ever relaxed this hard for this long ever in my life. Just…sitting around eating fruit, yeah, but I mean, this whole trip. I needed it so bad, I didn't realize it until my vacation started. You know what I mean? When I realized I didn't hafta glare at a computer screen working out codes, sit in meeting after meeting after meeting trying to jump through the bureaucratic hoops to keep my company in the green when all I wanna do is pump out video games and worry about the rest of the shit later. I swear, before this trip, at night, I'd shut my eyes to sleep and I'd either see numbers on my eyelids, or I'd see a lot of red fuggin' tape."
"Jesus. How'd you even deal with that for so many years?"
"It was just…what I had to do, I guess. There was no other way to get my company off the ground, start making a profit, start hiring people to help, start expanding, giving good wages and benefits. Getting BarTech to a place where I could afford to treat my employees how they deserve to be treated by their employer… I had to work nonstop for multiple years in a row. And I forgot how to relax."
"You seem to be relaxing okay now," she teased.
"Oh, you have helped with that so much. If I hadn't met you, I'd probably be running around in circles trying to do all the touristy stuff and I'd probably run myself ragged with that, too."
She made a face. "If you hadn't met me, some other woman on this island would've gotten her eyes on you and she would've swept in just like I did." Smirking, she tossed some fruit between her lips and chewed slowly. "But I got to you first. Sucks to be her."
He threw his head back with a laugh. "I'm sure she found some debonair tourist with razor sharp wit and nice swoopy hair and GQ model looks. And a six pack you can use as a washboard." All she had to do was glare and point at him with a rigid finger and he shrunk a bit. "I know, you're right. You're right. I'm doing the thing again."
"I'll keep pointing it out, too. Do I need to go out and get one of those squirt bottles? Give you a little spritz to the face every time you dress yourself down…" She mimicked pulling the trigger on the spray bottle, making an adorably bad "fftttt ffftttt" sound.
He giggled. "With how humid it is, that wouldn't exactly be a deterrent."
"Ugh." She wrinkled up her pretty face. "Good point. If there was one thing I'd pick about Hawaii that kind of sucks, it's how the air feels thick like soup sometimes. But it isn't that big of a deal when I can just walk down the street and go into the ocean. The ocean is always good to me."
"Not me." He pressed his lips together and made a sound of regret. "I'd like to take that back. It was way too negative and pessimistic for this moment. Will you let me take that back, please?"
"Take what back?" she asked helpfully.
Chuck felt himself inadvertently giving her a dreamy look. "Oh, I like you a whole lot."
She seemed to blush almost, ducking her head. "It's a good thing. Otherwise I would've had to pay for all of that fruit. My job isn't as cushy as yours."
He laughed and shook his head. "You're like a one liner machine right now. Is it the sugar from the fruit?"
"Probably," she cackled, and then she pushed up to her feet and stretched, pressing her hands to the small of her back and arching. "Can I say something crass real quick? Is that okay? I won't shock you, will I?"
"You might shock me, but I think I can handle being a little shocked. Lay it on me." He lifted up his hands and waved them towards himself. "C'mon. I'm ready."
Sarah turned to face him and winced leaning down a bit to massage her thighs. "My muscles are absolutely aching right now. I think it took time for everything I did last night to catch up to me. But God, my limbs. Ouch." She rolled her shoulders. He gave her a confused look, not sure why—and then she threw him a Really?! look and he figured it out, his eyes going wide. Still, she felt the need to clarify. "All of that sex we had on the boat. First it was that tiny cot—"
"Wait, I thought the cot wasn't the problem, me being too tall was the problem—"
"And then the very cramped shower."
"That part was all you, thanks very much."
"You're welcome," she said, pursing her lips. That made him snort. Her sense of humor truly just took him out sometimes. It crept up on him, subtle and cheeky, genuinely funny. "But that's what I mean; that's why I'm the one with the old lady aches and pains right now. I was doing all the work."
"That is not what I meant, how dare you!" He leapt up to lunge for her and she yelped, dodging him, cracking up. "I meant you were the one who started it in the shower, you absolute nymph."
She doubled over with laughter, still half-heartedly trying to bat away his attempt to grab her. "Did you just call me a nymph? Have I foisted too much Shakespeare on you? Are you a scribe now?"
Chuck finally managed to get his arms around her then, pinning her own arms to her sides tightly, their noses mere centimeters away from touching. "I will never be a scribe. Unfortunately, I don't have that kind of talent."
"Don't you write…codes or whatever? Brainiac."
"Not the same thing at all," he chuckled. "Nor am I Shakesp—Uh oh. I felt it."
"What?" she asked, eyes wide.
There it went again. A big drop, this time it splashed right onto his nose and he squeaked.
"Oh God, I got the splash from that one."
"Fruit inside! Quick!"
They acted fast, gathering up the fruit they still hadn't been able to get through, pushing their way off of the balcony just in time for the downpour to come back.
"The way it happens so fast… Just whoosh all of a sudden, like…someone's dumping a bucket of water on us from up there. Madness," he said, ruffling his now damp hair. "Now my curls are gonna be nuts all day."
"Oh yeah? Is that any different from usual?"
His jaw fell open as she laughed again, trying to dodge him once more, but this time he was faster than she was—or maybe she was letting him get her on purpose. He grabbed both of her wrists in a tight grip and pulled her hands up between their bodies, leaning in close and smiling at her. "Yes, okay? My hair is regularly a mess."
"Hey, now. I never said your hair is a mess. Your hair happens to be one of the things that first attracted me to you. I saw you out on my boat and I was like, 'Wow, look at the way the wind is whipping at those beautiful curls of his—' No! Stop! Not tickling! I'll kill you!" she squealed as he let go of one wrist to start mercilessly tickling at her waist.
"Murder threats now? This took quite a turn."
She laughed, bumping him with her hip. But then they let go of each other and she stepped back again, reaching over to get another piece of fruit and popping it between her lips. She groaned a little and bent her knees, looking like she actually did have some legitimate aches going on.
Something occurred to him then and he straightened up. "Hm. Wait." He spun to look around the place, nibbling his lip thoughtfully. Where would they keep it if it was here? "Bathroom," he muttered.
"Uh. Cool…? You could just go. You don't really have to announce it to everybody."
He sent her a droll look as she grinned teasingly with her tongue between her teeth. "I said that 'cause I think I'll find it in the bathroom. If there is anything like that. Probably a long shot." He wandered over to the bathroom and knelt down, opening the cupboards and rummaging. "It isn't like…shampoo or whatever…" Bath bombs, shampoo, body wash, extra bar of soap, conditioner, hairdryer… Wait, was that it?
"What are you looking for?" Sarah asked, having followed him into the bathroom.
But he was already pulling it out from the back, turning the bottle to read the label. "How do you feel about lavender?"
"It's…nice."
"How do you feel about having it on your body?"
She arched her eyebrows and pulled her chin back. "Okay, now this just got a little kinky…"
Chuck sent her a look. "What is wrong with you? Do you mind having a lavender scent following you around because it's—" She blinked at him. "Jesus Christ, I found some lavender oil that you can use for a massage."
"Wow. I'm nice to the tourist and he wants me to give him a massage all of a sudden? That's not part of the tour, tourist boy." She snatched the oil from his hand and looked at it haughtily.
Chuck stood to his full height and leaned in close. She broke character, she seemed surprised enough by how quickly he'd gotten so close to her. Her eyes widened, her lips twitching. "First of all, I'm going to be giving you a massage. And secondly, you have a problem with giving me a massage, but not drinking champagne from my bellybutton?"
Sarah gasped. "Cheeky. But touché, mon beau. I'm not mad." Her wink did things to him and it was downright cruelty because she had to know that by now. "I'm just glad you have an innie, because an outie would've made it a lot messier."
"Oh my God!" he exclaimed, laughing, honestly a little scandalized, giving her a teasing and gentle push towards the bed. "Go get on my bed and wait for me. I have to prepare the oil."
"Those are the two most salacious sentences any man has ever said to me."
He snorted, eyeing the oil, seeing if there was any sort of expiration date or anything. Did massage oil have expiration dates? Were there maybe some instructions he could subtly read as Sarah took her bathing suit top off and—Wait, what?!
Chuck spun to do a double take as she sat on the edge of his bed, neatly folding her bathing suit top and setting it off to the side. Just…there…her torso bare, her breasts just…there…in front of his face.
"What?" she asked, shrugging. "You have massage oil, what'd you think, you'd rub it all over my shirt?"
"Oh, g-good… D'you think you could…try not to just…sit there with your—I mean, where I can…see…just for a…ahem…"
Sarah giggled. "You've seen all of this before, you goof." And then she stood to slide her drawstring cotton pants down to her feet and stepping out of them, folding them on top of the rest of her clothes. "I'll leave these on if it'll make you squeamish to have 'em off," she said, rolling her eyes as she pointed to her bikini bottoms—the literal last shred of clothing she was wearing. Then she crawled onto the bed, laughing at his expression and shaking her head.
"I'm cutting off your sugar intake for the rest of today," he muttered, making her laugh again.
A few minutes later, he approached the bed, having caught a glance at some semblance of instructions that he snuck on his phone since the bottle wasn't at all helpful. "So I don't…have anything to heat this oil with…um…"
She turned her head towards him, lying on her stomach with her head at the foot of the bed, her arms folded under her chin. "Excuse me? No perfectly temperatured oil? That's it. I'm going home."
"Haaaa," he sassed, making a quiet "pffft" sound and crawling onto the bed. He knelt next to her, then second guessed it, swinging his leg over onto her other side to straddle her backside, and then he second guessed that and swung his leg back over, kneeling at her side again. "There. Yes. Um." Nah, it was a little awkward going at this from the sideways angle. So he swung his leg back over to straddle her yet again.
"What the hell is going on back there?" she giggled.
"Nothing. Just deciding on…angle. But, uh, massage time. Massage comin' at ya. Because I know exaaaaaaaactly what I'm doing." He really didn't at all. Flying by the seat of his pants.
"Why am I suddenly dubious?" She looked at him more closely, raising one beautifully sculpted eyebrow.
He huffed. "Okay, fine. You got me. I've never actually given someone a massage before."
"What?" She chuckled. "Never?" He shook his head. "And now you're giving me one?"
"You seem like you need one. It's still pouring outside. I've got two hands and the oil stuff. I figured I could…handle it just fine. The Google didn't help that much, though."
"You did the Google to figure out how to give me a massage?"
"Well, I mean, I didn't type 'How to massage Sarah Walker' into the Google search bar." She laughed, her body bouncing against the mattress. "Annnnnnd now you're laughing at me. See? This is what honesty gets me, Sarah. I should've kept my trap shut and just done the thing and you'd never know."
"Unless you sucked at it. Then I'd be wondering why you sucked at it."
Chuck took it in the teasing spirit with which she clearly meant it. "Would you tell me if I sucked at it?"
"Probably not," she said, giggling. "Wouldn't want to hurt your feelings. But I'd still wonder. Silently."
"Wow. Great. Okay, now I'm feeling pressure." He rolled his shoulders. "Dang, I'm so tense, I might need the massage."
Sarah laughed harder. "No tenseness. No pressure. I'm just teasing you." She pulled one hand out from under her chin and squeezed his thigh reassuringly. "The fact that you've never done this before isn't that nuts."
"Because I've rarely gotten in good enough with a woman to be in a position where she'd want me to give her a massage? I mean, at least not since college. And you won't see me giving Morgan one. No fucking way."
She cackled at that. "I'm not commenting on who you have and haven't dated. My point is that you tried to Google how to give a massage for me and that's insanely sweet. It's like every single day I think you can't get better and you do."
Chuck blushed, and for a moment, he had the insane thought that if you were to collect every single time Sarah had made him blush in the last few weeks and monetized it, he'd be the richest man in the world. He'd probably be able to buy the island of Kauai, gift it back to its indigenous people, and forever rid the island of corporate influence. Sarah might like the sound of that. He should tell her that, he thought…
"Just squirt the oil on your hands, give 'em a rub together, and then you use your fingers to get the kinks out of the muscles. You can use this part of your palm too." She lifted her hands and craned her neck, pointing to the heel of her palm, before she folded them back under her chin and relaxed again. "All of this has been teasing, Chuck. I'm sure you're going to make me feel very good."
"I'm glad you think so," he chuckled good-naturedly, doing what she said and putting the oil on his hands, rubbing them together. At least it wasn't too cold. The more he rubbed his hands the better it got too.
"There's precedent there. You put your hands on me, nerd boy, and it never fails to make me feel very good." She furrowed her brow and glanced up at him. "That sounded stupid but I was trying to come onto you."
"Uh, well…you can't see my face very clearly, but you should know that I'm blushing pretty hard. I can feel my face burning so…congrats."
"Oh good," she giggled. "I'm satisfied."
Yeah, well… He was hoping she'd be even more satisfied when he finished this massage.
He moved to straddle her, lowering only a bit of his weight onto the backs of her thighs, and then he put his warm hands on the small of her back, thumbs first, pressing into her muscle there. And as he continued to work, Sarah began to sigh, letting out little moans, turning her face so that her cheek was pillowed on her hands, her eyes shut, and he could see a slow, satisfied smile start to grow on her face.
Hell yeah, he was doing it.
Chuck moved up to her shoulders and spent a long time there, as that seemed to be where she was keeping her energy when she complained about aches and pains earlier. There were huge knots in her muscles there. "Geez. You are very tense up here."
"Mmmm, that's where I keep my stress, my worry, my…nerves. All the above. In my shoulders and upper back."
He hummed and nodded, putting the heel of his palm to work on her right side and earning a deliciously scratchy groan. "There?"
"Yes, please," she breathed. "You are firing on all cylinders with the massage for being such a self-proclaimed newbie."
"The massage n00b is n00b no more." She giggled, even though he thought she probably didn't pick up on the gaming lingo. "Hey, so…what's with the crazy knots here? You have stress? Nerves?"
Her eyes flicked open, and her smile dimmed just slightly enough that he barely saw it, nearly missing it. "I mean, who doesn't?"
Hm. She had a point, but this was the first time since he met her that he felt this much tenseness in her, to the point where she was visibly achy? He'd had plenty of opportunities to have his hands here, on this spot of her back. Cuddling, sleeping, sex…and he'd never felt this under his hands. Did he push or just let it go?
He was Chuck Bartowski.
So he pushed. Just a little.
"Is it something in particular though? Something I can help with?" She sent him a look. "Besides physically massaging it out, which I'm more than happy to do."
Sighing, she dropped her cheek to her hands again and shook her head.
"Does it have to do with last night? The voicemail the, uh, the other guy left you? Deleting his number from your phone and blocking him? Should I not have told you to do that? Do you regret it now?"
She smiled and shook her head. "No, that was the right thing to do. I guess I'm…" She pushed herself up onto her elbows then, turning her face more towards him. "You're going to think I'm ridiculous," she said over her shoulder.
Curling his fingers around her sides, he leaned down over her so that his face was close to hers, making it easier for them to see one another more clearly. "I'm not. I bet you one hundred bucks I'm not."
Sarah snorted. "Not taking that bet. I need that hundred for my next grocery trip." He grinned at her for that. "I guess I'm a little superstitious sometimes. He reached out to me like that, and it feels like…that life, in my past, is reaching out, too. Like it's gonna follow. I dunno, like…my ex opened the door, and everything else I left behind in D.C. is gonna come waltzing through. I guess it's got me tense, unable to sleep." Chuck didn't say anything, trying to work out what she was telling him. Everything else I left behind…
What else had she left behind? Her job? Was it that bad? Was the city that bad? The rest of the people she'd had there?
He'd already pushed enough, he decided. So instead of asking any of those questions out loud, he slowly massaged her sides and pushed around to the front just slightly, rubbing her abs. She became putty in his hands and groaned, and he pressed a kiss to the nape of her neck, right next to her hairline. He watched her get goosebumps, feeling her shiver under him.
"I'm sorry. Sometimes all it takes is the one thing that seems…insignificant at the time. But it pulls in a rush of other thoughts that…feel like they plague you," he tried. "It sucks that it takes one stupid drunken call for all the other things to come back and bother you."
"It does suck. I left for a reason." She sighed. "I just want to enjoy these last few days with you before you go back to LA." His heart hurt at that. Yet another reminder that this was almost over. "I don't want my past in D.C. giving me all this worry that I'm carrying up in my shoulders."
"If it does, I'm kind of a pro at this now. So…"
Sarah laughed. "I'm not making you give me a massage every time my past tries to come back to needle me."
"Why not? I'd do it gladly."
"That's very sweet."
He smiled at her. "Lie back down. We aren't done here yet, Miss Walker. You paid for the deluxe package."
"Hmmm I don't think I did pay for the deluxe package though," she said, lying back down and sighing, the smile back on her face.
"You didn't, but I upgraded you for free. On the house."
"Oh yeah? That's pretty cool. What'd you do that for?"
Chuck wracked his brain for a response. All he could come up with was, "I'd like you to become a returning customer."
"Don't get on that plane in a few days and you've got a deal," she muttered.
It was all Chuck could do not to freeze entirely. But she seemed not to think anything of what she'd just said, her eyes slipping shut again, the satisfied smile still on her face, her lips tilted up happily.
He opted to pretend not to think more of it than what it was. Probably. He didn't know what it was. Did she not want him to get on the plane? Did she want him to stay longer?
Chuck didn't ask, instead picking up one of her arms and pulling her hand out from under her face, massaging her bicep.
"You are very thorough," she said, grinning.
"I'm a thorough guy, I guess. That apparently extends to the massages I give."
"Hmm, I like a man who's thorough," she said in a way that made her words sound like warm melted chocolate was dripping from them. He finished her other arm and got off of her, meaning to start on her legs, but then she rolled onto her back and arched her eyebrow. "How about my front?"
Chuck was only human, a straight red-blooded man whose red blood had a tendency to heat up quite easily when this particular woman gave him a look like the one she was giving him now. "Your front, too?"
"Is that not part of the deluxe package?" she teased, biting her lip. "Is there another upgrade I can pay for? I can get my credit card."
"Oh, no need. I'll, uh, take care of this for you."
She gave him an inviting smile and reached up for him, curling her fingers around his wrists and pulling his hands towards her body, adamantly putting them on her, one on her hip, the waistband of her underwear scratching at his fingertips, and the other one directly on her breast.
"Okay," he breathed, shaking his head. "I can't."
And he crawled down to stretch his body out next to hers, keeping his hands where she put them as he rolled closer to and pressed his lips to hers. As he hummed happily, he felt her hands latch onto the drawstring of his pants, and immediately start to shove at them to get them out of her way, but then he heard the loud ringing of his cell phone and they both jumped.
He broke the kiss. "Fucking fuck," he snapped against her jaw.
She laughed, her fingertips stroking maddeningly up and down his hipbones she'd revealed as she'd pushed his pants down to his mid-thigh. "Get it."
"No. Absolutely not."
"And if it's something important? We can do this in a minute."
"But the fire is in my blood now…"
Sarah bit her lip and moved her hand between their bodies, touching him, and he whimpered in surprise. "Don't worry, I'll put it back after you answer the call."
He had no doubt she would. So he took a deep breath, gently reached down to remove her hand from between his legs, and rolled off of her to scoot across the bed, hop up to his feet, and tug his pants back up, tying them again even as he went to grab his cell.
It was Ellie.
He swiped to answer. "Hi."
"Hey. You never answered my text I sent you yesterday. Just making sure there aren't any hurricanes."
He had a hurricane behind his bellybutton right now, actually, but that wasn't something his big sister needed to know. "Uh, no hurricanes." A lie. "I was going to text this morning and it totally escaped my memory."
Chuck crawled back onto the bed and put it on speaker, setting it on the mattress and setting his hands to Sarah's thigh, massaging her strong muscles there as she peered up at him in surprise. He was surprised too, honestly.
"Uuuuh huh. I'm sure it did," Ellie's voice drawled. He sent the phone a dirty look and Sarah smirked. "So how about it?"
"How about what?"
Ellie sighed patiently. "My text last night. I don't have to be at surgery and I know you have a meeting later that day when you get back to LA, so I thought I could pick you up from the airport, treat you to super late lunch, and drop you home in time for you to get all gussied up for your dinner meeting."
Chuck felt himself frowning. And he pointedly avoided Sarah's gaze, feeling her watching him closely. "Ah. Yeah! You know what? I'd like that. A lot. I miss ya."
That was true at least. He had missed his sister. He'd missed Captain Awesome and Morgan. He'd missed the office and his assistant. He'd missed his employees and the vibe at BarTech that made him feel really good about what he'd built there. He missed that invigorating feeling of knowing there was much more to come, too. He got that feeling every time he had a meeting with his people, saw their minds work together, their ideas and brainstorming filling the room.
But going back to that would mean leaving this. And it felt like an extremely unfair situation, that life was telling him to choose between the two. Because he couldn't have this…and that. He couldn't have Sarah Walker…and his life in LA.
"I miss you toooo," Ellie sang. "But at least it sounds like you're having a good time."
"Oh, I am," he said, giving Sarah an eyebrow dance. Her smirk widened and then she gave him a wide-eyed look when he lifted her leg and propped her foot on his shoulder so that he could massage her calf muscles too.
Ellie chuckled. "You sound kind of far-off. You someplace with weird reception?"
"Nah, I have you on speaker."
"Oh. Why?"
That was a really good question.
"I'm, um, busy doing somethin' that requires two hands." He wrinkled his nose in a wince at Sarah, lowering her leg back down but continuing the massage still.
Sarah looked fit to burst, her lips pressed tightly together, cheeks pink.
"Oooh, okay. Makes sense. What are you doing?"
Chuck froze and Sarah clamped her hands over her mouth. "…Cutting up some fruit. Yeah. I went to a nice little farm nearby. Bought some fruit. So I'm slicing it up to eat. Yep."
Sarah removed her hands and gave him an impressed look. He shrugged one shoulder modestly making her shake her head in amusement.
"Oooo Hawaiian fruit. That sounds so tasty. I wish you were allowed to bring some back."
"Ugh me too. There are a lot of things from this place I'd like to bring back with me when I leave in a few days."
He could feel Sarah freeze a bit, and he realized everyone heard the extra meaning in that. Including his sister…apparently.
Because then she let out a knowing, "A-haaaaa. And how is she?" Oh, shit. "How's Sarah? Still spending time with her?"
Sarah's jaw fell open and Chuck pounced, snatching the phone from the mattress and fumbling it to try to turn off the speaker function. Why wasn't the screen waking up?!
"Have you said anything yet about—"
He finally turned off the speaker and put it to his ear, climbing to his feet next to the bed.
"—go forward from here, right? Like, you need to decide that before you go."
Thank God he was the only one who heard the end of that.
Chuck cleared his throat. "Uh, yeah. But…uh…"
"Oh God. Chuck. Seriously?! She's in the room, isn't she? And she heard that."
"Yyyyyup."
"Why did you put me on speaker with Sarah in the room and you didn't even warn me?!" she exclaimed. "I almost said stuff she shouldn't be hearing."
"I know that. Which is why I took you off speaker," he hissed.
"You could've said at the beginning of the call, 'oh hey sis I'm cutting fruit so I have you on speaker AND SARAH IS HERE TOO', don't you think? Like, maybe that would've been an idea?"
He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"You haven't broached the subject, have you?"
"You said not to."
"You leave in like two days and some change, bud. Last time I talked to you, there was a lot more time left and I didn't know if…it would keep… Well? I wasn't sure if it was a fun little thing and it'd be over by the time you left."
Chuck turned his back to Sarah and muttered, "That's…not what happened. But I'm gonna go. I bought all this fruit and I gotta cut it. Sharah's gonna sare it, I mean Sarah's gonna share it. I've…gotta go. I'll send you my flight info later."
Ellie was still laughing when he hung up.
He spun on his heels and winced. "Sorry. Sorry about…uh…that…" He cleared his throat and set down the phone, shifting his weight. "I should've told her up front that she was on speaker and you were also here. That was totally on me. Yeeeeah."
Sarah pushed herself up onto her elbows, an amused look on her face at least. And then she crooked her finger for him to go closer. "Come back over here."
He grinned at her, and then trotted up to the bed and leapt into the air, careful to land next to her and not on top of her as she threw her head back with a cackle. "You're right. We were in the middle of something."
"Mhm," she hummed with a smirk, her arms wrapping around his shoulders.
"I still have one more calf to massage and—" He reached over to pick her leg furthest from him up, his hand slipping down to her calf, but she interrupted him by grabbing him by his hips and yanking him on top of her. "Oh. You didn't mean the massage…?"
"The massage worked wonders…."
"But it's over now and you have something else in mind?" he mumbled, his lips pressed against her jaw. He moved his mouth to her neck and she sighed.
"Precisely."
"Noted.
}o{
He loved how wet sand felt under his feet. The rain and the clouds had cleared. The sun was almost down now, sinking below the horizon straight ahead from him as he walked along the water line, letting the waves trickle over his toes and recede back again.
This sand was especially soaked after that downpour.
They stayed in bed all afternoon as it rained, talking…not talking. Waiting for the rain to stop, and yet, at the same time, at least in his case, not wanting it to stop. Ever. Sarah got a call as well, and she intelligently did not put it on speaker phone.
It was just Zeki calling to ask where to find a tool he needed because they were fixing up an old motor in the garage next to the Scuba Shack, since they couldn't take anyone out in the rain. She'd groused that she was so glad she wasn't stuck at the Shack during the storm because it got obnoxious with a handful of them there doing stuff on the same project. Too many cooks in the kitchen, and all of them with different ideas about what was needed. She'd admitted to Chuck that she typically found an excuse to wander back to the Shack and do paperwork or inventory or something else—anything else. For her own mental health.
And when the rain had finally stopped, they'd crawled out from the bed at Sarah's suggestion to walk by the water. The sun was setting, and she'd insisted they see it since the clouds were clearing.
Here they were now, walking side by side. Well, sort of. Sarah had wandered up the beach about eight or nine feet to look at a clump of seaweed, and now she was walking up there, parallel to his path.
It had been silent and peaceful, nothing awkward or uncomfortable about it. Just two people who felt good around one another, whether they filled the space with words or not.
Chuck wondered if he was reading too much into it, but it felt significant. It felt like something people who were in an actual relationship would do. He wasn't even sure this was a relationship, let alone a good one. He didn't know if it even could be.
He felt significantly more comfortable being quiet around her, not having to force conversation the way he had a tendency to do with people he didn't know very well. And still, after only a few weeks, he knew he didn't know her nearly as well as pretty much everyone in his life up until the point he climbed onto that plane at LAX. All that being considered, Chuck had a feeling he knew her better than a lot of people in her life knew her.
That was also significant.
"Oh no way."
Chuck turned to look at her as she squinted at something in front of them, and she rushed to the water, waiting for it to recede before she dug something up and cleaned it in the wave as it lapped back up the shore.
He reached her just as she spun to face him, holding it up at eye level.
"Now what are the chances we find two of these ever let alone in the short span of your trip? You've only been here a month and two sunrise shells. In perfect condition." She grinned at him as he carefully picked it out of her grip, looking at it closely. "Has to mean something."
"What's it mean?" he asked, taking in the stunning yellows, oranges, pinks, and reds of the shells surface, turning it over and almost gasping at how beautiful and vibrant the smooth inside of the shell was.
"I don't know." She smiled. "If I was the superstitious type, I'd say the island has chosen you."
"Oh God. Am I gonna be sacrificed to a volcano?"
She cracked up, shaking her head at him and snatched the shell back. "Gimme that. It's mine now. You don't get it. That heinous volcano crack."
Chuckling, the BarTech founder shrugged. "Sorry. Guess I've seen the Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan flick too many times."
"He gets sacrificed to a volcano?"
"Well, his doctor tells him he's gonna die soon from a brain cloud," he explains. "And he's approached by this guy trying to save his island—I think, I think I'm getting this right, it's been over a decade since I've watched it. The guy tells him there needs to be a sacrifice and nobody will volunteer. If he volunteers to sacrifice himself to the island, this guy will pay for him to live the last days of his life however he wants. So he agrees."
"This is…a real movie…?"
They kept walking.
"Yes. Yes, it is."
"And so he spends his last days doing whatever he wants, bankrolled by this island guy, and then he jumps into the volcano…" she muttered dryly, sending him a strange look. "Because he's dying anyway from this brain cloud thing."
"No. See, he falls in love with the pilot of the boat who takes him to the island. And sh—Whoa." His jaw dropped, something occurring to him then. "Oh wow. This is uncanny."
"Do not."
"What? You don't know what I'm gonna say."
"Yes, I do. You're comparing yourself to brain cloud sacrifice guy and you're comparing me to the woman piloting the boat. And no. Absolutely not. I would never take you to some random island to kill yourself."
"Even if you didn't know me and it might save a whole island of people?"
"Well, since that shit is fake? Yes even then."
"GASP! You'd let the island sink, Sarah Walker?"
"Oh my God," she moaned, giggling. "Did you just actually say the word gasp instead of just gasping?"
"I spend a lot of time at BarTech with young people who've just left college or are still in college and not only do they say GASP instead of gasping, they also pronounce 'Lol' instead of just laughing. Not even spelling it out like L.O.L., but Lol."
"That sounds like torture. You hire these people?" He laughed hard at how well she played that disdain off. "You still didn't tell me. He falls in love and jumps anyway?"
"They decide they're gonna jump in together. She marries him right before they go up the volcano to jump."
"So she's a nut, too."
"A nut who wants to save an island of people! A nut who-who can't bear to live without the man she loves and—Yeah, yep, she's a nut."
Sarah giggled. "So they die, the end."
"I…hm…" He made a thoughtful face. "I don't want to tell you."
"What?! Why?! I want to know!"
"Because it spoils the ending and I don't want you spoiled."
She narrowed her eyes. "You're going to make me watch this now, aren't you?"
"Yes. Yes, I am."
"Speaking of torture."
"Oh come onnnnnnn! It's Tom Hanks!"
Sarah shook her head, laughing. "Fine, put it on and I'll watch it. I can't deny I'm intrigued. Worse comes to worst, we can do a drinking game to it if it's that bad."
"Ummm it isn't bad, which is why I watched it so many times."
"Don't you read, like…comic books…?" she teased.
Chuck actually gasped this time. "Rude! I have excellent taste because I read comic books."
Still giggling, she stepped in close to him and rounded his waist with her arm, hugging him as they walked, pressing a kiss to his jaw. "I'm teasing you. The truth is, if I'm flicking around the channels on my TV, and Dances with Wolves is on, I'll watch all the way to the end every single time. I've seen it probably fifty-seven times since I was a kid and watched the VHS at…oh crap, how old was I? Maybe eight? Found it buried in one of my grandma's drawers." She looked pretty proud of herself for that and it was adorable.
But then he made a face. "Hold on, hold on. Are you trying to act like Dances with Wolves isn't, like, a classic masterpiece of '90s film legend? Didn't it win the Oscar for Best Picture? And, like, fifty thousand other awards? I know Kevin Costner walked away with something."
"Really?" She raised her eyebrows. "Huh."
"You didn't know? It's called one of the best movies in history or something like that. There's a reason you like it so much."
She shrugged. "Oh. I guess I was listening to the wrong people."
"You knew someone who didn't like it?"
"My ex."
Chuck winced. Then he frowned. "Wait." He laid his hand on her shoulder furthest from him, inadvertently pulling her in tighter to his side. "That wouldn't happen to be the drunken voicemail ex, would it?"
She wrinkled up her nose. "It…would."
He tried not to feel a little less special about her feeling comfortable enough to share that story about stealing her grandma's VHS and watching it fifty-seven times simply because she'd apparently been close enough with this ex that she'd told him that, too. Otherwise how would she know the ex didn't like it?
Jealousy was stupid and pointless in this situation, so it wasn't that. He just felt…a little less special.
"This guy gets worse and worse," he said with an extra amount of fire that probably wasn't necessary. "No wonder you hightailed it outta there." She gave him a look and he winced yet again. "Sorry. Wasn't funny. Totally agree." She giggled at that, though. "Well, he was objectively wrong, and you're objectively right."
"And you are objectively adorable. You're really making a case for me to let you show me that volcano movie…"
"Okay, I need you to know right now, Sarah Walker, that Joe Versus the Volcano is no Dances with Wolves."
"Ummmmmm I wasn't expecting that. Trust me," she drawled sarcastically.
"Okay, good."
Chuck felt Sarah's hand creep along the waistband of his shorts then, and as he looked down, he noticed her slipping the shell into his pocket. "For safe keeping," she said when he gave her a curious look. "And something you'll remember this beach by. This specific beach. This specific moment on this specific beach…"
"No way am I ever gonna forget it, with or without the pretty shell."
She sent him a long look, pulling them both to a stop, tilting her head back as their eyes met. And she rounded his waist with both of her arms and hugged his front tight to hers. "I'm not gonna forget either." Then she seemed almost a little uncomfortable with how much gravity this moment had suddenly, and she flicked her gaze to the side, squirming. "Let's-Let's do something tomorrow. Something that'd be on one of those To-Do Lists travel bloggers make about places." She narrowed her eyes, backtracking then. "Sorry. It's your vacation, your last two days, you get to spend them how you want. Ignore me."
"I am not ignoring you. That's a splendid idea. I've never looked at any of those lists, let alone one for Kauai. You tell me what we should do."
She nibbled on her lip thoughtfully for a moment, glancing out at the water. And she exclaimed, "Gasp!" making him laugh so hard, she had to hold him up. She waited for him to sober up a little, beaming, almost as if she was a little proud of herself. Then she shrugged with a, "Waimea Canyon."
"…Waimea Canyon. Is that like…Grand Canyon? But Hawaiian?"
She pursed her lips and tilted her head. "Huh. Maybe. Let's go. Tomorrow. I'll drive."
"Well, I mean…yeah."
"Oh." She snorted. "Good point. I live here. I have a car."
"Riiiiiight." He giggled and kissed her forehead. "I'm so game. Let's do it. Tomorrow."
"And today?" she asked after a comfortable silence settled between them, the sun almost totally gone.
"And today, we are going to find a good hamburger place, get it to-go, order fries if they have 'em, take it all back to my hotel, and eat in bed while watching Joe Versus the Volcano."
Sarah laughed. "I really thought maybe you'd forgotten about that."
"Nnnnnope."
"Ah well. All right." She sighed dramatically, clutching his arm and turning them around. "But let's go back now then because I'm hungry. That fruit was delicious but not nearly enough sustenance. I need some protein."
"Red meeeat!"
She laughed as they turned back to head for his hotel which loomed large in the distance. And Chuck found himself grinning as he felt her fingers graze lightly down his forearm, before she found his hand and threaded their fingers together, squeezing.
Holding her hand back, he told himself to stay in the moment, to memorize it, etch it into his brain. Because when they woke up in the morning, he would only have two full days left. On this beautiful island. And with this beautiful person.
A/N: Hope you enjoyed! This fic is still ongoing. Review if you've got the time and you feel like it. Thanks!
-SC