Chapter Text
“Oh my God.”
“Ricky.”
“Gina, you– oh God you…”
“Ricky, please, can you just–”
“ YOU WERE A WOLF ,” Ricky cried, back still pressed firmly against the stiff, wooden wall. His body shaking like a leaf as he lamely flicked his hand to gesture in the girl’s direction, “there was a bright light and…you were, like see-through! A wolf! …am I dreaming? That’s what this has to be – a dream.”
“No, Ricky, you’re not dreaming,” Gina replied plainly, already growing aggravated by the whole early dawn ordeal.
“Are you gonna kill me?”
“What?”
“Are you gonna kill me?” Ricky tersely asked, eyes wide and unblinking. “Cause, you know, I saw something I wasn’t supposed to see.”
“No, I’m not going to kill you,” Gina stated, eyes pointed and shoulders tense. “Unless you plan on running your mouth and telling people then I maybe will have to do something drastic.”
Ricky stared at the girl, face utterly befuddled. “Gina, the only person I talk to is the old woman who runs the small general store at the edge of town. Who am I gonna tell?”
“I don’t know, maybe the person who keeps trying to contact you every day?”
Right on time, as if to highlight her point, Ricky’s phone starts ringing. He pulled it out of his pajama bottom pocket and checked the caller ID. Grimacing at the name, he silenced it and slid it back into his pocket.
“Seriously, that person really wants to talk to you.”
“Well, I don’t want to talk to them.”
“Not even to tell them about the weird girl you kidnapped who may or may not be a supernatural creature?”
“Not like they’d ever believe me…” he muttered under his breath. “And I see what you’re doing here. Stop trying to change the subject.”
“Who said I was doing that? You’re the one being dodgy!” Gina scoffed, crossing her arms and pressing them against her chest. She sighed, chipped fingernails digging into her skin as she folded into herself. Ricky, still stammering and struggling to ground himself to whatever his reality was in this moment, watched as the once impenetrable walls the stranger had once built high, that he swore had started to inch open the tiniest bit in the passing days, were beginning to unwillingly crack. “Okay, you know what? Just…get up and sit down. I’ll explain.”
Gathering a semblance of his bearings, Ricky pulled himself to his feet, collapsing into the recliner. His seat, far enough to create a safe space between the two in case things went south, but not enough distance that the girl wouldn’t feel like she was being alienated or interrogated. “So, you maybe wanna explain what all that was?”
“Not really…” Gina mumbled faintly under her breath as she threw herself onto the couch. “But I’m guessing I don’t have a choice anymore, now do I?”
The boy just stared at her. The answer was deafening in the silence.
The girl sighed, resigned to her fate, “okay, I guess we’re doing this. Well, to start this off: yes, the wolf from earlier was me.”
“That night during the storm,” Ricky whispered, refusing to look at her, “…was that you?”
“…yeah. It was.”
“So, you really are a werewolf?”
“Not exactly, or at least that’s not what some call us,” Gina corrected. “But for simplicity's sake, let’s go with that.
“You’re not a werewolf?” Ricky questioned, utterly stupefied.
“My…‘condition,’ isn’t an exact match to what most consider traditional werewolf lore. If there really is any traditional werewolf lore to begin with, that is.”
“So, you don’t transform into a big hairy beast during full moons or whatever?”
“I mean…it’s more complicated than that,” Gina replied sheepishly, refusing to look Ricky directly in the eye.
“Okay,” Ricky sighed, the initial shock of the morning’s discovery gradually wearing off, “so explain it then. Clearly.”
Gina chewed her bottom lip, “well, to answer your question: technically I do transform during the full moon. But it’s not just the full moon. And it’s not really a transformation in the normal sense. And what I did this morning is very different from what would happen on a night when there’s a full moon—”
“Wait stop, you’re not making any sense.”
“Well, I’m getting there so shut up,” Gina snarled, though the sight of her fingernails digging into her exposed skin revealed her true anxiety — faint white scratches lining light brown. Ricky was worried she’d accidentally tear a layer of skin off in the process. She sighed, “look, I, I’m sorry. I’ve never had to explain all this to someone else before. It’s…a lot.”
Without thinking, Ricky scooted to the edge of his seat and reached out for the girl's hand. He hadn’t known what came over himself at that moment. There was just a deep-seated need to make sure she was okay. To make sure she knew that he was there for her. As his fingers drew closer, she shot backwards, snapping her hand back near instinctively. Ricky froze, his hand hanging suspended in midair. Calmly, as if not to frighten her further, he pulled back, resituating himself back in his seat.
Ten seconds passed in pure silence.
“Sorry,” Ricky whispered eventually, bringing life to the dead air.
The young woman shook her head, telling him that all was fine between them. She twiddled her digits until she gave them a good squeeze. “Look, to sum up the basics: every night when the moon is clear and visible in the sky, my ‘soul’ essentially exits my physical body and transforms into that wolf form you saw. It works differently when it’s a full moon, but don’t worry about that right now.”
“Different how?”
“And when the sun comes up,” Gina continued, decidedly ignoring Ricky’s follow up question, my ‘soul’ goes back into my body. Or that’s how it’s usually supposed to go.”
“Hold up,” Ricky jumped in once more, “what do you mean, usually?”
“There may or may not be a distance factor to it,” Gina said unsurely, like she was processing, absorbing, and second guessing herself as the information spilled from her lips. “I’m not fully sure.”
Ricky weakly chuckled, “you don’t seem to be sure about much of anything. At least concretely.”
Suddenly, Gina’s face shifted to an angry glower, fists clenched and eyes slotted and piercing — reminding the young man of a wolf. “Well, it’s not like I have someone here giving me history lessons on this crap! It’s just me here!” As the last of her sentence passed her lips, the words settling deep, her body slowly relaxed. Her eyes went wide then squinted, discomfort swimming in her corneas as she bit back her thoughts with a tight homo on her bottom lip. “My mom said that my dad used to be able to switch between wolf and human forms at night whenever he chose, but I can barely remember back to that time. I was rarely awake when he supposedly did so…”
“So, you were born like this?”
“Yup, this hell was inherited.” Gina smirked, “what, did you think I got bitten by a rabid wolf man or something?”
“Scratched, actually,” Ricky shrugged, playing along with her antics.
Gina chuckled, cracking a small fragment of a smile. Ricky smiled right back — it finally felt like they were getting somewhere. The two’s conversations seemed to always ebb and flow like water down a mountain river: rocky and intense with steep drop offs that’ll knock one off course, but there’s beauty and a weird sense of tranquility in rush.
“So, let me get this straight,” Ricky cleared his throat, summarizing what he’d learned through bits and pieces of string out thoughts. “When the moon is in the sky, your soul leaps outta your body and turns into a wolf until the sun comes out? Did I get that right?”
Gina gave a dull nod, “yup.”
“There’s nothing else I need to know?” Ricky prodded, “no secret powers you’re hiding from me? Ooh, wait, what about the full moon thing? You said that it works differently on those days.”
Gina’s breath hitched, “I said you didn’t have to worry about that.”
“I thought we were being honest.”
“It’s nothing so drop it,” Gina said harshly. She dipped her head, voice cracking, “besides, it’s not like I’m going to be around for you to see it anyway.”
And just like that, they’ve reached a dam.
Ricky felt as if a thorny sticker bush had sprouted throughout his torso and neck — the acute barbs pricking and puncturing his organs and throat, making breathing and even thinking difficult to accomplish.
As the seconds ticked, he managed to choke out, “a-are…are you planning on leaving sometime soon?”
“I didn’t think this was a permanent situation,” Gina muttered. “I thought the deal was: I play hostage until I got better?”
“Ahh, I see we’re back to kidnapping stuff again…” Ricky groaned.
“Always back to the kidnapping stuff,” the woman poked sarcastically.
“But you’re wrong by the way.”
“I’m what?”
“You’re wrong,” Ricky repeated, fully and slowly annunciating the words so she couldn’t be mistaken (and to drive her just a little bit nuts for his own amusement). “I said you could stay until you felt better, or the weather got better. But look,” he pointed out the window — gray clouds filled the sky, the outside world as dreary and monochrome as this conversation had become. “The weather hasn’t cleared up yet.”
“Ricky,” Gina argued lightly, “that’s just some clouds. The storm is gone.”
“Clouds like that mean it’s gonna rain, Gina,” Ricky stated matter of factly, as if he was a meteorologist in his past life. “And I’m guessing you don’t have anywhere to go after you leave here, do you?”
“That’s mighty presumptuous of you, Dicky ,” Gina sneered, but Ricky theorized it was more out of poorly disguised embarrassment rather than malice.
“But you’re not denying it?” Gina said nothing. “Exactly, so you should just keep staying here.”
“Why are you pushing this so hard?” Gina cried, throwing her hands up in exasperation. “We barely know each other, hell, you just found out I shift into a wolf at nighttime and now you’re begging to keep living with you! Why? What are you getting out of this?”
Ricky bit his tongue. He didn’t know why he was reacting so strongly to this; it wasn’t like he and Gina were friends or anything. She was just a sick girl who reluctantly was crashing on his couch. When it came to companionship, she was shitty company. But that was the thing, she was company. And after spending months without any — the only semi-regular interactions with others coming from infrequent phone calls with his parents he only answered once in a blue moon, sporadic messages from his friends that he rarely replied to, or quick trips to the store — Ricky missed a constant presence in his life.
Fortunately for the fumbling young man, the collective sound of their growling stomachs filled the room, clearing the tense air.
Gina opened her mouth to speak, but Ricky beat her to the punch. “Look, I know you’re probably suspicious of me, rightfully so, I don’t know your history. But I’m hungry. And I’m guessing you probably are too. So, let’s just table this until after we get some food in our stomachs, and we can talk about this like rational people. And maybe we can learn some more about each other in the process. Okay?”
With a small, hesitant nod, Gina agreed. “Okay.”
Ricky pulled himself up from his seat, “deal. So, let’s figure out what to eat.” Walking to the kitchen, he began shuffling through the cabinets and fridge, “well, we got some nearly expired milk and some cereal left.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask, but can you actually cook?” Ricky jumped as Gina was suddenly behind him in the kitchen, peering over his shoulder. “Not to sound ungrateful but I have been surviving this past week on basically nothing, but things found in a can and if I do stay here, my body can only take so much overly processed foods.”
“You’re quite picky, you know that?” Ricky jabbed, turning his back to her and facing the empty kitchen shelves. “I didn’t know you had fresh homemade from scratch meals living out in the woods.”
“Again, with the assumptions about my living situation,” Gina tsked, moving from behind him to his sides.
“Is it really an assumption when the first time I fed you, you scarfed it down like a starving wild animal?” Ricky mumbled under his breath.
“What was that?” Gina questioned, pestering the boy as she glanced amongst the kitchen with her own eyes, silently taking inventory of the limited selection.
“Nothing.”
A shit-eating grin sprouted across her lips, viny yet enticing. In a way, she weirdly reminded Ricky of Medusa, the young woman’s smile similar to the head of vipers that could halt you to stone with a single glance, “I’m guessing you’re being this argumentative cause I struck a nerve…you can’t cook huh?”
“You think if I could cook, I’d be feeding us shit outta can for the past week?” Ricky mumbled furiously; the tips of his ears dyed a blistering pink.
“You live by yourself, and you can’t cook?” Gina asked astounded, her hands occupied with kitchen utensils Ricky had neither seen nor touched before in his life. When had his mom and Todd even bought those? “What have you been feeding yourself for the last…however long you’ve been here?”
“Mostly stuff out of a box or can.” Gina stared at him with wide, horrified eyes. Her aghast expression sent a bash fury down his spine, “it’s worked so far! I’m still alive and functioning, aren’t I?”
“That’s debatable,” Gina argued, not bothering to spare the tormented man a passing glance. “When’s the last time you’ve eaten a fruit or vegetable? A fresh one.”
“…theoretically, if said fresh fruit or vegetable was put into something that you bought does that count?”
“Oh my god,” Gina fretted about, marching towards the entryway, “we’re going to the store right now.”
Ricky stumbled after her, “what? Why? We have cereal here!”
“Cause I’m gonna make you an actual meal with real ingredients you have to cook on a stove. Maybe even use the oven if I’m feeling frisky.” She grabbed her clothes and bag and headed to what had become her personal bathroom for the last few days. “Now, go get ready.”
Ricky stood just before the doorframe, arms crossed, “you can cook?”
“Better than you can at least,” she smirked, back and head tilting against the doorframe.
Ricky folded his arms, “that’s big talk for someone who hasn’t even made anything yet.”
“Well, if you actually went and got dressed instead of standing there talking to me, we could be closer to proving me right.” An innocent pride laced her words as she twirled back into the room, graceful like a ballerina. Gradually shutting the door, she placed her cheek against the wood, sending a humored yet pointed smile Ricky’s way, “now go!”
The drive into town was relatively quiet. From what Ricky had heard and personally experienced, the mountain roads were rarely occupied at this time of the year. The most traffic he’d come across was the occasional car or a woodland creature who accidentally grazed too far from their trail and out onto the path.
He turned the radio dial to the right seconds after powering on the car, the slightly muffled disembodied voice competing with the constant rumble of the engine and crunch of rocks and twigs under the rubber tires. Ricky could tolerate that quiet tranquility for so long — his brain craved cacophonous disorder and distractions in order to properly function. Which usually meant endless music looping in his ears or nonstop chattering. But Ricky knew better than to try bothering Gina again after their less than harmonious morning conversation. He tapped his fingers against the cushioned wheel, the musician hidden inside keeping time without thought.
“I’m sorry.”
The methodical taps on the steering wheel paused mid beat as Ricky turned his head to glance at the woman in the passenger seat. Her body was faced away from his, almost entirely turned towards the door. “What?”
“For snapping at you earlier. And for calling you a kidnapper and doubting your intentions. Just for being an ungrateful asshole,” Gina sighed. Long fingers twisted the dark belt across her chest before quietly continuing, “…no one’s ever really fought so hard to keep me around before.”
“What about your parents?” Ricky asked. “They didn’t fight for you?”
She didn’t respond, now silently laying her head fully against the door, dark near black coils smushed against the seatbelt and kissing the glass. Ricky couldn’t get a good look at her eyes, but he knew they were gazing past the windowpane, watching the scenery pass by in a green and brown blur.
The rest of the car ride down the mountain is absent of talking, the only sounds coming from the soft hum of the engine, the tires spinning on the sleek rocky road, and buzz of the radio as they breathed in cheap car clip-in freshener that clogged their nostrils. It’s silence verging on comfortable — not quite as too much is left lingering in the reticent void — but getting there.
“Ricky, we have to go back.”
“What! Why?”
“We forgot to buy butter,” Gina cried, twisted up in her belt as she furiously rustled through the dozens of plastic bags situated in the back seat.
They had decided to venture to the big chain department store at the other end of town rather than the small mom and pop shops Ricky naturally preferred to visit — the young man figured it’d be simpler and faster to handle all their shopping needs in one space.
“Is there a budget we have to work with while here?” Gina questioned, snatching a vacant shopping cart from the rows of immobile plastic bins on wheels right as they first walked through the automatic doors.
“Not really,” Ricky shrugged, taking position behind the cart so he could push while the wolf girl could solely focus on navigating which direction they needed to go. Especially since she refused to tell him what exactly she was making. “Todd, my mom’s husband, is basically some big successful corporate lawyer or something — essentially, he’s rich off his ass and covers almost all my expenses while I’m staying in his winter vacation home. I usually try to pay for my own stuff or at least not go too crazy with his money — I don’t like the idea of feeling like I owe him anything — but I don’t think going a little overboard on just this one occasion is gonna hurt him.”
“Todd, huh,” Gina stopped at the head of the cart, nearly getting run over. Other customers shot daggers at the two taking up space in the walkway, mean-mugging them as they had to walk around. “I take it you two aren’t close?”
“Understatement of the century,” Ricky groaned.
“So, you’re not a little secret rich boy at heart?” she teased, leaning backwards and forwards against the cart, her fingers hooked through the plastic holes to maintain her grip.
“Yeah, no. Far from it actually,” Ricky stated assertively, shutting the taunting down fervently. “After my mom…left — to put it generously — my dad didn’t take it well. He spent the first few months rotting away in our house and later branched out by going to the bar. He eventually lost his job ‘cause he showed up at the office for the first time in nearly a week piss poor drunk.
“Throughout high school, we lost our house and had to move to a hole in the wall apartment in the shady part of town. Dad couldn’t keep a stable job and turned to more questionable ‘employment opportunities’ as he called them. By the end of my senior year, we’d gotten into such a bad argument, I moved out and stayed with my best friend for a few months over the summer until I started community college and moved in with my girl—” Ricky gasped, pausing mid sentence. Like the word had gummed up and gotten stuck in his throat. He took a deep, shaky breath, “it’s not important. Bottom line is I’m pretty sure my mom and Todd’s financial generosity stems more so from them feeling guilty about everything that went down than anything else.”
“Ricky,” Gina began, “I’m—”
“Don’t,” Ricky pleaded, biting his lip as he stared down at his hands tightly gripping the handle bar, “just…don’t.”
Gina said nothing, processing every word spoken. Ricky could tell she had things she wanted to say, questions she wanted to ask. They both knew that there was more to the story that Ricky was holding back. But she held her tongue. She knew more than anyone about keeping secrets and history close to your chest.
“It’s my bad anyway,” Ricky apologized, pushing the cart again absentmindedly, brushing against a rack of hanging shirts. “Didn’t mean to dump all that on you like that—”
“No,” Gina said firmly, brown meeting hazel, the flecks of green seemingly diminished. “No, you’re okay.”
Ricky nodded appreciatively, happy to avoid talking about his past any further. He continued to brush his fingers against the yellow fabric, a cartoony sun with sunglasses with the phrase ‘do what makes you happy’ in funky shaped letters printed across the front. “Hey, should we buy you some other stuff for the house as well as groceries? Like some more clothes and stuff?”
Gina smirked, “you really are trying to get me to stay with you, huh?”
“Or maybe I just want to get back the clothes and blankets I lent you?”
“…sure. But I’m not wearing that shirt. I’m not five.”
They spend the next two hours running around the store picking out clothes, amenities like toothbrushes, bedding, hair and face products, and eventually groceries. Back and forth between sections as they grab items and then remember they forgot something else and have to go back. Neither would admit it — much too stubborn and busy grumbling and teasing the other the entire time to do so — but this trip was the most normal and fun they’d had in a long, long time. But by the time they finally made it back to Ricky’s car, they were ready to head home.
Or Ricky thought they were.
“Gina, we just escaped that place,” Ricky whined as they stopped at a red light, slouching down in the driver’s seat in protest. “Do we really need butter?”
“Do you want a homemade breakfast?”
“That’s literally the whole reason why we went shopping.”
“Then yes, we need butter.”
“Didn’t we just buy pancake mix? Let’s just use that! That only needs like…water, right?”
“That wasn’t for today! That’s for the future.”
“The future?” Ricky tapped his head against the steering wheel, “why the heck would time matter?”
Gina sat right in her seat again, adjusting the seat belt across her chest, “because if I’m gonna teach you how to cook, I thought pancakes from the box would be a good place to start: they’re simple with only a few instructions and incredibly hard to screw up. But today, however, I’m making a real meal from scratch! And that requires butter.”
“Fine,” Ricky relented, “but we’re not going back to that Walmart. I didn’t think a store in such a small town just past the ass crack of dawn could be that busy!”
“Then, where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
The doorbell jingled as Ricky pushed the door open to Calloway’s General Store, holding it open for Gina to step in behind him. The store was virtually empty, not too surprising as it wasn’t even 9 am yet. “Now, let’s just hurry up and grab this butter before—”
“Before what?” Ricky and Gina jumped, swiveling on their heels to see the one and only Ethel May Calloway, with her signature warm red hair and irked disposition, standing at the bottom of one of the aisles stocking the end cap, her hands placed snugly on her hips as she stared inquisitively at them. “I know you weren’t trying to sneak in here without saying hi to me Ricky Bowen. I’m the main employee here, you know.”
“Ethel May!” Ricky straightened out his back, a forced smile stretching across his lips, “of course not!”
“Uh huh,” she rolled her eyes, obviously not buying a word he said.
“We were just itching to get back home since we’ve been up for hours and we wanted to make breakfast,” Ricky weakly murmured, already pushing Gina in the direction away from the older woman.
“You can cook?” Ethel May asked with raised eyebrows, “and wait a hot minute: WE ?”
“Yes, we ,” Ricky replied haughtily. “Gina, this is Ethel May Calloway. Ethel May, this is my…Gina.”
Ethel May shot Ricky a cheeky grin, “your Gina?”
“Stop,” Ricky grumbled, avoiding eye contact with both women “it’s not like that. Gina’s my…my friend.”
“Friend?” Ethel May’s eyes went wide, greeting Gina officially with a gentle smile. “Hello deary.”
“Hello,” Gina replied pleasantly, holding out her hand for Ethel May to shake.
“I didn’t know Ricky had friends,” the elder said raptly, giving Gina a loose shake. “Beautiful ones especially. Hell, I didn't think Ricky talked to other people.”
“I have other friends too, you know,” Ricky snapped.
“Well, I’ve never seen or heard you talk about them before!” Ethel May argued, her glasses slipping partially from the bridge of her nose. “It’s why I keep trying to set you up with my niece who’s around your age. Well, not ‘set up’ because she has a girlfriend currently — a sweet girl and very smart! But anywho, you need friends Ricky, and can’t spend all your time alone in that house up in the mountains.”
“I’m literally in that house up in the mountains because my doctor and therapist convinced my parents that I needed to ‘separate myself from society.’”
“Then what about her,” the redhead pointed to the curly haired girl standing next to Ricky’s side. “Is she an exception to that separation from society rule?”
“…where’s your butter, Ethel May?”
The woman glared at Ricky for a moment before giving in with a sign, “over there in the back corner with the other refrigerated stuff.”
Ricky stomped to the back where the fridges were located, not stopping to check if Gina was following. Once he reached the chillers, he scooped up one box that read ‘salted’ and another that read ‘unsalted.’ Gina never specified which one she wanted. “Gina, which one?”
But Gina was nowhere to be seen.
“Gina?”
Ricky briskly walked back up to the aisle, red fingers curled around the cold cartons. “Gina?”
The curly haired girl was standing where Ricky had left her, engaged in deep conversation with Ethel May. He was too far away to hear most of their talk but caught the end of the back and forth.
“You must be a pretty special friend to get Mr. Solitude to actually allow you to be near him,” Ethel May winking in Gina’s direction, snickering when the girl’s skin flushed, brown eyes darting to the fall.
“Not that special…” Gina whispered, knocking her shoe against her covered foot.
A gentler, understanding smile formed on Ethel May’s face, “I don’t know everything about what went down in that boy’s past months before he moved into that house, but I’m glad that he has someone to finally confide in. He’s a little ass sometimes but has a good heart. You two treat each other well, okay?”
A contemplative look fell over Gina’s face, shoulders slumping as she let the older woman’s plea sink in.
Before she could reply, Ricky stepped onto a creaky tile, causing the women to separate and glance over at the not so sneaky young man.
“Why are you lurking in the back like that?” Ethel May frowned, crossing her arms. Gina said nothing, cheeks still pinker than Ricky recalled them being before under the white, fluorescent lights.
“Just…” he held up the butters, “wanting to know which butter Gina wanted?”
“Oh,” Gina popped up, sidestepping out from the store owner's side and over to a waiting Ricky, grabbing the boxes from his hands. “Uhm, both actually? I’m going to go grab a few more.” Without wasting a second, she rocketed off to the back of the store.
“She’s a cutie,” Ethel May beamed, bumping Ricky just below the shoulder. “Kinda quiet though.”
“Yeah…I mean to the quiet part!” Ricky yammered frantically. “I haven’t really noticed, you know, the cute part…”
“Yeah, okay big man,” she snorted, patting the boy sympathetically on the back, “I’ll leave you be…for now.”
“Wow, thanks.”
“Don’t mention it. Any sighting of that wolf I told you about yet?”
Ricky froze, “the…wolf?”
“Yes, the wolf! Don’t make me add ‘bad memory’ to your list of issues, boy.”
“Whatever you old hag,” Ricky shooed her off his shoulder, “and no, I haven’t seen that dumb imaginary wolf of yours.” He stared over to where Gina walked off to, desperately hoping for her to return. He’d never felt more antsy to leave one of his only spots of relative comfort in recent memory than right now.
“Just, be careful Ricky,” the senior sighed, “there’s a lot in this world that’s weird or deemed impossible, imaginary or can’t be explained but that doesn’t mean it’s not there. Be vigilant. You never know what or when trouble could appear from the shadows.”
“What—”
“Ricky, look at this!” Gina yelled giddily, shoving a large blue cotton shirt into his face as Ethel May walked away. On it was the sketched out back of a car heading towards a mountain, with the cursive words ‘COL-A-RODA Up the Mountain’ printed on it.
“Didn’t think gimmicky road trip novelty shirts were your thing, Gina,” Ricky said as he pushed the shirt out of his face.
“No, not for me,” Gina cried out, “for you!”
“Me?”
“It fits your vibe!”
“I feel like I should be offended by that,” Ricky cringed.
“Dorky in a kind of cute and endearing way — your vibe to a tee,” Gina cheesed, folding the shirt over her arm, a dance in her step.
“So, you do think I’m cute?” Ricky winked cockily, leaning over slightly, his face inching closer to Gina’s.
Gina pulled back, “don’t make me strangle you with this shirt.”
Ricky chuckled, skipping past Gina to the small display of cheap shirts. He picked up a shirt similar to Gina’s in design, but this time in an obnoxiously bright pink, “I’ll buy the one you have if you get one as well?”
She thought over his proposal, thumb and index squeezing the sides of her chin. “Deal.”
After they paid for their abundance of butter, matching, campy shirts, and a bit more teasing from the woman in charge, Ricky and Gina finally made their way to the car. As Ricky started to look for his keys, he noticed Gina’s face: a familiar musing etched on her face. She was nearly too preoccupied by her thoughts to pay attention to where she was going, almost walking past the parked car.
“Okay,” Ricky stopped, “what’s up?”
Gina spun around, that pensive expression from when she had been talking to Ethel May still plastered across her face, “what?”
“Why are you making that face?”
The young woman placed her free hand not holding the large brown grocery bag on her hip, “what face?”
“This one,” Ricky contorted his face in an exaggerated grin, eyes scrunching then widening in faux rumination.
“Ricky!” Gina laughed, “oh my gosh, knock it off!”
“What? I’m just showing you what you look like!” Ricky smiled, beaming harder as he puffed out his cheeks further — expanding and red like inflated balloons. “I’m basically your reflection in the mirror, Gina! Seriously, twinsies!”
“Whatever you ass,” Gina rolled her eyes as she shook her head, her smile never faltering. She faced the car once more, chipped fingernail tracing circles on the window. It was almost like she was…nervous? “Is it true?”
“Is what true?” Ricky asked, stomping to his side of the car, depositing his bags on to the roof, finally fishing out the keys from his pockets.
“I know you overheard what Ethel May said to me. About me being, you know, a ‘special friend.’ And then what she said about me being a cutie and all,” Gina replied, finally glancing upward, back into Ricky’s eyes for the briefest period before falling once more. “So, am I…a ‘special friend’ of yours?”
Ricky froze. Oh. He hadn’t thought too hard about agreeing with Ethel May when she said that earlier, more focused on escaping out the door and anyway from the embarrassing conversation.
But now…
“Well,” he cleared his throat, “you are making me breakfast from scratch…so I guess you’re pretty special.”
Gina lifted her head. Her eyes finally met Ricky’s — speckles of honey stirred in the rich brown sparking in the rising sunlight. A teeny tiny smile blossomed over her lips, cheeks the color of fresh flowers sprouting upright from the widespread meadow. There was beauty in its simplicity yet an intriguing intricacy to it. Gina was a body of consistent contradictions — Ricky yearned and feared to unravel as many as possible.
“…I guess you’re pretty special as well.”
Ricky raised a brow, “really now?”
Gina nodded, dancing on her tiptoes, “you would have to be pretty special to let a stranger stay in your home.”
“Stay and not kidnap?” Ricky gasped.
“Yeah,” Gina relented, “you would be a crappy kidnapper. But I’m still ruling out the Stockholm Syndrome possibility.”
Ricky unlocked the car, yanking the door open with an unenthusiastic pull, “get in the car, Gina.”
Gina smirked, opening her door as well, “yes, sir.”
A couple hours later, after putting away all of the groceries and Gina's new belongings, the two sat down for a breakfast of buttery, mixed berry scones drenched in thin, sugary icing, eggs scrambled with chopped spinach, diced onions and tomatoes, (and cheddar cheese in Ricky's case), and fat slabs of ham on the side. All made by Gina herself.
And for the first time in as long as the two could remember, they felt truly at home.