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Gwen parked her mother’s car by the sidewalk outside Kevin’s house, then walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell. Kevin’s mother had invited her for dinner, and after the busy day she’d had, catching up on homework and school projects that had been put on the backburner because of the team’s missions, good food and good company were exactly what she needed to unwind.
She didn’t get to greet Kevin when he opened the door; he immediately bent down to kiss her on the lips and wrapped his arms around her waist. She laughed, her warm breath vibrating against his lips.
When neither of them could take the lack of air anymore, he pulled away, dragging her bottom lip between his teeth. Slowly, he opened his eyes to see her smiling at him with a raised brow, as if to ask where his fervor had come from. “Had to get that outta my system before Mom got home,” he explained shamelessly.
“I’m not complaining.” She patted his chest before walking past him through the open door. “Where is your mom, anyway?”
“Out gettin’ ingredients.” He shut the door and joined her by the couch, sinking into the cushion with a contented sigh.
Gwen remained standing, her curiosity piqued by a cartoon on the TV which Kevin unpaused. She picked up the DVD case from the coffee table. “Captain Planet and the Planeteers?”
He gave her a weak shrug. “Wanted to relive my childhood. Sue me.”
The name didn’t ring a bell, so it was only when she read the synopsis on the back that something clicked. “Oh, is this the show you kept talking about the other day? Never watched it.”
He grinned, keeping his eyes glued to the TV. “Dug it outta storage this morning. Didn’t even know Mom still kept it. I almost…” His voice cracked, his next words sounding foreign to him. “I almost feel like a kid again. Can’t believe I forgot what the show was even called. I used to watch it all the time!”
Thinking back to the mission on the Pacific Garbage Vortex, Gwen remembered how dismissive she’d been. She hadn’t realized how much those TV shows meant to Kevin, but now it all made sense. His childhood had effectively been cut short by his running away from home, and even before that, it had been far from ideal. Watching those shows had given him respite from all that troubled him. Of course he’d hold on to those fond memories.
At the lack of a response from her, he grabbed the remote and paused the episode. “Uh, riiiight, you don’t care. Lemme put somethin’ else on.”
He didn’t sound offended, but she felt like an insensitive jerk nonetheless. “No, I care.” She put the DVD case down and sat next to him, keeping her body flush with his despite the ample space on the couch. “I’m sorry.”
He stared at her blankly. “Uh… what for?”
She hoped he could see the sincerity on her face as she turned to him. “For brushing you off the other day when you were all excited about your shows.”
He held up a hand. “Nah, I get it. We were on a mission.”
Gwen tightly interlaced her fingers with Kevin’s and lowered his hand to his lap. “Still, I don’t want you thinking I don’t care about the stuff you like. This show clearly means a lot to you, and I wanna see why.”
“Ya sure? You don’t needa do it for my sake. I can put somethin’ else on, it’s no big deal.”
“If it’s important to you, it’s important to me.” She squeezed his hand to accentuate her point. Compared to the countless times he’d sat through a movie he didn’t like with her, or gone shopping with her, this was nothing.
He thanked her with a smile, then faced the TV and unpaused the episode.
She tapped the back of his hand. “Start from the beginning.”
After doing as he was asked, Kevin put the remote down and wrapped his arm around Gwen’s shoulders. “Maybe we can watch some X-Files with Mom after dinner? Pretty sure we have the boxset somewhere.”
“Sure! What’s X-Files?”
“Oh, boy.”