Road Trip

by Andie M. Long

  I can’t cope with this. Dick used to snore, but nothing to this degree. I’m just merging onto the M1 when I suddenly can’t take it anymore. Felix fucking Montague needs to wake his arse up and NOW.

  I swing my arm back and elbow him in the chest with such force that he blurts awake in a wild panic, eyes bulging out of his sockets, his arms flailing around so erratically he hits me away. My head hits the side of the door hard.

  ‘Fuck!’ I shout, the pain blinding me temporarily.

  ‘Shit,’ he hisses, as the car loses control. I feel myself flung around the car as he desperately attempts to take the wheel. I try too, slamming my foot on the brake.

  We spin fast into a circle, the brakes screeching underneath me so that Felix’s hard body is thrown into mine. I scrunch my eyes shut to stop the view of the road whizzing around me.

  I’m going to die. Oh my God, I’m going to die!

  It takes a few seconds of just hearing my own accelerated breathing to realise the car has stopped moving. I open my eyes slowly and look around. Felix is staring at me, eyes wide, clearly shaken.

  ‘What the fuck, Kitty Kat?’

  I stare back at him, my tongue quivering so much in my mouth I can’t seem to form a response. He takes the wheel and starts steering it to the left.

  ‘Accelerate slowly.’

  I look around to see that we’re in the left-hand lane and traffic is having to go around us. Slowly together we manage to get it on the hard shoulder. As soon as he pulls the handbrake up he turns to me, taking my shaking hand in his.

  ‘Katy, are you okay?’

  My throat tightens, emotion clawing at it. Looking into his concerned eyes is too much for me right now. I burst into tears. Big, ugly, full-on snotty tears. He undoes my seat belt and pulls me into his chest, lifting me off my chair and over the handbrake onto his lap as if I weigh nothing at all.

  He cradles me to him as I sob uncontrollably. I almost just killed us, all because I couldn’t stand his snoring. What does that say about me? What does it say about my personality that his snoring grates on me that much? Maybe Felix is right, and I do have a stick up my arse.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I sob.

  He pulls me back to look at me, tilting up my chin with his index finger.

  ‘What the hell happened back there? Did I…’ his face twists in torment. ‘Did I hit you in my sleep?’

  Oh bless him, he thinks he’s turned into a woman beater in his slumber.

  ‘I hit you first,’ I admit begrudgingly. He frowns back at me. ‘It’s just that you snore so fucking bad. Has anyone ever told you that before?’

  ‘No,’ he says in horror. ‘I don’t bloody snore.’

  ‘You do! You’re like a foghorn. Maybe it’s just because you kick your skanks out right after sex and don’t give them the pleasure of staying the night to hear your horrendous snoring.’

  His face twists. Why does he look so angry?

  ‘I don’t sleep with skanks,’ he snaps, completely removing his arms from around me. ‘I’m driving.’ He gets out, leaving me to fall into the seat and slams the door behind him. Well… that’s upset him.

  He goes around to the driver's seat and lets himself in, completely ignoring me. Why do I feel so terrible? He does sleep with skanks, right?

  I thought driving with Felix would be hard work, but I never banked on him giving me the silent treatment. Normally he’s a right chatty bastard. I can’t have offended him that much, can I? Or maybe he is rightly moody due the fact that I nearly killed him. God, what was I thinking?

  Anyway, I need to focus. We’ve just pulled into Norfolk and Felix's interview is in an hour. My stomach rumbles, reminding me that I haven’t eaten since breakfast. I suppose nearly killing yourself will make you forget about your stomach. Well, only for so long in my case.

  ‘Can we pull over somewhere and get something to eat?’

  He nods, without saying a word.

  ‘Shall we just grab a maccy d’s?’

  ‘Yeah fine. Suppose it’ll help the budget.’

  I find the nearest one using my map app on my phone and he parks up. We start queuing up with him still ignoring me. I’ve had enough of this crap.

  I poke him in the shoulder. ‘So are you going to ignore me all day or what?’

  He sighs. ‘Well I’m sorry if I’m a little pissed off that you almost killed us.’

  ‘Was it really that? Or just that I intimated you were a manwhore?’

  He rolls his eyes. ‘Did you ever just consider that I could be nervous?’

  ‘Nervous?’ I blurt out in shock. ‘Nervous of what?’

  He rolls his eyes. ‘If you must know, I haven’t had an interview for a year and I’m hoping they don’t ask any stupid questions.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like what bloody animal I think I’d be.’

  I snort out a laugh. ‘Well if it helps I reckon you’d be a cheater.’

  He looks offended. ‘Hey, don’t put all us men in the same category as your ex.’

  ‘Oh really?’ I laugh. ‘Coming from the manwhore.’

  ‘Hey, I might have slept with a few women, but I don’t cheat when I’m in a relationship.’

  ‘That’s because you don’t have relationships,’ I counter with a smug smile.

  He grins, breaking the tension. ‘True.’

  We finally make it to the counter and put our order in. I decide to treat myself to a McFlurry too. The lady gives us our meal on a tray but tells me I have to wait for the McFlurry as there’s something wrong with the machine. Isn’t there bloody always?

  Felix takes the food and wanders off to find us a table while I wait behind. God, I’d tell them to forget it, if it wasn’t my favourite dessert. The woman finally places it down at the counter before running off to serve someone else.

  I reach out to pick it up, but it's whipped away from me right before my eyes. I turn around to see a teenage girl about to walk away with it.

  ‘Hey!’ I shout aggressively. ‘That’s my McFlurry!’

  She turns, a devilish smile on her lips. ‘I don’t think so. This is my McFlurry.’

  ‘Well then you must be bloody blind, because that woman just handed it over to me.’

  She shrugs. ‘Finders keepers, bitch.’

  She turns around and starts to walk away. The fucking cheek of it!

  Before I even consider what I’m doing, I grab her arm and pull her back. She stares at me in horror.

  ‘Listen here, you little bitch. I’ve already had the week from hell. I’ve been cheated on, fired, and now the one thing I’m looking forward to has been taken away from me by you. Not happening, sweetheart.’

  I grab the McFlurry out of her hands. She attempts to grab it back and almost instantly we’re playing tug-of-war with it.

  Felix appears. ‘Kat, what the hell are you doing?’

  ‘This bitch is trying to take my McFlurry!’ I shout, just as I lose my footing and the girl and I both topple over onto the floor.

  He tries to intervene, attempting to take the McFlurry off both of us, but instead his strong hands force the ice-cream to shoot up and onto his suit jacket shoulder, and his chin. Oh crap.

  I stare at him in horror, eyes wide. ‘Oh my God. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Jesus, Kitty Kat. I’ve heard of women creaming themselves around me, but this is ridiculous.’

  ‘I still can’t believe I’m going to have to walk in with a stained jacket,’ Felix moans as we wait in the reception area of the school.

  ‘Oh shut up moaning about it, will you? I’m embarrassed enough.’

  He smirks. ‘I still can’t believe you had it in you, Kitty Kat. Who knew you had claws? It just took a love for ice-cream to bring it out.’

  I smile despite feeling pissed off. He has that effect on me. ‘Just don’t ever get in the way of me and my desserts and we’ll get along just fine.’

  He’s the first one to be called, by a tall woman in her early fifties. He saunters
in like he doesn’t have a care in the world, when I know he’s nervous. Who knew someone as cocky as him actually felt nerves? I suppose there’s still a lot I have to learn about Felix Montague.

  He emerges forty minutes later with the usual cocky grin I’ve become accustomed to. It still gives me a girly thrill when It's aimed at me. He gives me a discreet thumbs-up behind the woman. Well he obviously aced it.

  ‘Katy Cornish?’ the woman asks me.

  I nod, with a large swallow. Now it’s my turn, I feel ridiculously nervous. I’ve never been good at interviews.

  I follow her in and sit across from her. She looks a bit flushed actually. That’s what you get for spending forty minutes with Felix. Flushed. Not that he affects me like that. Of course not.

  The interview goes well. I’m not as nervous and awkward as I’d feared and I’m feeling pretty confident by the end that I could be in with a chance of getting the role. Ha, that would piss Felix off.

  The door suddenly bursts open and a scared looking secretary comes in. ‘I’m so sorry, Mrs Amble, but your daughter has said she needs to see you urgently.’

  She’s pushed aside by a teenage girl who stomps past me and straight to her mother. Oh dear Jesus! It’s the girl I was wrestling with over a McFlurry only a few hours earlier.

  Shit, shit, shit.

  Maybe if I keep my head down she won’t notice me?

  ‘Mum, Miss Philips is picking on me again. I’m telling you, you need to fire that bitch.’

  Mrs Amble’s face reddens, obviously embarrassed for it to have happened in front of me.

  ‘Darling, this is something we need to discuss later. I’m interviewing right now.’ She points to me as if to prove her point.

  I discreetly nod, keeping my eyes on the floor. I can’t help but take a peek and the little bitch is staring at me with recognition. Damn it!

  ‘You’re interviewing her?’ she asks in disgust.

  Mrs Amble looks at her daughter confused. ‘Yes. Have you already met Miss Cornish?’

  Here she goes. An evil smirk spreads over her lips.

  ‘You could say that. She assaulted me earlier.’

  Mrs Amble’s mouth drops open, practically touching the floor. ‘What?’

  Okay, how am I going to play this? Think Katy. I’ll feign ignorance and claim it wasn’t me.

  I pointedly look behind me. ‘Sorry, do you mean me?’ I ask as innocently as I can.

  ‘Yes, you!’ she shouts. She turns back to her mum. ‘This woman is a nutter. Do NOT hire her.’

  ‘You must have me confused with someone else,’ I offer with a shake of my head. ‘You hear about teenagers getting confused all the time. It's your hormones.’

  She jumps into my face. ‘I know it was you, bitch!’

  God, she’s aggressive for a young one. Maybe I don’t want to work here if this is what the calibre of teenagers are like.

  ‘Just admit it!’ she screams, her eyes bulging out of their sockets. Jesus, is she on coke or something?

  In that moment I want to smash her face in. I feel everything I’ve been through in the past week bubble up inside me. Getting cheated on, my own sister betraying me, losing my job, my parents moving away, having to travel with Felix. It bubbles until it hits boiling point.

  ‘You stole my McFlurry!’ I scream back, so loudly it echoes off the walls.

  Silence descends on the room.

  Uh-oh. That was definitely not the right way to react.

  Katy

  ‘I can’t believe it’s straight back on the road, I’m knackered.’ I complain, my eyes heavy and sore.

  ‘Well, maybe if you hadn’t been brawling you’d have more energy,’ Felix fires back. Smart arse.

  ‘So, it’s five pm and the route planner says three and a half hours travelling so we’d better get on our way. I’ll start driving and you have a nap. Then you can take over halfway.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ I tell him. After the drama of earlier I’m in no great rush to get behind the wheel again.

  ‘What are we going to do about food?’ He asks me. God, men, all they think about is either their stomachs or their dicks.

  ‘No idea. Needs to be cheap.’ I bite my lip while I think. ‘I know, lets pop into a supermarket when we get a bit nearer and raid the reduced section.’

  ‘Bargain old food it is. I can hardly wait.’ Felix moans as we get into the car and he starts driving.

  Of course, what we had not factored into the journey is tea-time traffic. In an hour we’ve moved what the Sat Nav estimated would take fifteen minutes. I now wish I’d not drunk a bottle full of water after my interview. It wasn’t my fault my throat was so dry. It was the interview and then trying to get away from the stupid McFlurry stealing bitch.

  Needless to say, I won’t be accepting a job there should they offer me one, which they won’t because I may have been dragged out of the room by Felix when Mrs Amble said everything could be settled by my apologising to her daughter. For which I shouted I would not be apologising to a McFlurry stealing brat, and I hoped that she was better at controlling schoolchildren than she was her daughter. Oops.

  Mrs Amble was about ready to grab my hair for insulting her and her delightful daughter when Felix came in and daughter dearest said the ice-cream on his jacket was hers and proceeded to try to lick it off. At which point her mother dragged her off while Felix got hold of me. We left in haste.

  Now we’re stuck in a traffic jam when I’d asked Felix if we could nip down to the coast and enjoy an ice-cream beforehand. But oh no, "We need to be on our way”, he’d said, so now here we were, stuck in my car: no ice-cream, no beach, and with my desperate need to piss.

  ‘I need to pee,’ I tell him.

  He turns to me. ‘Well, we’re nose to tail. Why don’t you nip out and go behind the bushes? I won’t have gone far.’

  ‘I am not peeing behind bushes! And anyway, what if the traffic clears and then I’m stuck out here while you’ve gone off in my car? Or what if a bee stings my arse cheek?’

  Flashbacks of Charlotte Jensen’s sixteenth birthday play back in my mind. That damn bee. I couldn’t sit down for a week.

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Katy.’ He looks at me with furrowed brows. ‘Oh God, it happened didn’t it? Only to you. It could happen only to you.’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault, it was Victoria’s.’ I huff. ‘She hit it with a stick while I was at a swimming pool party. It flew around and stung my bum. Then it died, so I felt really sad while Vic laughed that it had been so scared of my bottom it had died of fright.’

  I could tell that Felix was trying very hard not to burst out laughing. Bastard. ‘How old were you when this happened?’

  ‘Fifteen. And I will never pee in the open air because of it.’ I cross my arms over my chest so he knows I mean it.

  ‘Well, I don’t know what else we’ll pass, but there are some services in two hours. Well, two hours plus traffic jam time.’

  ‘TWO HOURS! I can’t wait another two minutes.’ My bladder is so bursting full it feels like it's going to split in two at any moment.

  ‘Grass it is then.’ He nods towards the bank in challenge. ‘Look, I’ll pull in to a layby when we get to one and you can use the car as cover.’

  I pick up my water bottle. ‘Do you think I could get it in here?’ I ponder. God, guys have it so much easier with their dicks. ‘No, that’s disgusting. I can’t do it.’

  ‘It’s not a fucking SHEWEE, but stop being so goddamn uptight woman. If you need to piss, get it in the bottle. Pretend I’m a doctor and I’ve asked you to provide a urine specimen.’

  I huff, ‘Definitely can’t do it now. You made me remember that when I do wee samples, I get wee all over my hands.’

  ‘God help me,’ Felix says, looking up at the roof of the car.

  After another thirty excruciating minutes, Felix pulls into a layby. My hesitancy about peeing in the grass has worn off due to the fact that I’m afraid that I’ll explode and cover Felix and
my car interior in a golden shower at any moment.

  I dash into the grass, lowering my pants down as I hover. My stream starts with a gush. Boy, I really did need to wee, and the feeling is akin to an intense orgasm. It’s that good. Not that I’ve had too many with Dick.

  It's then I hear the buzzing. What the fuck? My luck can’t be that bad, right? I must be having some kind of panic-induced flashback instead.

  I grab my knickers and drag them up quickly anyway, but it's as the material touches my skin that I feel the piercing sting. Motherfucker!

  ‘Ouch, fucking ouch. Oh my God,’ I scream, pulling my knickers down to find a dying bee. Well that’s what you get when you go around stinging innocent victims arses. God, the pain throbs uncontrollably. I run for the car leaving my pants in my wake.

  ‘What the fuck is the matter with you now?’ Felix asks, shaking his head as I run towards him. ‘I know you’re desperate for me but running towards me knicker-less is a tad desperate.’

  ‘Shut up, you dickhead! I’ve been stung on my arse again. Felix, help me, it burns.’ I shriek as I catch up to the side of the car.

  ‘You will not have been stung, you’re just panicking.’ He says, as tears fall down my face.

  ‘I have. Felix it really hurts. The sting is probably still in it. You’re going to have to look and take it out.’

  His jaw drops. ‘You want me to look at your naked ass in a layby on the A17? We’re not going to make tomorrow’s interviews, we’re going to be arrested!’

  Hearty tears now pour down my cheeks and drip off my chin. ‘I’ve never been so embarrassed in my whole life. Oh, I want to die.’ I wail dramatically.

  ‘Now, come on, Katy.’ Felix pats me on the shoulder. ‘It’s not that bad. Come on then, let me take a look. You are not going to die.’

  ‘I am going to die.’ I state. ‘Of embarrassment.’

  He looks at me sternly. ‘Katy, I work with teenagers; I’ve seen worse things than your naked bum, let me tell you.’

  ‘That would help,’ I sniffle.