Audrey’s Road Trip
By Susan Bella Ikin
First published 2017
Copyright © Susan Bella Ikin 2017
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This is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and situations within its pages and places or persons, living or dead, is unintentional and co-incidental.
Audrey’s Road Trip
Audrey
It had been a long flight, the plane had been full so there had been no opportunity to stretch out, and several small children seem to have taken it in turns to cry loudly so that any chance of sleep was gone for everyone within earshot. We had collected our bags from the conveyor belts, and were now standing in a seemingly endless queue to get out of Los Angeles Airport.
When I had originally agreed to go on this road trip, the four of us had decided that we would keep baggage to a minimum, as we would be sharing a car. So I had packed as lightly as I could, having only a large backpack and a cabin bag for my laptop and my wallet and small camera. James had packed similarly, and Andrew was also quite a light traveler, but Kerry had insisted that she needed a large suitcase, a small one, and a carryon bag. Consequently she had been struggling since we boarded the plane in Melbourne, and everyone had to help her out. I was already annoyed, which wasn’t boding well for the next three months.
I really didn’t know Kerry and Andrew, I had only met them once before we all met at Tullamarine Airport. Well, to be honest, I had only spoken to them once before, I did know their faces. I had only agreed to this trip because James was going, I had a crush on him years before, but he didn’t know that, he didn’t even remember me, which wasn’t surprising under the circumstances.
I had first seen James during Orientation week at University, when I was a first year student. I was studying accounting, and James was a final year student who was helping out with some of the activities. I had seen him behind a table handing out brochures to other first year students like myself, and had instantly developed a burning crush on him, and had approached the table thinking to feign an interest in whatever club he was promoting, just so I could talk to him. There were a couple of people ahead of me, and just before it would have been my turn to approach the tall, brown haired and very handsome student, another young woman appeared and pulled his head down to kiss him passionately. His arms went around her and he clearly forgot everything else but kissing this woman. I instantly hated her.
During my first year, I saw the couple around the lecture halls quite a lot, and they were usually kissing, or had hands all over each other. It was quite annoying to see. I don't think anyone else actually paid any attention, but my crush on James meant that I could not ignore them if I saw them. I had managed to find out that his name was James, and that her name was Maddy (I assumed it was short for Madeline, but didn’t bother to find out). I also saw James with another couple which I later knew to be Kerry and Andrew, and the four of them spent a lot of time with each other.
Eventually the third year students graduated, and I didn’t see James anymore. That was until Emily gave me the number of a ‘friend of a friend’ who was planning a trip to the USA with some other friends, but as one of them had dropped out, they were looking for a replacement traveler. As they were planning to go for the entire American summer, they needed the fourth person to share the costs, and Emily knew that I was interested in travel, so thought I should meet with them to see if I wanted to go.
I had called the number and had spoken to a man with a beautiful rich voice, and as no warning bells had gone off during the phone call, I agreed to meet him. I knew that he was the younger brother of a friend of Emily’s friend Sarah, and that Emily had met him, so if he had seemed a bit ‘off’ Emily wouldn’t have given me his number, and I thought there could be no harm in meeting him.
We agreed to meet at Flinders Street Station, under the clocks, as generations of Melburnians had done before us. James had told me that he would be wearing jeans and a t-shirt, and that so I could recognize him he would be carrying a brochure with the Statue of Liberty on the front. When I arrived, I was struck dumb by the amazing coincidences of life. The man standing under the clocks was not only a head turner, but he was that man from Uni. I almost turned and ran, but curiousity made me approach him. But I determined that if one of the other people going was Maddy, I would not be spending three months travelling around with them, watching them paw each other. I had enough of that over three years ago!
James noticed me approaching and I saw an appreciative glint in his eye. I knew that I looked good in my jeans and close cut top, and allowed a little wiggle to make its way into my walk. I saw the moment he realized that I wasn’t just a random person walking past, but was the Audrey that he had spoken to on the phone. The glint in his eye told me that he was pleased that the woman he might be travelling with was easy on the eye, but I wasn’t impressed by that – was Maddy still in the picture? Even if she wasn’t, I was nothing like her, so if that’s what he expected he was going to be very disappointed.
“You must be James” I said, holding out my hand.
“Yes, I guess I must.” He said taking my hand. A feeling like a small electric shock make my fingers tingle at the contact. This wasn’t a good development. “That would make you Audrey?” he asked.
I nodded yes, and James offered to buy me a drink in Young & Jackson’s, a pub on the opposite corner, so that we could talk. I accepted, hoping that he wasn’t planning to ply me with alcohol. If that was the type of person he was, I wouldn’t be going on this trip, and as I had already started thinking about the places I could go, that would be disappointing.
As it turned out, when we sat down at a table with our drinks, James became all business, and I began to relax. Just because James liked what he saw, he obviously wasn’t the kind to act on every impulse, so that was good. I was still on my guard though. At some point, James stopped talking about the trip, and looked at me queryingly:
“Have we met somewhere before? You look familiar, but I can’t place your face”.
Really? Had James really noticed me in the one year when we were at Uni at the same time? I didn’t want to admit that I had known who he was when I saw him, as I didn’t want to get into lengthy explanations which might lead him to realize that I had a crush on him at Uni anyway. Although I thought it was long behind me, apparently it wasn’t, as I still found him very attractive, so I was going to have to be careful.
“No, I don’t think so, did Emily show you my photo or something?” I decided to play dumb.
Eventually, after James asked where I worked, which lead to him discovering that I was an accountant like him, he asked where I had gone to Uni, and then when that had been. So in just a few questions James worked out that we must have ‘crossed paths’ at some time during his final year of Uni, and I agreed that was where it must have been.
James and I sat talking for a few hours, and by the end of that time I knew I wanted to meet his friends. I thought that I could put my crush on him behind me, and enjoy travelling around America with him, we had hit it off well and seemed to have plenty in common to talk about. I had esta
blished that his friends were a couple that he had known since Uni, so obviously the female was not Maddy. If the meeting with his friends went well, then I would agree to go.
Obviously, the meeting had gone well, as here we all were. We had permission to enter the USA for a three month holiday, and Andrew had arranged a cheap rental of an SUV, since we would be using it for so long. We had all put in requests for places we wanted to see, and had sorted out a rough itinerary, planning a large loop around the west coast and central states. As all three of us enjoyed bush walking, we planned to spend a lot of time in the National Parks, particularly as we could buy an annual pass which would mean that the cost per park was very low. We planned to purchase some cheap tents so that we could camp in some of the parks, and keep our costs down that way, and had agreed that as much as possible we would share rooms when we booked into motels.
Although Kerry and Andrew were a couple, they agreed that when we could only get a room which had two beds, Kerry and I would share, and James and Andrew would share, so that we only had to pay for one room between us. The alternative was staying in hostels, but as we each were bringing some valuable items such as laptops or cameras, none of us wanted to stay in a room full of strangers.
However, returning to my earlier gripe about Kerry’s bag, it wasn’t a good sign. Not only was she unable to manage her own luggage by herself, but I was wondering if all four of us, and our bags, were going to fit into the car! I think my annoyance must have shown, as she was speaking to me less, and to Andrew and James more. I hoped we weren't going to be sharing a bed tonight, as she was beginning to seriously annoy me and I didn't want to be that close to her!
Finally we cleared through the customs line, and headed to the shuttle bus which would take us to the car hire office. By this stage, all I wanted to do was shower, brush my teeth and get into clean clothes, the trip had been long and I felt uncomfortable, particularly as it was quite warm outside the terminal.
Our itinerary was going to take us south of Los Angeles, and hopefully to Mexico, but we had to sort that out at the car hire office first, Andrew had been unable to organize insurance. Apparently James, Andrew, Kerry and their friend had been thinking of taking a short cruise to Mexico, but had decided to drive there instead. Accomodation was a lot cheaper in Mexico, so the plan was to spend a week there.
However, that was the next problem, the car hire business was not happy for one of their cars to be taken to Mexico, especially by foreigners such as ourselves, as apparently car jackings were common enough that insurance was going to be prohibitive. We decided to abandon that plan. After sorting out the paperwork, and waiting for the car to be ready – even though we had arrived on time, the car wasn’t ready – we finally were handed the keys to a car and headed towards it, James helping Kerry with her luggage as Andrew was holding onto the paperwork for the car.
No matter how we arranged the luggage, we couldn’t fit everything into the rear luggage compartment, so we put one of the soft backpacks in the middle of the backseat. This now meant that we wouldn’t be able to leave the car unattended, as anyone passing by could see that there were items stored in the car. Damn Kerry and her overpacking – it was only day one and I was already losing patience with her – although maybe my tiredness had something to do with that.
Somehow Kerry and Andrew climbed into the backseat first, which left James and myself to take the front seat. James volunteered to drive, and as I was so tired, I agreed, although I queried James on how he felt.
“I’m ok for now”, James said, “But if I feel tired, we should stop because I couldn’t sleep at all on the plane, so I’ve probably been up for over twenty-four hours now. I just want to get out of the city, then we’ll see if we can find somewhere that looks good, don’t you agree?”
Andrew said yes from the back seat, as I didn’t hear from Kerry I looked around, and she was already asleep. Lucky Kerry. We drove for a while, following directions to the coast road. We were planning to follow highway one down to San Diego, then turn around and drive up the road as far as Canada.
From the street signs, we soon realized we would be driving past Santa Monica, so we drove onto the pier and found a place to park. Kerry was still asleep and Andrew was starting to doze, so James tossed the keys to Andrew and said we would knock on the window when we wanted to get back in. Andrew sleepily nodded and rolled his window down a bit to let in some air, then leaned his head against the headrest in the middle of the backseat and went to sleep.
James and I walked along the pier, the fresh air woke me up a little bit, but I was still concerned about James. He had shadows under his eyes which demonstrated how tired he was, and as we walked and looked at the various attractions, I again suggested that we stop soon, as we didn’t want to have our trip cut short by having a car accident on day one! James bought a coffee and agreed that we would stop soon, he conceded that it had been overly ambitious to think we would get far on the first day, we had three months after all, so there would be no rush.
We walked back to the car, and startled Andrew out of a sound sleep by knocking loudly on the window. He passed us the keys and then went back to sleep. I was envious as I was tired myself, but I refused to give in to sleep and leave James on his own, not only was that not fair, but it was not safe – without someone to talk to, he might nod off while driving and that could be fatal for us all.
Eventually we only made it as far as Seal Beach, which wasn’t very far out of Los Angeles at all, and checked into a cheap motel that had a family room with two bedrooms. We had woken Andrew and Kerry up, and carried in all our bags. Before any discussion was had about sleeping arrangements, Andrew and Kerry took the master bedroom, James and I were left with the ‘children’s’ bedroom, which had two single beds. Not being in a mood to argue, I quickly showered and dressed into summer pyjamas, and must have been asleep before my head hit the pillow. We had broken one of the first rules of travelling – instead of trying to get ourselves onto the local time zone, we had all gone to sleep when tired, so it was going to be difficult getting our body clocks to line up with local time, but I was so tired, I didn’t really care.
James
I woke up in the twilight, feeling disoriented. Where was I? The room was unfamiliar. I was also lying in a single bed, something I hadn’t done for years. I heard the sound of soft breathing and looked over at the noise – that’s right, I was sharing a room with Audrey. In the dim light, I could see her outline as she lay covered only by the thin sheet. She was lying on her side, facing the other way, and the sheet clung to her form. I lay there for a while looking at the way the sheet followed the dip where her waist was, and rose again to outline the shape of her hip. Nice.
Since I had met Audrey a couple of months ago, and worked out that we had been at University together, albeit briefly, I had been wondering what it would have been like if I had not been so heavily involved with Maddy. I had been doing relatively well in first and second years, although I had noticed Maddy, which wasn't surprising as her obvious charms had most of the young men in her classes lusting after her. Maddy however had been involved with a final year Law Student, and had not been interested in anyone in any of her classes. However, once that student had graduated, Maddy had looked around for a replacement, and had seen me. Not that I had complained, Maddy was passionate, and not afraid to let a man know exactly what she wanted and how he could please her, and over the summer holiday term, which we both attended, we began a very passionate and steamy relationship. Neither of us had been under any misapprehension that our relationship had been about anything other than sex, but I was young enough, and horny enough, to not care.
Our relationship had continued into final year, and between nights spent with Maddy, and time spent on my part time job, my grades had began to suffer. One lecturer had drawn me aside halfway through the year, and explained that if I didn’t make some changes, I would be lucky to graduate at all. I had tried to slow things down with Maddy, but it was
difficult, partly because she wasn’t interested in how her behaviour impacted on me, partly because I really didn’t want to have less sex with Maddy anyway. I had been with very few women before going to University, so Maddy’s overt sexuality was difficult to resist.
I had seen Audrey around the lecture rooms a few times, and at those times had tried to be a little bit less demonstrative about my ‘affection’ for Maddy, but Maddy always seemed to be able to bring my attention back to her, mostly by whispered promises of what we could do after class that day.
I did manage to pass after all, but not very well, so had not got the job of my dreams as those jobs went to students with better marks than I achieved. As soon as exams were over, Maddy dropped me anyway, reminding me that we had never made promises to each other, and she needed to be with a man more successful than I would be. The last I had heard she was seeing a junior partner in a law firm. Although I missed the hot, unbridled sex that seemed to happen all the time, I found that I really didn’t miss Maddy. She had been very high maintenance, had not had anything to offer outside the bedroom so unless we were actually engaged in sex we had nothing to say to each other, and I wanted more for my future. I knuckled down and worked very hard, having no social life at all, and eventually my endeavours were noticed by my superiors and they offered me opportunities for growth. After I learned everything I could at the small accountancy firm that I started work for after graduation, the senior accountant arranged an interview for me at one of the prestige firms, saying that he could not offer me the type of work that I had shown I was capable of.
So for the last couple of years I had been working very long hours, and not taking much leave, which had allowed me to accumulate a bit of leave, and some money. I had stayed in touch with Kerry and Andrew, and when they had suggested taking some time off and rewarding ourselves with this trip, I had agreed. A friend from my old firm had been going to be the fourth person, but a family emergency had made him pull out, and at a barbecue hosted by my brother and his wife I had met a friend of theirs named Emily who said she had a sister who might be interested in making up the numbers for the trip. That had been Audrey, and I was surprised and delighted to discover that not only was I going to be on holiday with someone that I felt an immediate connection with, but that we had actually met before, even though we hadn’t gotten to know each other.
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