Dedicated to _antisocialbookworm_ because she's literally everywhere. Thanks for checking out all my works babe ilysm

Chapter 5

At first I thought I could handle the car ride if I just stayed silent, trying to forget the fact that Austin was sitting right next to me, with nothing but the console between us to separate our seats.

I thought that if I busied myself with other things, like poring over the car's interior—noting the slightly greasy dashboard, the crumbs caught on the frizzy floor mats, the fact that the speedometer didn't seem to be working—I could distract myself enough to forget his presence.

It was, however, a lot more difficult than I expected.

It wasn't just because I didn't have my phone with me. If I did, I could have plugged my earphones on and read a book to keep myself busy. It was also because Austin was singing along to the Paramore album we chose earlier—and his singing was horrid.

Five minutes in and it was already driving me crazy. "Dick, please stop singing."

He sent me a sideways glance before grinning a manic grin and belting out the lyrics of For a Pessimist, I'm Pretty Optimistic even louder than before.

I never thought I could feel so much hatred for one person at that moment. I glared at him, wondering if my ears would bleed to death just by hearing his tone-deaf screeching. And even if they didn't, I wouldn't be surprised if my auditory sense had been permanently impaired.

When it became clear that there was no way I could force him to stop singing as long I showed the slightest bit of annoyance, I pursed my lips together and looked out the window instead.

There was also something that's been nagging me at the back of my head, but I refused to acknowledge it completely. I could feel it, though, as the events of the night played back in my head. It was like he and I had a lot of things in common—our short tempers and mutual hatred for each other. I could see why we would clash like two cars colliding with each other, casualties be damned.

But if I was even just the slightest bit similar to him, did that mean I was just as insufferable?

Well, at least I wasn't a terrible singer. "Turn left here." My voice had lost the fight in it. Ignoring his singing (if one could even call it that) was sucking all the energy out of me.

Tori owed me big-time.

Something also seemed off here. Tori wouldn't have ditched me as easily as that, would she? (Now that I think about it, the answer was yes.) She seemed smitten with Lewis, enough for her to possibly run off with him. She also knew I (supposedly) had her phone, so maybe she'd left me a message there to meet up somewhere else, but we couldn't get back to Tyler's house with the cops lurking around the area.

If we couldn't manage to find her and Lewis immediately, maybe we could go back to Tyler's to look for the phone in an hour or so.

Just the thought of having to stay with Austin for one more hour made me want to moan pitifully to myself. It was hard enough to try fighting the terrible hallucinations brought about by his singing, which I was sure would haunt me long after we've parted ways.

"Dick, please stop singing," I finally snapped when he sang a particularly high note that no one could ever sing more horribly than he just did.

He looked at me with a sneer, but he did stop singing. (The annoyance, however, didn't exactly lessen with the look on his face.) "I've heard most girls love it when guys serenade them."

"I hate it when guys serenade girls." I made a face. "Second, your singing isn't exactly lovable."

"Georgina isn't complaining." He momentarily reached for the dashboard, rubbing it soothingly. "Right, Georgie?"

"Now that I think about it, remember the Georgina's whining when you tried the engine on?" I said. "That's exactly how your singing sounds like."

"Aww, Georgie," he gushed, "Red complimented your singing. We should harmonize and serenade her, G."

"Georgie, Dick here sits on a throne of lies. That was not a compliment to either of you."

He started snickering all of a sudden, making me wonder if he finally cracked, going bonkers from all this stress. "You're talking to a car."

"You're talking to a car."

Shooting me a quick look, he smirked. "Unlike you, Georgina and I share a special bond."

I looked away and focused instead outside the window, watching the houses disappear behind us. "I'm sure it's a very special relationship."

"She tells me you stink, by the way. Says you're getting that marshmallow stench all over the car."

"What was that, Georgie?" I leaned closer to the dashboard, tilting my ears to it, like I was listening in on some secret. I leaned back and looked over at Austin. "She says you smell like beer and it's disgusting."

"That was your fault."

"I don't think you've fully grasped the concept of an accident," I pointed out.

Something in his face shifted. His slightly annoyed expression was replaced with a stern look. "Oh, trust me, I have."

I blinked. I was sure I hadn't just imagined the change in the tone in his voice—clipped and resentful, bordering on bitter. Whatever it was, I hadn't expected to hear anything even remotely close to that from him.

I figured, however, that it wasn't any of my business, so I shut up and tore my eyes away from him. I clamped my mouth shut, trying not to wonder what that was all about.

Despite the stereo blasting Paramore, the silence in the car was heavy with something I couldn't quite point out, and for a second I wondered if his horrible singing would have been better than this eerie hush.

---

For a few weeks after the almost-getting-r@ped incident, Tori refused to go to talk to anyone other than her therapist.

I came over as much as I could, but she had locked herself up in her room and when I knocked, she wouldn't even bother with a reply. All my calls went straight to voice mail and all the messages I sent her received no replies.

It was the longest time we'd spent not talking to each other.

There was something scary about that—seeing your friend shut you out. Knowing someone who talked about literally anything could suddenly just stop talking. Because of this and the guilt eating me up inside, I felt something tugging at me, like a string, binding me to Tori until I made a silent promise to myself.

I was never going to let her get in harm's way.

It could easily be an empty promise, but I wouldn't let that stop me from trying to keep her from doing crazy things.

She, of course, didn't make it so easy.

Here I was, running around the town with a guy I barely knew, riding a car who was actually named Georgina, while trying not to think too much of how this night could have gone differently if we never watched that fucking movie in the first place.

I checked my wristwatch as the car slowed down. It was thirty-seven minutes past eight. Somehow, we decided to check the parking lots and the general area around the clubs to look for my car, hoping it would be parked nearby. I squinted in the darkness, trying to see despite the lack of light.

The Paramore album was already repeating itself. There was still no sign of my car anywhere. In fact, I was getting bored from driving around senselessly. I could tell he was growing frustrating as well, if the restless sigh he occasionally let out meant anything at all.

It didn't help that it was a Saturday night at almost nine o'clock and there were more people scattered around and having fun.

"Maybe we should try looking elsewhere," I suggested. I wrinkled my nose in disgust and forced myself to drop my hand to my lap, realizing I'd been biting on my thumbnail. It was a nasty habit that I've always hated. I hadn't done it in a long while, but the night was wearing me down. "Maybe we're not exactly—"

"Uh-oh." He reached for the gear stick and adjusted it. "Shit."

"Uh-oh?" I asked him with wide eyes. "Shit? What's wrong?"

That was when the car started to decelerate, Georgina's engine falling quiet. We gradually slowed into a full stop. He had half a mind to jerk the steering wheel to the right, somehow managing to get us in a (slightly sloppy) parallel park position. For a second we both just sat there, neither of us saying anything. I took in a deep breath and tried to calm myself before speaking.

"Please tell me this is not what I think it is," I said.

"That depends. What do you think is it?"

"Did Georgina just break down?"

"Ah. Then it isn'twhat you think it is," he said, but he didn't sound too happy about it either. "We ran out of gas."

"What?" If the engine had broken down, that would have been better, since neither of us could have prevented it. Georgina wasn't exactly brand new and it wouldn't have come off as a surprise. But running out of gas—something so utterly simple and something we could have easily avoided—was another story altogether. "You're telling me you didn't notice we'd been running low on gas?"

He deliberately didn't look at me, adjusting the gear stick again, and trying to turn the engine on. Georgina did that whining of hers, but it was a futile attempt.

"I can't believe you haven't been paying attention to—"

"How was I supposed to think of the fucking—"

"You're driving, it should be—"

"Can we just"—he gestured vaguely between the two of us—"maybe not do this? It's not exactly helping."

Swallowing back a few more insults, I forced myself to take three deep breaths in an attempt to keep myself calm. He was right. Fighting over his idiocy technically wouldn't help. I looked around us, pressing my face against the glass. At least we didn't stop in one of the main highways.

He turned the A/C and stereo off, making sure not to leave anything open so as not to drain the battery.

"There's a gas station a few blocks from here," I said as I recognized the ice cream shop to my right. It was already closed and somehow, there was something about seeing something usually fraught with so many children and bright moods looking so dreary that made me look away. I turned to see him with a calculating look on his face.

"How far is it?"

I wasn't exactly sure. I clicked my tongue and bit my lower lip as I thought about it. "Around ten minutes by foot. Fifteen tops."

"Well then. Lock the door before you leave." He pulled the key off of the key slot, the others clanging together slightly at the motion. "No time to waste, Red."

He opened his door and clambered out of his seat, shutting it close behind him without so much as a backward glance. He didn't even wait for me as he started to walk. I rolled my eyes and followed suit, getting out of the car and standing there for a few more seconds, watching his retreating back.

When he noticed that I wasn't following him and that I was just standing there by Georgina's hood, he stopped on his tracks and turned to me. "What're you waiting for, Red? Hurry up or I won't wait for you."

I rolled my eyes. "Uh, Dick?" I hooked my thumb over my shoulder. "It's this way."

"Oh."

I suppressed a smile. It wasn't much, but I couldn't deny that seeing the flustered look on his face almost made the situation slightly less crappy.

---

It was considerably more difficult not to acknowledge each other while walking than it was when we were stuck in the car. At least with that, he was driving, so that made one of us busy with something. Walking, however, offered nothing for either of us to be busy with.

We hadn't been walking for even just two minutes when I felt the awfulness of the awkward silence between us.

He must have been feeling it too, because not a moment later, he took a deep breath and said, "So."

Which, honestly, only made things seem even more awkward. I would have strangled him for that stupid So of his, seeing as the punctuated silence afterwards was unbearably suffocating. I didn't bother with a reply. I figured attempting a conversation wasn't exactly one of our brightest ideas.

"What if we don't find them in any of the clubs?" he asked me. "What's our next move?"

We were in that part of the town where there were a lot of boutiques and small food shops, but they were already closing, and the road we were taking was lit up by nothing but the dim orange streetlights. There were still three or four shops with the lights on and at the end of the street, I could see Coffee Overdose still brightly lit.

If I wasn't mistaken, it was one of the cafés that were open for twenty-four hours in town.

I needed caffeine—it served as some sort of stress reliever for me—but I didn't exactly have my wallet and I would rather watch The Notebook thrice in one day than ask Austin to buy me coffee.

"Red," he said when I still haven't said anything, "are you seriously not going to talk to me?"

I gave him a pointed look as a reply. I fixed my stare ahead of us and reached up in an attempt to tie my light brown hair in a ponytail while one of my hands wrapped in a handkerchief.

Earlier in the car, I decided to wrap use the hanky as a makeshift bandage, securing it with a small knot. It wasn't easy to tie the ends together with just one hand, but Austin didn't exactly seem like the type of guy who'd help me tie a bloody handkerchief. He wouldn't even willingly look at it for longer than two seconds.

"Red," he said, "if you really want to find those idiots, you can't ignore me forever."

"Last time I checked, you would rather not talk to me at all."

"Last time I checked, we weren't supposed to end up in this situation," he replied without missing a beat, shrugging a little. "So as much as I hate to admit it, we kind of have to work together on this one."

I frowned. "And we can do that without having to talk to each other."

He muttered something under his breath and I could feel my eye almost twitching in irritation from whatever he must have said. I might not have heard it, but I knew him enough to know that whatever it was, it was miles away from being a nice compliment.

"Stop being so fucking difficult."

"I'm difficult?" I raised an eyebrow. "Well, sorry if I'm not exactly up for a conversation with the dickhead who was idiotic enough not to notice that we were running low on gas. This night had been shitty enough without having to walk all the way to the gas station, thank you very much."

The expression on his face probably matched my own. "It just didn't cross my mind to check, all right?"

I rolled my eyes. "Only an idiot wouldn't check. I can't say I'm not surprised."

He stopped walking. "Well, Red." He shot me an angry look. "This idiot saved your sorry, underage ass from getting arrested."

I squirmed, knowing he kind of had a point there. If it wasn't for him, I never would have been able to outrun the cop chasing me. I never liked owing people, and owing Austin? It was infuriating. I clicked my tongue and hissed out a "Fine. Whatever."

"You're welcome."

I didn't reply.

Groaning, he resumed walking, dismissing the subject with a shake of his head. "So what's our next plan of action?"

"Did you seriously just say plan of action?"

"Yes, Red, plan of action."

"Who the fuck says plan of action?"

He casted me with a glare. "Red, stop being a bitch."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever." We managed to reach the corner, where Coffee Overdose stood in all its caffeinated goodness. I forced myself to look away and ignore the warm and cozy appearance of the soft light emanating from the café. "Maybe we should go in the clubs or something. Just for a few minutes. We can ask bartenders or other people around if they'd seen them around."

He didn't answer right away, so I turned to look at him. His eyes were fixed somewhere across the street. When I followed his gaze, I saw a figure in the darkness, curled up on the pavement.

"Dick?" I called out.

He blinked, like he was snapping out of his daze. "What was that?"

If I hadn't been confused with his weird behavior, I would have been irritated. I repeated my suggested "plan of action" to him.

By the time I finished, there was a dubious expression on his face. "Would that even work?"

Trying to ignore his obvious uncertainty about my suggestion, I crossed my arms over my chest and huffed. "You got a better idea?" When he didn't reply, I said, "Didn't think so."

"Are you always this snarky?" He shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged.

"Around people I don't like, yes."

He scoffed and muttered something under his breath. In the silence of the night, however, I managed to hear a bit of it.

"What was that?" I demanded.

"Nothing."

"What was that?"

Sending me a sideways glance, he smirked. "I said, for someone you don't like"—he tilted his head to the side—"you've been checking me out quite a lot of times."

"I have never checked you out."

This only seemed to amuse him more. His smile was kind of lopsided—with one corner lifted higher than the other—and I was momentarily furious at the fact that it made him look good. "Admit it, Red."

"There's nothing to admit," I said through gritted teeth.

"Oh, please." His stride grew more confident. Cocky dickhead. "I know you think my butt is sexy."

"I do not think that—"

He walked ahead of me and wiggled his ass in a completely, utterly, undeniably ridiculous way. "Admit it, Red!"

I let out an exasperated groan and fought the urge to rip all my hair out. God, I was going to fucking murder someone by the end of the night.

---

I was thankful for the A/C in the small convenience store in the gas station. The stifling summer humidity and the fact that we'd been walking for around twelve minutes made me feel so crappy and generally icky. Sweat made my Go Cougars!! shirt cling to my back and I could feel the beads of sweat running down my neck.

There were only three other customers in the store—a middle-aged man paying for a cup of instant coffee and two burly guys examining the liquor aisle. The clerk behind the counter looked out of place, too perky and positive to be working at such a dull place.

I looked behind me through the glass wall, eyeing Austin, who was still busy buying some bottled gasoline. He asked me to go ahead to the convenience store so I could get us some snacks. He didn't even hesitate when he pulled his wallet out of his back pocket to fish out a wad of bills.

"Red Skittles and a bottle of blue Gatorade for me," he said, "buy whatever with the rest of the money."

When he noticed that I was looking at the picture on his wallet, he quickly snapped it shut and stuffed it back into his pocket. He didn't say anything, but there was something in his gesture that made me feel like he was saying it's none of your business, so I just turned and walked away.

The picture on his wallet was that of a pretty redhead, smiling widely at the camera. I wasn't sure, exactly, but it seemed like she was riding a swing or something.

I didn't really care about the picture or the girl or whoever she was to Austin, so I shrugged off the little bit of curiosity I was feeling. Austin didn't seem like the kind of guy who would have a picture of his girlfriend on his wallet, but what did I know? He didn't seem like the red Skittles kind of guy either.

I was just on my way to the counter, lugging around all the snacks I decided to buy, when Austin walked into the convenience store. He was dark green plastic bottle of fuel with him and I was mildly surprised at how he carried it with ease.

"Got everything?" he asked me as he walked closer.

"Yeah."

He eyed the stuff I was holding. "Uh."

"What?"

He reached for the pack of raisins from the pile I was holding. "What's this shit?"

If my hands weren't full, I would have placed one of them on my hip. "Excuse me?"

He rolled his eyes. "I'm not eating that. Put everything except the Skittles and Gatorade back."

"You said buy whatever."

"Yes, not buy this shit."

"The word 'whatever' entails that—"

"Please, Red. Just thank me for getting here before you paid for that crap."

I rolled my eyes. "Like hell I would," I said, but he was already making a beeline for the candy aisle. I put back the stuff I'd taken—a pack of some dried fruits, some processed nuts, granola bars—and followed him.

He seemed intent on giving us cavities by the end of the night, seeing as he had taken a bunch of candy from the aisle, before moving on and heading for the chips. Humming a low tune under his breath (thankfully, he wasn't full-on singing), he grabbed some Pringles and Lays and handed them to me.

"Are you some kind of health freak or something?" he asked me when he caught me eyeing all the junk food he'd given me. "I mean, dried fruit. Who the fuck enjoys dried fruit as a snack?"

"Shut up."

The truth, though, was that when I was younger, my mom and dad would always take us to some kind of road trip, and there was always a pack of dried fruits sitting on the console between their seats for the three of us to eat. Dad used to avoid eating the pears, knowing those were Mom's favorites, and he always feigned a battle with me over the kiwi slices, but he gave them to me anyway.

I guess when I grabbed the pack, it was just one of those things that seemed like a force of habit I acquired over the years. Even Tori knew it somehow. Whenever we went to have long drives, she'd bring a pack of dried fruits for me, despite the fact that she hated even just the idea of dried fruits.

"Why eat dried fruits when you can eat, like, real fruits?"

"They are real fruits," I would tell her. "Just not fresh."

With Austin, however, I couldn't exactly force him into buying them. It was his money in the first place. When he finished dumping every junk food he deemed was "snack-worthy," he nodded at me and gestured to the counter before walking off to another aisle.

While the cashier was ringing every item up, Austin reappeared beside me, carrying a pack of bread. I eyed it and raised an eyebrow.

"Bread?"

"Yeah," he said, placing it right next to the Pringles.

"You mean to say," I said, "that dried fruits aren't okay, but bread is?"

He simply shrugged.

Of course, at that moment, I dismissed it as just another annoying and weird thing about Austin that even the universe couldn't possibly explain.

On our way back to Georgina, however, I realized I was wrong. We were walking in amiable silence. Every so often, he'd switch the bottled fuel he was holding to the other hand. When we got to the corner where Coffee Overdose was located, he stopped and set the bottle down on the pavement.

"Hand me the bread," he said.

That was when it hit me.

I looked over his shoulder, where the man we'd seen earlier was still curled up on the sidewalk. Something tugged at my subconscious as Austin jogged across the street with the bread and a bottle of water, towards the homeless man.

Maybe, I thought, just maybe, he's not as bad as I first thought he was.

When he walked back, he wordlessly picked up the bottled fuel and resumed walking without saying anything.

I couldn't help myself from saying, "For a dickhead, that was nice of you."

He looked at me, laughing slightly. "Next thing I know, you'll be admitting I'm sexy."

"Now you're just being a dickhead."

"With a sexy butt." He shot me a wink.

I groaned.

---

A/N:

Oh gosh, I love writing all this dialogue between them hahaha. Since I'm actually currently working on Chapter 14 of this, when I edited this chapter, I felt kind of nostalgic about it hahahaha. Thanks so much for reading and I hope you guys liked their banter (along with Austin and Georgina's special bond)