Chapter Text
John excitedly clambers into his dad’s minivan. He’s in the passenger seat right now, but in about 30 minutes he will be meeting his very bestest friends for the first time in person!!
“You ready?” Dad asks
“Yes!” John says. Dad starts the car, and clicks on the radio. They start the first half-hour of their 8 day road trip.
They pull up to the airport, and John jumps out of the car. Dad chuckles good naturedly at his son’s excitement, and follows him to the waiting area. The luck they managed to have at finding flights from Texas, New York, and the Pacific Islands that all arrived in Seattle within an hour of each other was a God-send. The first sign that they would have good luck this spring break.
First in was New York. A stream of bleary eyed passengers begin to exit the terminal into the lobby. Some had people waiting, many pull out their phone to call an Uber. John jumps up from his place on the floor, where he had been sitting at his dad’s feet. A girl walks out, looking much more alert than her fellow passengers. She has blonde hair that is nearly white, and unnerving purple eyes. She looks very serious, or disinterested, but her eyes light up when she sees John waving at her. John runs over and wraps her in a hug.
“Rose!!!”
“Hi John!” The girl lets go of her sparkly purple wheelie-suitcase to hug John back.
Dad walks over and grabs her suitcase for her. “Hello Rose, nice to meet you,”
The children break apart and Rose looks up at Dad “Hello Mr. Egbert,” She extends her hand and gives Dad a surprisingly firm handshake
“You have a good handshake,” Dad says approvingly.
“Thank you sir,” She says
Dad laughs “No need to call me sir,” Dad turns to John, who seems to be dying of embarrassment “Dave’s flight should be unboarding any minute now. Then when he gets here it will be about 45 minutes until we can expect to see Jade, so you guys can get breakfast if you’d like. Now you kids behave, I’m going to step outside for a moment.”
“Okay!” John says, and Rose and he settle back onto the floor, where Rose begins to attempt to read John’s palm.
Dad steps outside to find the designated smoking area. He pulls out his pipe and lights it. Dad goes through the itinerary for the trip in his head. The car is already all packed up, and from the airport they will be heading down into Oregon. Once in Oregon they will drive to the high desert and spend the night in Mitchell. After that they will drive through the Painted Hills, and down to California. In California they will hike in the redwoods, then drive to the coast. They will then drive up the coast to get back home. Good plan. Dad nods to himself, reassured by going over the plan in his mind. He takes another puff from his pipe.
Rose trails her fingers over her friend's hand. She almost can’t believe she is actually meeting her friends in person. “You will live a long life,” She says, pointing to John’s strong life line.
John turns his head sharply towards the gate, where another stream of people is beginning to filter out. Both children stand up, Dad walks in to stand behind them.
Dad sees the boy who must be Dave come out. He has white blond hair, like Rose. He has tan skin, still much paler than the two other children. Much to Dad’s concern the boy has thin scars up his arms, that look less like childhood accidents on a bike or climbing trees but more like they were done with a blade. The most distinct thing about Dave is that he has a pair of dark sunglasses on, despite having just been on a dark airplane.
Rose and John run forward. John calls Dave’s name, and the three children embrace.
“Hey dudes,” Dave says after they separate, in a fairly thick Texan accent “How’ve you been?”
“We’re trying not to talk about anything very important until Jade gets here, so no one misses out,” Rose explains. John nods.
“Okay,” Dave says, adjusting his backpack.
Dad walks over “Hello David, nice to meet you,” he extends his hand to the boy.
Dave shakes his hand, again with a very firm grip “It’s Dave,”
“Of course, sorry Dave,” Dad addresses all three kids. “Jade won’t get here for about 45 more minutes if you want to go over to the McDonalds and get a bite to eat.”
Dad gives John some money, and the kids walk off.
The kids are sitting at one of the weird tall tables in the McDonalds. Rose is sipping an almost comically large chocolate milkshake, John got a normal breakfast sandwich and a Pepsi, and Dave is eating a bacon burger and apple juice.
“This is so cool,” John says “Meeting you guys in person,”
“It's totally rad,” Says Dave.
They wander back just in time, and Dad waves them over. After ten minutes of people watching they see Jade. Too tall for her age, with wild black hair that falls down to her butt. She has terra-cotta coloured skin, the same colour as John’s. Her face is covered in freckles, making it very obvious she spends a lot of time in the sun.
“Hiiiiiii!” She bounds towards them. Wrapping them all in a hug. “I’m so excited to see you guys!” She has a slight British lilt to her voice.
She releases her friends, this time hugging them all individually, even lifting Dave right off the ground causing him to yelp.
After the kids greet Jade, and Dad introduces himself, they all make their way back to the car.
There are two rows of seats, and the girls claim the far back. Once the kids are settled in Dad turns the car on and heads out.
Dave grins “I made CDs,” and hands a red CD book over to John. John flips through, eyes lighting up when he sees a CD with his name on it.
“For me?”
“Yeah, I figured you guys might not always want to listen to my objectively superior taste so I made you each a CD,”
“Aweee, Dave, that's so sweet,” Jade cooed.
John hands the CD to Dad, who pops it into the CD player and as they exit the airport the song ‘How do I live’ from the ConAir soundtrack starts to play, much to John’s delight.