Chapter Text
Thursday Night around 8:45 p.m., About 2 Hours Outside Evergreen
The headlights of the Sebring illuminated the curvy, deserted dirt road ahead through the gathering gloom of the forest. Cursing under his breath, Adrian briefly turned his attention from the road to glance at his passenger, who was snoring softly with his head resting against the passenger side window.
“Fucking just pass out, why don’t you Chris, it’s fine, I’ll just drive us through god-knows-where, don’t worry, just take a nap, why don’t you, I’ll do all the work, just fucking typical fucking bullshit…”
“Whuzza?” Chris muttered, stirring briefly.
“Never mind, go back to sleep,” Adrian groused, and Chris obliged.
This sucked. The rest of the team were safely back in Evergreen, finishing up a preliminary report for their latest client. Adrian and Chris were also supposed to be there, but at the last minute they’d gotten a call from a supplier, a sketchy survivalist dude who lived out in the middle of nowhere and supposedly made the best undetectable surveillance equipment available. The problem was that sketchy survivalist dudes didn’t like leaving their compounds, so someone had to go pick up the stuff. It had been decided that Adrian and Chris should be the ones to go since (1) Chris had the most experience with sketchy survivalist dude types, and (2) they were “useless” and “underfoot” when It came to report writing. Of all the nerve.
So the two of them had made the trek out to the sketchy survivalist enclave, and met up with the sketchy survivalist dude. It had been just about as awful as Adrian had thought it would be. The guy had three teeth; a pack of mangy, unlicensed dogs; what seemed to be five or six wives; and a confederate flag, for fuck’s sake. He wasn’t a historian by any means, but Adrian was fairly certain that Washington State had not been a part of the Confederacy. Then the dude had pulled out some nasty-smelling homegrown weed and some moonshine, and had insisted that they partake. Adrian had begged off, citing that he needed to drive. The dude almost picked a fight, but Chris had valiantly stepped in and consumed his share and Adrian’s. That placated the sketchy survivalist dude, and eventually the deal was done. Adrian poured Chris into the car, and they set back out for home.
It was so weird. Even a year ago, Adrian would have given his eye teeth, his left nut, his brainstem, his heart, for the chance to spend several hours alone in the car with Chris. Now it was just tense. Tense and awkward and strained and the whole thing was terrible and it sucked and he was getting tired and kind of had to pee and wanted to be home and in his pajamas watching television and eating toast. He let out an exasperated groan, then jumped as a meaty hand closed on his shoulder.
“You all right, Vij?” Chris mumbled. “You seem kinda stressed.”
Adrian turned his head to look at his friend. “Ah, no, don’t worry about it.”
They locked eyes as Chris squeezed Adrian’s upper arm. “Dude, I’m not worried, I’m annoyed. You’ve been pissy all day. Is there something — HOSHIT!”
“Is there somthing hoshit? I don’t -“
“Dude! Dude! Dude! Fuck!” Chris grabbed the wheel and wrenched it sharply to the right. Adrian looked up and screamed as a giant Roosevelt Elk loomed large in the windshield. The car skidded off the road and into a drainage ditch, narrowly missing the majestic beast. The front bumper hit dirt as the back wheels were lifted off the ground and the vehicle came to a slow, thudding stop. The elk sniffed at the trunk, then loped off in the opposite direction.
Both men sat still for a moment, silent with shock. Chris broke the silence first.
“Dude, you okay?”
“Yeah… yeah…” Adrian breathed. “Yeah, I’m okay. You?”
“Yeah, I’m okay. Fuck.”
Adrian nodded blankly. “Fuck. Shit.”
Chris looked through the back windshield and saw treetops and sky. “Shit! Fuck!”
Adrian sighed and killed the engine. “Fuck.”
Chris slowly opened the passenger door and gingerly got out. “Shit.”
Adrian tried to open the driver’s side door, but it was blocked by a tree stump. He unbuckled his seatbelt and slithered across the front seat, eventually climbing out the passenger side as well. Both men stood in ankle deep water in the ditch, hands on hips, surveying the damage.
“It… I don’t think she’s hurt too bad, buddy,” Chris said, soothingly. “I think once we get’er towed out of the ditch, she’ll probably be drivable.” Right on cue, the front axle cracked, and the car slumped over like it had been doing shots of survivalist hooch.
Adrian was staring at the shambles of his car, unblinking. Chris patted him on the back. “Look, Vij, it’s probably not as bad as it looks. It’s probably —“
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!” Adrian lifted his face to the overcast heavens and bellowed from the bottom of his New Balance. Once he had run out of voice, he climbed out of the ditch and started heading down the road in the direction they had been driving.
Chris caught up to him with a few long-legged strides. “Where are you going?”
“Going to where I can get signal.” Adrian held up his phone. “Going to call and get us picked up.”
“All right, but you don’t have to be a shitty jerk about it,” Chris argued. “I just saved our lives back there.”
“Oh, did you?” Adrian stopped and faced him. “Or did you distract me while I was driving, so that I didn’t notice a FUCKING ELK in the middle of the road?”
“Well…” Chris waggled his head back and forth. “A little of both? But I didn’t mean to.”
“Yeah, I know, you never mean to,” Adrian said, resuming his walk.
“Are you mad at me, Vij? Because it seems like you’re mad at me.”
Adrian shook his head. “No. No, I’m not mad. If I were mad, I’d tell you I was mad. Not mad, no.”
“You’re doing it again. Damnit, Adrian, every time I tell you not to do your passive aggressive bullshit, you do more, well, passive aggressive bullshit!”
Adrian set his jaw. “Have you ever noticed that you only call me Adrian when you’re saying something you know I won’t like?”
Chris scoffed. “What do you mean? I call you Adrian all the time. Adrian Adrian Adrian. The other day, at work, I said, ‘Hey Adrian, wanna grab a drink?’ Remember?”
Adrian scowled. “No, you didn’t. You said, ‘Hey, Thimble, saunter that bodacious butt down to the corner store and get me a protein shake and a six pack’.”
“Okay, then I complimented your butt! Sue me for being a supportive friend! Plus, you know I’m joking with the whole Thimble thing.”
“Bahhhhh…” Adrian waved his arms dismissively and continued his trudge.
“Wait a second.” Chris stopped in the middle of the road again. “You’re still pissed at me from before. You said we were cool, man. I apologized to you, and you said we were cool. And now I find out you’re still holding a grudge. That’s not fucking fair.”
Adrian pivoted on his foot and walked back to where Chris stood. “You… God, and everyone says I’m oblivious. You don’t get a fucking thing!”
Chris held his hands out at his sides, pleading. “So explain it to me, Vij. I mean, Adrian. I want to know what’s going on.”