Alive & Kicking (Stay Until Your Love Is)

5

Bracing herself, Claire Standish stopped at the door of the camper van and rapped hard on it three times.

What followed were a series of muffled noises from within, but the door remained shut.

Sighing, she pulled on the handle (which promptly came off in her hand) and wrenched the door open.

"Hey watch it!" Bender cried.

Claire coughed, waving the smoke from in front of her face.

"Oh. It's you," he grumbled, from his horizontal position on the small bed.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, looking between him and Andy.

"What are you doin'?" Andy smirked, slumped on the door with a can of beer in one hand and a joint in the other, which he proffered to her. "You want some?"

Claire rolled her eyes.

"Don't share it with that fuckin' psycho," Bender slurred.

"John that is not very nice," Brian hiccupped.

"Brian," she sighed, surprised to see the third boy just as inebriated as the others.

"What's the problem?" he asked, trying to stand up but failing miserably, instead finding himself wedged between the table and the wall. "What, you think I'm too much of a nerd to let loose once in a while?"

"I just thought you knew better is all," Claire told him.

"What're you, his mom?" Bender demanded.

"Oh my god. What... if she is?" he gasped, starting to laugh.

Ignoring him, Claire turned to look at Andrew.

"Can I talk to you?"

He nodded.

"Alone," she added.

Groaning, the sport pulled himself up, casting the other two a look as he followed her outside.

"Don't tell Klepto!" Bender called, as Brian threw his empty beer can at the door which had closed behind them.

"What?" Andy asked, leaning against the side of the van and surveying her.

"What do you think you're doing?" Claire asked, folding her arms.

"Y'know, in case you hadn't noticed, you're not my mom either," Andy told her, watching her lazily.

"Whatever's going on between you and Allison, this won't make it better," she told him.

"You think I'm gonna take relationship advice from one half of Shermer's most dysfunctional couple?" Andy snorted, raising his hands in refusal. "Thanks, but no thanks."

With that, he moved past her, heading back towards the house.

"You really wanna lose her?" Claire called.

"What do you know?" Andy called, turning to look at her again. "Nothin'. You don't know the first freakin' thing about our relationship!"

"I know she thinks you don't feel the same way you used to, and that you'll never get past the whole LA thing," Claire said, standing in front of him again. "And I know that you've been acting like an ass all day."

Scoffing, Andy shook his head furiously. "Where do you get off, Claire? You don't get to show up after cutting us dead for the last six months or so, and start judging me! Or telling me how my girlfriend does or doesn't feel!"

"I'm trying to help you," Claire reasoned.

"Well I don't need your help! Get your own house in order before you start lookin' at mine!" he cried, turning and disappearing back inside.

For a moment, Claire simply stood in his wake, until a noise behind her brought her from her thoughts.

Turning around, she watched as the door of the camper van creaked open and she was met with the spaced-out faces of John and Brian.

Huffing, Claire spun on her heel and made her way back towards the house.

She was starting to think this whole trip had been a really bad idea.

=o=o=o=o=

Allison felt somebody sit on the end of the sofa and stirred, turning onto her back and pushing the quilt away from her face.

"Hey, you," Isobel whispered. "What're you doing down here?"

Allison shrugged. Her mother hadn't bothered to switch the lamp on, so the only light was from the hallway outside, and she was glad.

"Did you and Andy have a fight?" she asked, smoothing the covers down.

"No," Allison told her truthfully, pulling herself into an upright position.

Isobel sighed, moving a little closer and stroking Allison's hair back out of her face.

"Talk to me sweetie. I can't help you otherwise," she pleaded.

Allison shook her head, refusing to make eye contact. "I don't think you can, anyway."

"Try me," her mother urged.

A pause followed, and Isobel Reynolds knew it was going to be a guessing game, but she had spent enough time with her daughter by now to become fairly adept at them.

"I thought you'd moved past this, you and Andy?"

"So did I," Allison responded, her voice barely above a whisper.

Isobel put a hand underneath Allison's chin, encouraging her daughter to look at her.

Allison chewed on her lower lip, unable to stop a tear escaping from her eye and rolling down her cheek.

"Come here," she said, reaching out and pulling her close.

Allison buried her face in her mother's shoulder.

"I don't know how to fix it," she sobbed. "It's like he hates me and I don't think he'll ever forgive me."

"I don't think he hates you, sweetheart," Isobel told her gently, sitting Allison up straight and drying her eyes. "But you know what I do think?"

"What?"

"I think you need to try and figure it out, once and for all. You both need to say whatever it is you need to say and you need to put it to rest. No matter what that means," her mother told her.

"He doesn't even wanna be in the same room as me," she shrugged.

"Well you both need to find a way to be in a room together – long enough to figure this out," Isobel said.

On the other side of the door, a plan had already begin to formulate in Brian Johnson's mind.

=o=o=o=o=