Many Other Dreams

Disclaimer: I do not own To The Moon or the characters

***

“Another job well done, eh?” Neil asked me. “I thought that we might not make it. I'm glad we did though.”

“Whatever,” I muttered, slamming down the hutch of the car. The tree we crashed into only did slight damage, and a quick fiddle around with the emergency toolkit was all we needed to get back on the road. While we had been lucky, the run-over squirrel hadn't been.

Neil looked at me, and gave a small smile. “Hey, come one. We did something good, and that's what counts.” I glared at him for a second, but when his smile didn't falter I looked away. “I guess you're right.”

The driver's seat opened with a large 'swish' and Neil jumped in, ready to go, unfazed by the recent events. “Alright! Time to go home and watch...hey, where are the keys?” The man rummaged around in the car, creating a large mess, until a familiar jingle came from my hand, causing him to look up.

“Oh great, you got them! Hand them over!” Neil shouted, getting out of the car and putting his arms above the roof, ready to catch the keys. His look of joy had turned to confusion as I stepped around the car and sat in the driver's seat. “What are you doing?”

“Well, considering you were the one who crashed the car in the first place, I thought it would be a good idea if I drove this time.”

Neil stared at me for a minute, registering what I had said, before giving me a guilty look. “Sorry about that, but that squirrel-”

“I thought we agreed on a cat.”

“Right, that cat just jumped out of nowhere, and I had to act.”

“I wouldn't consider swerving the car into the road barrier a good thing to do in this situation.”

The man bowed to me, fists clamped tightly at his sides. “I'm s-sorry,” he apologised. His eyes were shut, but after a moment he opened them, looking up at me. For a second he looked just like a helpless puppy.

I sighed and gave a slight nod, watching as he jumped up, a wide smile plastered on his face, and made his way to the passenger seat. There was a loud 'whoosh' as Neil shut the door, and I placed the keys in the ignition. After I heard the click of his seatbelt, I turned the keys, and the whole car seemed to hum to life.

As I backed out of the tree we had hit, I noticed that Neil gasped and grumbled something as I ran over the dead squirrel again. I shrugged it off knowing that it was just Neil being himself, and swerved the car back onto the road, doing a turn onto the other lane.

“H-hey, Eva?” Neil asked softly. I barely noticed he had said anything until he finished, and for a second I moved my head to get a glimpse of him. His eyes were filled with sadness, but his smile was bright and joyful. Something about him was different. I turned my head back to the road. “What is it?” I asked. He chuckled a little, and I tensed up. Whatever he was up to made me uncertain.

“Never mind...”