Engineering Moon Forth and Doctor Beam

Chapter 7

As I promise to you guys, another day, another chapter.. I'm very happy to have received the reviews and comments for the last chapter, they are always encouraging and good fodder for the muse. ^^v

Being alone with Beam, usually something I would dream incessantly about, but not this morning. Too many things have happened, some without my knowledge, for me to enjoy alone time with my crush.

Right now, Beam is gripping the steering wheel of his car, you know, like if he loosened up, the damn thing was going to sprout wings and go airborne. Although, if that did happen, I would not be surprised at all – I'm beyond surprise now. I'm way beyond anything a human being could possibly feel at this point.

After P'sing's oh so subtle retelling of last night's escapades (read that as the biggest and sorriest black hole of memory lapse ever on my part), Beam literally grabbed me and dragged me out to his car (Even though I'm bigger than him, his actually quite strong too with his body like that). I got shoved into it head first, as in, I now know what his floorboards taste like, and before I could even get properly seated, he had torn out of his driveway like P'sing was going to come after us with rice and confetti.

He might have, who knows, I was a little busy trying to get my legs inside of the car.

So here we are, Beam driving at speeds that Nascar drivers can't achieve, with me in the passenger side hoping like crazy that the seat belt isn't faulty towards a destination that could not be my house. Awkward silence? Sure. Tense atmosphere? Yep.

I haven't said anything since I saw P'sing, and you know, I don't know if I should say anything now. Beam looks.. pissed? Maybe, more like mortified. He probably wants to drive out to some out of the way swamp and dump my body. Not that I blame him, hell, I kissed the guy for the love of god, didn't I?

Half of me is quite sorry that I did (but I like it too for what i did), because that one act assured that Beam will hate me for the rest of his life (or the rest of my life, which is looking really short right now even though I'm tall). The other half is fucking pissed, because I can't remember what possibly could have been the best thing ever! That's right, I'm so unlucky and the gods hate me so much that I can't even recall feeling his ridiculously hot lips against mine.

Man, whoever the hell said you remember your first kiss until the day you die apparently never considered the possibility that it could happen during a drunken black out. Asshole. Shit.

Twenty minutes of aimless driving later, in a neighborhood that is not at all familiar to me, I wonder if I should say something. Like tell Beam that I don't live in this area, or that I really have to get home before P'wan finds out that I didn't spend the night at Nicky's. But see, my tongue, like my emotions, are frozen, and can't seem to say anything at all. What should i do?

That's not to say I don't have questions buzzing around in my head like flies around a rotten piece of meat. For instance, I'd love to ask 'did you enjoy the kiss,"HAHAHAH!!" but my self preservation units prevent me from doing so. Then there is the ever popular 'was there tongue involved,' but I have a feeling that one will be as well received as the first question. You see, I can't get my mind off the kiss that I couldn't even remember and I wanted details, damn it. If I was going to die from doing something my brain obviously could not recall, might as well get the dirty and sexy details, you know?

My head went on a random trip, much like this drive, and eventually, something did pop out of my mouth. Safe to say, it wasn't diplomatic in any sense and I wonder sometimes if I'm missing that vital nerve that connects my brain to anything speech related.

"So," I said, "it was your first kiss?"

See? I either have a set of brass lined diamond balls or I'm stinking stupid.

Soon as I said it, Beam swerved and hit the brakes hard, jerking me against the seat belt and giving me a hell of a whiplash. Okay, whiplash added to the shock of this morning on top of my hangover, let's just say Beam's damned lucky I didn't reupholster his car with the acid swimming around in my tummy.

"Don't ever talk about that," Beam hissed at me as I was trying to figure out if all my internal organs were where they were supposed to be. "You mention it again, I will kill you."

What else is new?

"Yeah, whatever," I mutter, all my effort on keeping my liver from crawling up my esophagus, "you gotta get in line anyway. After Nicky's done with me, all you'll get to do is kick around my corpse a little."

We sat in the car for a while, the engine idling and random vehicles of the soccer mom variety whizzing by once in a while (where the hell were we anyways?). I had given up on getting home in time to avoid P'wan's wrath, my best friend was probably planning on disemboweling me with a shrimp fork and my crush, seated next to me looking hot as ever, most likely was thinking he hated me with everything he had.

As you can see, I no longer have any reasons to fear death.

"Why did you do it?"

Was it me or did Beam actually ask me that? Didn't he say he'd kill me if I ever brought it up again? So, why was he bringing it up, did he want to discuss it as much as I did, did he like it to some degree, am I delusional, what?

I look askance at Beam, just to make sure that I wasn't hearing shit, because come on, still hungover and aural hallucinations do happen under severe stress, but well, he really must've said it. I mean, he's staring at me like I should be answering. Do you want my answer? Really?

"I don't know," I lie completely straight-faced, no way I'm saying I did it most likely because I love him, "I don't even know that it happened. You know, if you don't remember, then it didn't happen.."

"Isn't that good for you?" Hm, Beam isn't all that happy with my answer. I wonder why that is. "You might be lucky enough for a black out, but I'm not. Now I have to live with that.. memory."

Man, did he ever know how to hurt a guy's feelings! "Look, Beam, I'm sure I was too drunk to even know what or who I was doing, okay?"

Beam splutters and flexes his fingers, kind of like he's going to lunge and shake me until my eyeballs rattle out of my head. What am I saying, at this point, I should just save everyone who wants to off me a favor and commit ritual suicide. Nothing is working out the way it's supposed to. I swear, I had a plan, but that went to hell in a lovely hand-basket.

"Just.." Beam pauses to take a much needed breath, he was turning all the possible shades of purple there for a minute, "never, ever mention what happened. Don't ever tell anyone about P'sing, he does not exist. If I even hear a hint of this ever again.."

"Yeah, yeah, you'll kill me, probably in a cruel and unusual way, blah blah, I get it." Satisfied?

After that, he put the car back in gear and we were off again, this time, towards my house because he actually deigned to ask me where I lived. After twenty minutes, we were in front of my house, a white and beige two bedroom deal with a small yard in the front, no fish pond, thank you.

"Thanks for driving me home," I say, after all, I can be polite, "and sorry about all the trouble."

He, of course, says nothing, but I didn't expect him to reply in any fashion, so with a shrug and a disappointed lurch in my heart, I got out and closed the door, girding up my loins for an P'wan filled doom. I was so busy pondering what my guardian would do to me that I almost missed Beam's low whisper filter through the slightly open window.

"Why did you have to taste like strawberries and pine?"

Then before I could react, he took off, nearly taking my arm with him which had lingered too closely to the handle of the door.

Well. If that don't beat all. It almost sounded like Beam didn't hate me, but hell, since everything is so damned loony, who am I to judge?

-

To be continue...