Park & Eleanor

Five

eleanor 

Gas stations always mocked her. She always hated it when they stopped at gas stations. They interrupted her sleep with bright lights and loud noises. They made her hungry with their tempting Twinkies. They killed the time that she could be doing something better in, rather than hopelessly trying to pee. So she didn’t like them very much. But for once in her life, she appreciated the gas station. Because now, stalling was good. The magazines hanging on the wall were good. The overly clichéd books on the bookshelf were good. They all meant that her uncle would just take longer to leave. 

She finally gave up waiting on all of them to come out of the bathrooms. She left the convenience store, heading out to her comfortable seat in the van. With a sigh, she found her cassette player. Sliding the headphones on, she let the nostalgia fill her veins.

“Take my hand. You know I’ll be there if you can, I’ll cross the sky for your love.”

park

Over the years, Cat had come to appreciate Prince. Park used to say that it had take her long enough. She made him sit and watch all of his movies with her. She would make his songs play at Drastic Plastic and it made Park a little sick to the stomach. He was very rapidly getting Prince’d out. 

But he did like one song; “Purple Rain” obviously. It was like Prince’s theme song. But Park really did generally like it. It always made him think of Eleanor. 

Back when they were in the Impala, back when it still wasn’t technically okay for Park to be driving, back before all of it happened, that song was playing on the radio. When Park discovered that Eleanor’s entire body was candy-sprinkled, those carefully placed riffs were serenading them. When Park had finally gotten to see what was behind that damn long zipper, those oddly comforting lyrics were being shared with the Omaha City listeners. When Park stopped himself from wholeheartedly ripping her pants off, Prince himself seemed to be egging them on. 

So he guessed Prince was alright if you listened to the right song. 

He wondered if Eleanor had heard that song since. 

He wondered if it made her think of him, too.