BULLSEYE

'Welcome to the Racing Track'

For the next two days I found no trace of him, and it was not for luck of trying. I asked around a little bit, at Luigi and Guido's, with Flo and Sally...

Mater. Nothing. Nothing at all. They all seemed to say the same thing, 'oh him,' they sighed, 'he seems to be a man of his own devices. I expect he'll came back soon enough'. But he didn't come back soon enough, not for me. My mind couldn't help bar think that his abrupt disappearance must have had something to do with the media. With his racing.

Alas, the days still whirred on as steadily as ever with the citizens and travellers of Route 66 being as ever kind and full of energy. I even caught my first cop, in what seemed like a couple of decades. For which I was still awaiting Sally's impending applause. Applause that would be like a match to my heart.

It was nearing midnight when I heard a faint knock on the door. Being the sheriff of this humble town I had had to teach myself how to wake up at any sound of noise and so the knock was just loud enough to get me up and onto my feet. My eyes bleary and my head spinning from lack of sleep. The room around me was nothing more than a blackened void. It took awhile for me, stumbling around in the bottomless dark, to find my jacket. Even longer to locate both of the arm sleeves and to push my arms threw them.

Outside it was raining, drops of water soon clinging to the leather of my jacket. Never to fall. Doc stood there, surrounded by the darkness, shrouded with an open gaze. His hair was pushed back against his scalp. His notorious jacket drenched by the deluge of water. He didn't seem to care and nor, much to my own disbelief, did I.

"What are you doing here rookie?" I questioned, never the less shocked at his sudden appearance. After two days of disappearance he had the audacity to stand here. Drenched and cold in the middle of the night.

Doc nodded smugly.

"Sorry about this," he replied with a wiry smile, "I have something for you," Shrugging my shoulders, I remained unfazed. One hand rested on the frame of the narrow door.

"What is it?" I inquired. Shocked at how befuddled Doc looked, at the words he seemed unable to draw from his blue lips.

"Did somebody set my town on fire again?" I added. Doc moved his head shyly, for the first time in the days since I had first met him he bluntly refused to catch my eye. Tentatively, he shifted his weight from foot to foot.

"I-," he stuttered. Drawing the collar of his shirt higher around his neck.

"I brought donuts," he declared. Lacking most of the usual arogance he donned. My eyes narrowed into naught bar narrow slits. I leaned further out into the rain.

"Donuts?" I questioned.

"And coffee, thought you might be hungry,"

It was then that I laughed, I couldn't help it. The laugh bubbled out of my lips, burst into the air before I could pay any heed. To my relief, Doc merrily laughed with me. His arrogance coming back to him, he whipped a callused hand through his thin black hair.

"Surely it could have waited for tomorrow," I mocked but Doc only stepped forward. Placing his outrageous booted leg on the threshold.

"They wouldn't let me do this tomorrow," he sighed. It was dark enough so that I couldn't see that he had moved closer. Not until I moved my head to face him and he lay his hands on the side of my cheeks. Drawing me closer. Our lips met, two fingers embraced. It was...

It wasn't like they deemed it in the books. It wasn't magical, something that could change the course of one's life. The wildness and recklessness of it kept my feet steady on the ground.

Doc pulled me towards him and I let him.

Gradually when he was quite breathless. His heart pushing against the bars of his chest's cage. His breathing coming out strained and harsh, he drew away. I stared at him, the man who now looked excruciatingly pleased with himself. A smug and wiry smile laden upon his face. I closed my eyes in an attempt to clear them and stop them from swimming. Opened.

"Your quite reckless, rookie. Reckless as hell," I spat. But Mr. Fabulous remained unfazed, he did not even drop his eyes. Instead, with a gaze that could have embedded itself halfway through my soul he stared at me.

"Oh I don't think even hell is as reckless as me," he teased. A moment of silence passed. In which all that could be heard was the sound of wind and rain. The melody of two hearts beating as one. Doc was the first one to breach it.

"Welcome to the racing track," he said.