American Vacanza

madison is the boss of the car • siena

The first thing that crossed my mind when I woke up was how Madison had forgiven me the night before. Since when did the ice queen forgive? I didn't know what had come over her - maybe it was just confusion, or maybe this trip was genuinely making her a better person.

Ha. Like we would ever, ever bond over this trip- especially considering the way it'd turned out so far. We'd come across a whiny ex-friend, a psychic diner owner, too many weird people at a weird ski resort - there was a reason nobody went to ski resorts in the summer, and this was it - and finally, a disgusting boyfriend that thought it was okay to just... kiss (if you could even call it that?) his girlfriend's stepsister.

And since we were back on the road, my mind couldn't help but wander. How would she go through with just dumping Ethan? "Not necessarily at the next rest stop, but somewhere along those lines." What did that even mean? Was she, like, going to send him to therapy or something? Or was she just going to scream at him? The latter seemed more plausible - at least by Madison's standards.

I had no idea what the next few days would bring, and I had no idea what my stepsister would do, to Ethan and to me. Obviously there would be some payback involved- she wouldn't let Ethan get away with kissing another girl. But I couldn't shake the feeling that she was still a little hurt- or more, angry, at me for letting him kiss me.

For the record, even though I'm fairly sure I have more than enough evidence for my case, Ethan has always been, is, and ever shall be, gross. The notion that I ever allowed Ethan to kiss me without pushing him away is a thought that should never be crossing anyone's mind.

I put my headphones on, and as I leaned my head against the window, I tried to tune out my own thoughts with music. The car was eerily silent, as it should be.

I stared numbly out the windshield at the long stretch of road. We'd switched from a two-lane road to a four-lane interstate, meaning that there was actually... civilization around us.

I suddenly had a vivid memory of the game I used to play with my dad, where we'd look at things out the window and find one for each letter of the alphabet. It was so stupid, looking back on it, but man, we would get competitive.

"There's an F on that license plate!" I screeched. "Does that count?"

"No," he would respond. "If it did, then it'd be too easy. But there's concrete on the road! That counts as a C! I'm on D now."

I wondered if my dad would go easy on me, just because I was a sore loser. It was one of the worst parts of me, then and now.

"But why not?" I whined, but my eight-year-old brain suddenly jumped at the sight of horses from the corner of my eye. "Ooh! Look! A farm!"

"That's why," Dad replied, "because you have to be patient and wait for the right thing to come along at the right time. That's life, kid."

That's life, kid. Words of wisdom from a man that I barely ever saw anymore. Even thought my stepdad was rich in material wealth, my real dad gave me everything I needed: wisdom, to guide myself through the real world.

I remembered his words about patience whenever Madison had a seemingly endless adult tantrum.

"Ouch! Quit it!" Madison sneered, slapping Ethan away from her with one hand on the steering wheel and snapping me out of my flashback. He had planted a kiss on her cheek, obviously trying to earn some brownie points after last night's.... events.

"I'm sorry, babe, just trying to lighten the mood." Ethan shrugged, his broad shoulders. "I just love you so much, and I don't want you to ever forget it."

This morning, before we left the Doubleside, I awoke to Madison and Ethan fighting over something, and I took a lucky guess as to what the fight was about. "You're hopeless!" Madison screamed. "You don't even know how to give a girl some space! God knows I need it! What were you thinking last night, trying to make out with my stepsister who's two years younger than you, you scumbag?"

"It's crazy how I didn't care when you ran off with Todd at that party to play "video games", but you're treating this incident like it's such a big deal!" He ran his fingers through his bushy hair. Oh, poor Ethan- he wasn't even aware that his comments would only make Madison angrier.

"He challenged me to a round of Futbol 2K14! My dad's company makes that game! I just wanted to crush him. And for God's sake, Ethan, we were just playing video games! How does that even compare to you trying to fucking make out with a fifteen-year-old!"

"Jeez, I'm sorry, babe."

That line up there? Ethan's dialogue? That was the nail in the coffin. Madison wasn't speaking to him anymore, no matter how hard he tried to prompt her. He wasn't her babe anymore. Nothing he could say would really change that.

He could steal all the kisses he wanted. He could crack more jokes than a season of Saturday Night Live. He could apologize a thousand times over, each apology as heartwarming as the final scene of a rom-com. But Madison just kept her eyes on the road, her reflective sunglasses facing forward and nowhere else.

But there was one tactic he hadn't tried. "So, Siena, I'm really sorry for what happened last night." He avoided eye contact with me, looking at the imaginary person in the seat next to me instead of into my eyes. "Really sorry."

I was suddenly at a loss for words, like my train of thought had come to a full stop. "I mean, I guess it's okay."

Madison, who was being as loud as she could while still keeping her eyes on the road, said, "No, no, no. It's not okay. Siena, you don't forgive him. I mean, it's easy for you to forgive him, he didn't really do anything to you, but don't forgive him just yet."

Good. Because I didn't. I just didn't want to be rude. I wasn't one for confrontations, but nobody could pull that kind of thing on me and get away with it. I hated Ethan anyways, and kind of wanted to get the popcorn for when he crashed and burned.

Ethan squirmed in his seat, which I supposed was Madison's objective. I kind of, for the first time in a while, understood why Madison was angry.

He pecked her on the cheek again, this time causing the car to swerve into the other lane and almost hit the oncoming car- from which a loud horn sounded. "Watch out, dude! No PDA when I'm driving!"

"We're not in public. Cars count as private," he pointed out. Oh, Ethan. Sweet, stupid Ethan. He'd been dating Madison for what, nine months? He should've known by now that correcting Madison when she was on one of her moods was -besides forcibly kissing her stepsister- the worst move you could make.

"Whatever! PDA can stand for Private Displays of Affection, too. I don't even care, just don't fucking bother me if you don't want me to crash the damn car." Knowing Madison, she would probably crash the car just to spite him.

"Shouldn't it be PDoA, then?" he quietly wondered, being his dumb self.

"Ethan!" I interjected, feeling a sudden rush of power as soon as I did. "We don't call it the USoA, right? Just shut up!"

I don't know what possessed me to do that, but needless to say, it impressed my stepsister. "She said it best, babe. I think what this car needs is some genuine quiet time."

I was all for it, but even with my headphones on, I swore I could hear Ethan whispering to himself. "USoA. United States OF America. Some people call it the USoA. I'm gonna start calling it the USoA. I think that sounds even better, USoA."

"So, quiet time is out of the question," I found myself saying, pausing the music on my rayPhone to see Madison's verdict. She was the queen of all the activity in our car; we didn't do anything without her approval. She had us scared straight. I sometimes wondered if Madison could have a future career in prison guarding. You know, if she needed to ever pick up some extra cash, she'd be good at it.

Mad sighed. "No, not really. As long as you just SHUT UP, Ethan, and don't do any more of your PDA or PDoA or USoA or whatever you're talking about now, we're gonna get along fine, okay?" Her choppy pink hair shook with rage as she gripped the steering wheel so hard I thought it might burst.

And so we were silent. And so we drove on.