Living With Anna Kendrick

Chapter 4 - The Trip (Edited Version)

Alex's POV

Of course, every great thing has its sacrifices, in this case, sacrifice has the name of trip or travel. The day had come, the day I had to leave my home, meaning I had to pack which literally every man, woman, and child hates. It was the crack of dawn, way too early for anyone to be out of bed, and here I was, laying back against the seat of the cheapest most crappy bus ride to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, anticipating for the slow and shaky movement of the bus to slowly rock me. It was always like this, for the first few hours or so, it felt as though the slow steady shaking of the bus were slowly nursing me to sleep, however, bit by bit the rocking would start to churn my stomach, and my peaceful bus ride would start getting more and more nauseous. It was a weird feeling, I must say as if the sea were thrashing me around leaving me breathless, swimming aimlessly through the trembling waters, a torturous mess of vertigo. Sweat drops would drip down my face as I tried to breathe in the right way, trying to hope that maybe that'll be enough to take away the agonizing feeling. I had my ways around it of course, as I had always suffered from extreme car sickness, listening to music had always helped as it distracted me from my incongruous stomach. Surprisingly enough, the playlist seems to sooth away some of the vertigo and slowly replaced my last few agonizing hours with a little peaceful sleep.

I had always been hard to wake, ever since I was born, hard to fall asleep but, once I'm asleep, good luck. Therefore, it was highly surprising that the short whiplash of the brakes had woken me. Which very conveniently gave me time to gather the strength necessary to open my eyes and pack my belongings up before the bus had completely halted to a stop. My mind wanders to a numb and empty place, as per usual, while I pull my sweaty, chestnut colored, long hair into a messy and lazy bun. I was told that one of the other cast members was to come and pick me up, and the thought of being stuck in a car for hours with someone I just met, was incredibly terrifying. My stomach churned, and this time it wasn't due to the rocking of the bus, but the incredible nerves that had so suddenly hit me. Don't get me wrong, I am generally a very chill and composed person, but, riding in a car for hours on end with no escape route, with someone I just met and was incredibly uncomfortable around... that shit twisted my guts.

Slowly but surely, the herd of travelers left the bus, gradually emptying the vehicle, and I waited, watching as the staggeringly slow line moved, that was until all that was left was the bus driver and I, and finally, I found the guts to step through the arched doorway of the bus into the wet concrete of the bus station. This provoked a quick and involuntary reaction to pull up the hood of my hooded jacket that was covered by my usual and staple article of clothing, a black leather jacket.

Anna's POV

I was up at unholy hours this morning, due to the production has asked me to pick up the new member of the cast as she had no other form of transport. I'm not stupid, I know they could have provided at the least 300 different alternative transport routes to set, but they deliberately decided to send me on this mission, meaning, they believe it may be beneficial for the movie that we get to know each other. The idea didn't seem too foreign, as I understood the amount of chemistry that had to exist between actors in order to make the audience believe that the characters do in fact have the level of intimacy being displayed by the plot. I was in fact quite pleased to carry out this task, and don't ask me for a reason because, I don't have one, something simply feels nice and I'm not about to question my well being because God knows that only lands us straight into more therapy sessions.

What I do hate about this whole experience is the silence that tortures me for these 40 minutes or so of solid highway driving, no radio stations seemed to have any type of music that didn't consist of a loud buzzing with a hip-hop beat in the background and I couldn't exactly just grab a CD as I needed to pay attention to the road, and so I drove in silence. Following both the robotic voice of my GPS and the beat up country road signs that directed me to the eventual arrival to the bus station. Slight joy crashed through my body as I knew I'd probably get a few minutes of a driving break waiting for her to arrive. I quickly exit my car once I've, very precariously might I add, park the rental car, locking the doors swiftly before briskly stepping towards the rusty establishment ahead of me. My initial instinct was to rush towards the 'front desk' which basically consisted of a lady, a few pounds overweight, drinking a cold cup of coffee (I could tell because there was absolutely no sign of vapor coming from the liquid and within this cold weather, I can bet ya that the lake can steam if you blow on it hard enough.), sitting on an old and crusty office chair against a blue office tables filled with over following amounts of paper. She seemed unamused by my presence but I stood my ground and made my doubts known. "Has the bus from LA arrived yet?" I question politely yet firmly, she undoubtedly was annoyed by my need for her service but obliged by checking the stack of papers on her desk, before fishing our what seemed to be what she was looking for. She let out a huff of amusement before responding to my question. "20 minutes till they arrive Ma'am." I didn't quite understand why she seemed amused by this situation but I neither the less thank her and walk off.