vroom vroom ;; closed
He catches her off guard— not for the first time, and not really anymore than he had during their previous encounters but this time her surprise is more evident, and less complicated.
Beefy guy who’d made a career out of wailing on other beefy guys likes quiet nights in with a book, and is awestruck by natural beauty. It’s incredibly unexpected but also horribly cliche. And it’s probably hypocritical for her to think that way considering who and what she is, but if she could with confidence say anything about what kind of person she was it was that she was an unapologetic hypocrite. After all, who wasn’t?
She’s not particularly sure what kind of expression she’s making underneath her helmet, people betraying her expectations generally left her quietly reeling for at least a few minutes but with the ocean quickly streaking past them and his voice vibrating against her back she doesn’t have as much down time as she’d like.
"If you don’t have anywhere more important to be." She says after a few seconds, tone somewhere in between careful and amused. And she veers toward the right, slowing gradually and taking the sloped fork down to the sand.
The beach isn’t very crowded, but also not exactly desolate. Students wander carelessly with little concern for the fact that they were still in their uniforms and that it was dangerously close to curfew. A few adults are sprinkled here and there across the shoreline but for the most part everyone else is under the age of 25. Who else had the time to go to the beach on a weekday night anyway.
Red removes her helmet, pulling back her hair and wiping away whatever perspiration had formed on her forehead all in one motion.
"Your cargo make it through the trip?" She nods in the direction of his groceries, smiling knowingly at the trauma she was fully aware she’d caused them.
There are several students, clad in Tancho uniforms romping about in the ocean. A spontaneous swim in the ocean, an unplanned trip to the beach— homework and responsibilities be damned, she’d always just assumed those kinds of things were only done by kids in movies and not actual people.
"Up for a dip?" She asks, nudging him with her elbow before jerking her chin in the direction of the targets of her vague envy. She digs her hands deep into the pockets of her jacket, frowning in a way that almost seemed childish to mask her bitterness. "Nothing makes you feel old the way kids living their lives does."
"I've got no plans," Jack answers automatically, despite the groceries hanging over the side of the bike. True, he had been meaning to make a nice dinner, but it isn't urgent. Nothing feels really urgent in this town, which is part of why he'd chosen it. It was a nice change of pace from the city, with its frenetic daytime hours and tense, busy nights.
Maybe it's because he grew up in the city that he appreciates this place so much now. He'd already gotten a few goodn-natured ribs from the locals for being such a city boy. It was true. To think he'd never even had the opportunity to stand on a beach like this, with the salt-water wind in his hair and white sand under his shoes.
Red's voice pulls him out of his reverie, and he glances down at his grocery bags. "Uh..." The bananas are probably a little bruised, but everything else will taste just the same even with a little wear and tear. He shrugs.
When he looks back at Red, she's smiling in that knowing, mysterious way she has. He realizes, kind of belatedly, that her quasi-speeding down the town's main streets was probably her way of messing with him. He considers being a little upset by that, but honestly, he's the one who accepted a ride from the person he had accidentally offended yesterday, so he's probably a little to blame too.
"A dip?" He turns to look back at the ocean. "I could swim, actually. Looks nice." Now that he's said it, he's honestly really tempted. He wonders if he could convince Red to go along with him, but pushes the thought away. Something about two adults playing in the water like school children feels strange and intimate, and he'd really rather not go there.
They watch the kids play for a while, their laughing voices echoing off the cliffside behind them. He shifts when Red nudges him. For some reason, every single one of her touches preoccupies him. "Aw, we're not that old. Sure, I couldn't fit in any of those uniforms, but to be honest nothing really did fit me at that age, so..."
He trails off, unsure of where he's going with this. His mouth really likes to run when he's talking to Red and it's starting to weird him out. He's quiet for a while, his gaze fixed on the horizon. The setting sun fires the water with colour and reddens the sand. Some of the shades he sees are the exact colour of Red's hair.
After a while, Jack clears his throat and resettles onto the bike, feeling sand shuffle under his shoes. "So, ready to head back? I didn't mean to keep you for so long."
