FicWad

I'll Swim Backwards

A few hours later, the elevator doors slid open and Chris stumbled into the apartment. She hollered, “Back!”

“Yay!” Someone responded from somewhere in the apartment.

Chris went straight to her room to drop off her bag and there she found Pete and Patrick sitting on her bed watching her television. “Hello, boys.”

“Hi,” they responded.

“CSI is it?” Chris asked, recognizing the symptoms. Glancing at the television, she saw she was right. She laughed and shook her head, going into her bathroom to change out of her university issued burnt orange polo and khaki shorts to put on an old t-shirt and athletic shorts. When she came out, CSI was on a commercial.

“Hey Chris,” Patrick said, as if they just noticed she was there.

“Hi,” she said grinning, going over to her bed, she demanded, “Scoot!” so there would be a spot
for her in between the two boys. “Oh, hey.”

“Hey,” Pete said, letting his head drop to her shoulder as she sat back, and taking her hand.

“Sooooo, CSI?” Chris asked.

“Typical,” Patrick answered. “Miniature Killer, if you were wondering.”

“Oooo which one?”

“Chicken Farm,” Patrick responded.

“Excellent. One of my favorites.” When another commercial started, she continued, “Where are the others?”

“Andy’s napping. I think he’s in Becca’s room.”

“I’m sad that Becca isn’t here. I can tell Andy’s sad.”

“He’ll get over it. Besides, Becca has plane tickets to Chicago in two weeks, so he’ll see her soon,” Patrick said. Chris nodded. “And Joe and Sara are doing whatever it is that Joe and Sara do.”

“Cool.” The show came back on. They watched the end of it and as the credits rolled, Chris asked, “Now I’m up for watching more CSI, but if there’s something Austin-y you want to do, I could get up and look pretty to go out.”

“First, you look pretty already,” Pete said.

“Awwwww.” Chris turned and kissed the top of Pete’s head.

“And second, we’re exhausted. Whenever we have time off we usually just do this,” Pete explained.

“Sweet.”

By the time the second episode was a quarter of the way over, Pete was asleep. Joe and Sara appeared at Chris’ door. “We’re gonna go get food. Either Chinese or we’re gonna go to the grocery store,” Sara said, softly so she wouldn’t wake Pete, “Anyone want to go?”

“I’ll go,” Patrick said, getting off of Chris’ bed.

“I’m gonna stay here,” Chris answered.

Sara nodded. She and the boys left the room. After a few minutes, Sara came back. “Andy’s gonna come with us too. We decided Chinese. Do you want the usual?”

“Yes, please.”

“What about that kid?” Sara asked.

“Ummm, I don’t know.” She squeezed Pete’s hand and shrugged her shoulder to wake him up. “Peter, wake up for a sec.”

He sat up sleepily, “Huh?”

“What kind of Chinese food do you want?” Chris asked.

“Ummm, I don’t know,” he mumbled, “Joe usually orders for me.”

Sara laughed, “Ok. Go back to sleep.” To Chris she said, “We’re gonna go down and order. It’ll probably take us a while. They’ll be busy.”

Chris smiled and said, “Make Joe buy you something pretty while y’all wait. There’s that tent sale a couple of blocks away from Great Wall.”

“Good thinking,” Sara replied with a grin. “See ya later.”

“Bye.” Pete had already put his head back on Chris’ shoulder. She asked, “Are you asleep yet?”

“Not particularly,” Pete replied.

“Good.” Chris took his chin in her uncasted hand and pulled his face up to hers. Pete responded enthusiastically with more energy than Chris expected from the sleepy boy next to her. He sat up, pulling her up with him, and wrapped his arms around her. He kissed down her jaw and neck. Chris moaned and said, “God, I missed you.”

He laughed and kissed her lightly on the nose. “I missed you, too.”

Chris wound her arms around his neck and kissed him again. Pete cradled the back of her head and lowered her back onto the bed. The usual activity commenced for a while. After a few minutes, they separated and Pete rolled off of her. Chris sat up smiling, looking down at Pete.

“So are you happy we came to visit?” He asked grabbing her hand and kissing the back of it.

“Of course I am,” she said. “Best surprise ever.”

“Good.”

Again, Chris’ phone rang. She had to get up to answer it. Before she did, she said to Pete, “I’m gonna go grab a soda. Want anything?”

“Water?”

Chris nodded and answered the phone and walked away. She returned a few minutes later. “That was my boss, thanking me for coming in today. I’m getting a bonus.”

“Good job,” he said. He pulled her down for a kiss when she handed him the bottle of water.

“Thanks,” she said. “I’m pretty stoked.” She put her Dr. Pepper down on the night stand and went into her bathroom.

Pete noticed that next to the drink there was a CD case. Still shrink wrapped. He was leaning over to see what it was when Chris walked back out with her brush. Pete straightened. He didn’t really need to see what it was. He knew.

Chris sat on the edge of her bed and began to run her brush through her hair. “So I made a plane reservation yesterday.”

“Ya? Where to?” Pete asked.

“Chicago.”

Pete’s face morphed into another grin. “Really? A couple of days ago you said you weren’t sure.”

“I decided I was sure.” Chris set her brush down on her night stand and took a drink from her
can. “I haven’t ever been back. It’s been three years. It’s time.”

“I’m so proud of you, Christina.” Pete opened his arms. “Come here.”

Chris smiled and fell into his arms, her head going to its favorite spot on his chest, Pete’s fingers tangled in her hair. “Besides, I figured once I bought the ticket, I’d have to get on the plane.”

“I’ll be there when you get off,” Pete responded, kissing her forehead. “When do you fly in?”

Chris paused, evidently thinking, before she said, “The seventeenth.”

“I’ll be there.” He hugged her.

“Good.”

“How long are you staying?”

“I haven’t bought a return ticket yet. I don’t technically have a job until January, so we’ll see how it goes. I should really spend some time at home.”

“I agree.”

“You’re just saying that because it means I’ll be in the same town as you,” she teased.

“Is there something wrong with that?”

She giggled and nuzzled herself further into his embrace. “Not at all.”

They stayed that way for a while, watching whatever was on the television, and Pete soon fell back asleep. Chris heard the others come in a little while later. Joe shouted throughout the apartment for Pete and Chris to come to dinner. Chris removed herself from Pete’s arms and kissed his cheek. “Wake up, Pete. Dinner time.”

He opened his eyes and smiled at the girl sitting over him. He put his arms back around her waist. “Hi.”

She giggled, “Hi.”

“So why did you wake me?”

“Dinner.” When Pete tightened his hold on her, Chris said, “Come on. If we don’t hurry, Joe will
eat all your food.”

“This is a good point,” he said, sitting up and kissing her.

After a few seconds, she pulled away, “Come on, you can kiss me all you want later tonight.”

“I like the sound of that,” he said.

Chris threw him a cocky smile and scrambled out of bed. She had made it halfway to the kitchen when Pete caught up with her and caught her around the waist. Chris squealed and he carried her into the kitchen.

“Sleeping Beauty awakes,” teased Sara.

“For a while at least,” he answered setting Chris down. “Thanks for getting dinner.”

“No problem.”

They all sat down to eat and Joe was telling them about the crazy homeless man who tried to sell him a piece of cardboard. They were cleaning up when Andy said, “So you said Becca was at her placement. Where’s that?”

Chris and Sara looked at each other in surprise. Sara asked, “Did she not tell you?”

“When I talked to her a couple of days ago, she said she didn’t know yet.”

“She did just find out the day before she left,” Chris reassured him, but still she had a wicked smile on her face. “I’m gonna let Becca tell you were her placement is. It’ll be more fun that way.”

“More fun?” Andy asked, torn between confusion and concern.

“You’re a mean person,” Sara told Chris, but she was wearing that same grin. She glanced up at the clock and counted in her head. “You can call and ask her. She’ll be out of training right now.”

Andy hurried off to do just that.

“Where is she gonna be?” Pete asked the two girls who were busy giggling and throwing out the garbage. They shrugged.

Pete didn’t have to wait long for his answer. Andy walked back into the room, a silly grin on his face.

“Off the phone already?” Patrick asked.

“Ya, she was headed out to dinner with the people she’s working with.”

A couple of moments of silence passed, until Pete, exasperated, hit Andy lightly on the arm and
asked, “So where’s she gonna be man?”

Andy’s grin got wider, “Chicago.”

“Dude, that’s awesome,” Joe said from his spot sitting on the counter.

They continued to talk and cleaned. Then Chris said, “I need to take the trash and recycling out. Can someone help me?”

“I will,” Patrick replied.

Together they toted the few bags of trash to the elevator. Once the doors closed, Patrick asked, “Why did I have to do trash? Sara just whispered while we were out that when you asked I was supposed to volunteer.”

Chris was laughing. When her laughter receded, she said, “We have a surprise for the others. We’re gonna be at the show in Chicago.”

“Really?”

“Ya. Except we don’t want to tell the rest of them. I told Pete I was going home, but not until a week later. Becca’s not due to go back until the end of June for her job, and Sara isn’t supposed to go at all. But, my o-staff commitments are over that day at ten in the morning, so we’re getting on a plane at eleven thirty. We’ll be in Chicago by three.” At this point, they were in the basement of the building, Chris leading the way to the dumpster. “My mom’s gonna come pick us up at the airport and I talked to Ryan from the venue and he’s gonna give us a hidden spot backstage so we can watch and then we’ll be in the green room after to see y’all. We just wanted one of you to know. Mostly so when I step off the plane in Chicago and I can’t get in my mother’s car and go to the house, I can call someone without ruining the surprise.”

“Call me,” Patrick said seriously. “I’ll come get you no matter what we’re doing.”

“I knew I could count on you.” Chris gave him a smile and the elevator started to go back up.

“Is this surprise in response to our surprise?” Patrick asked.

“No. We planned this like a week and a half ago. Who’s idea was this anyway?”

“Pete’s, obviously. He wanted to do something cute like send you flowers at work or something, but then our second DC show got canceled, so he suggested we fly down instead.”

“Awww thoughtful.”

Patrick laughed. When Chris raised her eyebrows at him, Patrick said, “Joe said that it would make you guys melt. It’s funny because, for once, he was right.”

“I’m disappointed we’re so predictable,” Chris replied with a smile.

The doors slid open and they went to find the others still sitting in the kitchen trying to decide what they were going to do for the night. They decided to go and do the whole sixth street thing since it was the boys’ only night in Austin. And tomorrow they would just chill.
Chris went to go shower and change. A half an hour later she reemerged in her denim cutoffs, an orange tank top, her crochet vest, and her embroidered boots. She went to Sara’s room to find her eye shadow that she suspected Sara of stealing. After a few minutes of good-natured bickering as they finished their makeup, the girls were ready to go. They collected the boys and they headed out into the vibrant Austin nightlife.

They went to a bunch of different clubs, drinking and dancing. Well the girls were dancing. Occasionally they could convince Pete and Joe to join them and at a couple of clubs, Chris demanded Patrick and Andy dance with her. It was around one in the morning when Sara got felt up for the third time by some random guy and they decided it was time to call it a night.

The walk home wasn’t too bad, but there was barely anyone around. Campus population had dissipated a month ago after school let out, so there were only the summer session students and locals around. Soon they were back in the apartment. They had a couple of more drinks in the living room. Joe and Sara wandered into bed. Chris told Andy to take Becca’s bed and Patrick to take the spare room. When she went into her own room after making sure the boys were settled, Chris found Pete in his pajamas, already in her bed watching television. She stopped to give him a quick kiss before she went to change. In a tank top and her pajama shorts, Chris slid between her sheets and into Pete’s arms.

“Hey,” he said, pulling Chris closer.

“Hey,” she responded. She tilted her head up and their lips met. “Thank you for coming to visit.
I really missed you.”

“I missed you, too,” he said tightening his hold on her. They stayed that way for a few quiet
moments, enjoying each other’s company. Then, Pete said, “Didn’t you say something about me being able to kiss you as much as I wanted later tonight? Is this later?”

She giggled and pressed up against him. “I guess so.”

“You did promise.”

“That is true.” Chris looked up at him; he was smiling down at her. She reached up and pressed her lips against his. Pete pulled her on top of him. She sat up and smiled wickedly before leaning down and gently biting on his bottom lip. He groaned and ran his hands up and down her back as they continued to kiss. His fingers were playing with the hem of her tank top. She smiled into the kiss, and taking a breath, she asked, “Whatchya doin?”

Pete sat up and innocently said, “Nothing,” before leaning in to nibble on her ear, his hands still at the hem of Chris’ shirt.

“Do you need help with that?” she asked breathlessly.

“Nope.” Pete pulled her shirt up over her head and paused, looking at the gorgeous girl sitting on his lap, topless.

“What?” Chris asked, suddenly self-conscious, a blush coming to her cheeks.

Pete grinned and kissed her cheek. He whispered in her ear, “You’re beautiful.”

Chris turned her head kissed him hard. Pete’s hands explored her naked back and she tugged off his shirt. They fell back onto the bed , Pete pulling Chris tight against him. Things continued on in the normal fashion for a while. Eventually they broke apart, Chris settled next to him, her head on his chest, their heavy breathing slowed.

“It’s fun acting like high school kids on their junior prom night,” Chris quipped.

Pete laughed. “It’s nice to do every once in a while, but I think I actually prefer being an adult.”

“Me too. There isn’t as much pressure,” Chris agreed.

“Mmhmm,” Pete responded, his hand rubbing up and down her arm and side. After a few minutes of silence, Pete asked, “TV?”

Chris laughed and said, “Yes. God we’re so lame.”

“Ah,” Pet replied reaching for the remote, “But we are lame together. And happy to be lame.”

“Truth.”

He flipped through the channels for a while before decided on some History Channel show. Pete and Chris had fallen asleep when there was a crash in the front of the apartment. Chris shot up in bed and started to move towards the door.

“First, if you are going out there, I’m going too.” Pete climbed out of bed. And then, smirking at her, he said, “Second, you might want to put on a shirt.”

She shushed him and pulled her shirt over her head and left the room, Pete following. As they got closer to the foyer, they heard more noise and someone muttering, “Jiminy Cricket. God bless America.”

Chris brightened, turned to Pete and said, “Becca.” She hurried to the foyer where she saw her friend on the floor wither her suitcase open and half of her possessions strewn across the
floor. “Someone’s back early.”

Becca looked up guiltily. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“It’s fine,” Chris said, hugging her. “Again, you’re back early?”

“Last day of training was today. I took the red-eye.” Chris released her, and Becca hugged Pete.

“I didn’t want to miss this.”

“Well I’m glad you’re home,” Chris said, yawning.

“See, I did wake you up. You guys should go back to bed. I’m not staying up. I’m exhausted.”

“Ok, Becca.”

“Night Chris, night Pete.”

“Night Rhodes.” Pete and Chris wandered back to her room hand in hand. Once in bed, they fell asleep.

Becca gathered her things from the foyer and padded to her own room. She opened the door and saw
Andy sprawled out on her bed dead asleep. She smiled and set her things down on the floor. She grabbed her pajamas and went to change and brush her teeth. When she returned Andy was still asleep. She pulled back her sheets and got into bed, nudging Andy over gently. He grunted and moved over, not opening his eyes. She lay down next to him and kissed his cheek. He mumbled and opened his eyes.

“Hey,” Becca said.

He grinned goofily, “Hey.”

She giggled. “You’re still asleep, huh?”

“Probably.”

“Give me a kiss and go back to sleep.”

He nodded and leaned toward her. She gave him a quick kiss and pulled the covers back over her and Andy. Andy closed his eyes again and draped his arm around Becca, pulling her close. Becca settled into his embrace and soon fell asleep with a smile on her face.