x_dark_siren_x asked for Bob/Brian huddling for warmth where at least one of them is always-a-girl - so, because I could, I went for them both being girls. (Yay, girls!)
Fandom cliche #3: huddling for warmth | girl!Bob/girl!Brian | PG-13 | 807 words | for
x_dark_siren_x Carry Your Thoughts Across An Open Field
“I swear to god, I am going to bash their heads together if they ever get here,” Bri says, slamming the door behind herself and scowling an indiscriminately annoyed scowl around the inside of the van.
Bob watches her shake snow off the end of her ponytail and tries not to smile. “How far out are they?”
Bri mutters something that sounds like too fucking far and curls up on the bench, pulling her feet up onto the cushion and glaring at her knees.
Bob wonders if it was maybe the best idea to let Bri be the one to call AAA; when Bri gets freaked out, she gets spitting mad.
“Cheer up, Schechter,” Bri tells her, keeping her voice casual like she hasn’t noticed that Bri’s hands have been shaking since the damn tire blew and she had to fight to wrench the wheel around and keep them on the road.
Bob unpeels herself from the driver’s seat and crawls over into the back, careful to avoid the stacked-up guitars and amps and mic stands, coming to kneel on the bench next to Bri.
Personally, she’s pretty fucking glad that they’re not dead in a ditch somewhere; sitting on the side of the road in the middle of Fuck Knows, Montana with a mini-blizzard battling around outside, waiting for AAA to come rescue their asses doesn’t seem that bad by comparison.
Bri turns to face her. Her eyebrows are drawn down in an unhappy V. “I am really fucking cheerful,” she says, with some hideous contortion of her face that Bob thinks might be meant to be a smile.
“Sure you are,” Bob agrees. She shifts closer so they’re pressed together down one side and jabs her elbow into Bri’s side to make her relax. She’s expecting Bri to swear at her or to elbow her right on back; she’s not expecting Bri to sigh and drop her head forward onto her knees, her weight folding into Bob like she doesn’t have the energy to hold herself upright anymore.
Uncertainly, Bob lifts an arm and lays it along Bri’s back. They’re not huggy people and, as the only two girls on tour, they have to be doubly careful not to be seen to be, especially not with each other.
“Cold,” Bri says like that’s an explanation for why she’s shivering. She sounds defensive but Bob knows that if Bri wanted this half-a-hug over, it would be over.
“Yeah,” Bob says, “Sucks.” It's cold enough in the van that she can see their breath exhaling in think white clouds. She rubs her hand up and down Bri’s arm, feeling the soft material of her sweatshirt rasp against Bob’s dry palms. Bri’s wearing a denim skirt and thick pantyhose and, when she lets her pulled-up legs rest against Bob’s, her knees feel freezing even through Bob’s jeans.
Eventually, Bri lifts her head and tips it back against the window. Her eyeliner is smeared and she looks tired. “I thought I was going to kill you,” Bri says, keeping her eyes shut.
Yeah. Bob had thought that too; she can still feel the sick spike of adrenaline from feeling the car lurch and knowing they weren’t going to be able to slow in time, that if they went over there’d be no help for miles. “Yeah, well, I thought you were going to kill you.”
Bri’s eyes slide open, a tiny sliver of blue in the dark of the van. “It’d be really fucking shitty if anything happened to you,” she says like it’s a secret, like Bob was supposed not to know that Bri cares about her.
“Schechter,” Bob tells her seriously, “I am so very touched by your effusive declaration.” She lifts her hand from Bri’s arm and strokes Bri’s hair back behind her ears. There’s no space between them and it’s easy for Bob to press her dry lips against Bri’s chapped ones. That’s another thing they don’t do in front of other people but have been doing more and more when it’s just the two of them alone.
Bri parts her lips with a shaky, gusty sigh and kisses Bob back for a long, sweet moment before pushing Bob back with hands that are far gentler than Bob expects them to be.
“You know what,” Bri says suddenly. Her frown is slowly melting away. “Fuck it. Let’s change the fucking tire ourselves.”
“Yeah?” Bob asks, reluctantly untwisting her fingers from Bri’s hair. “You been hiding your fierce car maintenance skills from me?”
Bri shakes her head but she’s smiling now. “Nope, but how hard can it be?” She stands up and stretches, reaches down and catches Bob’s wrist with a careful tug. “Coming?”
Bob looks out the window at the mounting snow and the really angry looking sky then looks back at Bri and Bri’s smile which says she’s excited to find out if she’s awesome at something new. “Sure,” she says, “Why the hell not.”
/End