[Fanfic] 25,000 Miles - Chap. 8
Next Stop : Grand Canyon, Arizona
8
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With Tiffany driving (or rather trying to), Taeyeon didn't sleep a wink. Her eyes were begging to close, but Taeyeon feared from the back of her head that Tiffany would carelessly get them into an accident. As tired and sleepy as she was, she stayed up.
They were going back home. This was it. This was the end of their 25,000 mile journey. Only completing 2,355 miles, they ended up with a badly injured Taeyeon and a heart stricken Tiffany.
It was the end.
And it was time to go home.
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The two stopped over at a gas station to refill their tank. Tiffany stayed by the car and Taeyeon went into the rest stop. Tiffany wasn't as good as a driver Taeyeon was and they went slow. But half a day's trip later, they were in Arizona ; just one state away from home.
With a car as big as theirs, filling up the gas took longer than usual. Taeyeon carelessly flipped and twirled the stack of postcards by the cashier, gaining the cashier's attention.
"Going to see the great Grand Canyon, I reckon?" Taeyeon had trouble understanding him at first that he had to repeat his statement. "If you're heading for the canyons, you won't be needing those postcards."
"Oh no I wasn't.." Taeyeon said embarrassingly retracting her hands from the stack. "I'm sorry."
"Nothing to worry about. I just haven't seen anyone look at those postcards in a long time. I get travelers a lot. Them city folk packed with their electronics and whatnot."
"Where do they all go?"
"Why of course, the Grand Canyon is the only thing Arizona is really known for. But don't quote me on that. I've lived here long enough to see that Canyon is a lot more trouble than it's worth."
"Why is that?" Taeyeon felt a little rude for asking too many questions, but talking to someone other than Tiffany, she kind of enjoyed it. She leaned an elbow on the counter.
"Ah, personal preference. It's nothing kid, I hope I didn't discourage you from going to the Canyons. Still a thing to see."
"Where is it?" Just then Tiffany called Taeyeon over so they could go on their way. Before Taeyeon budged, the cashier smiled with one side and told Taeyeon the way.
"I want to go somewhere." Taeyeon said sitting down next to Tiffany. Tiffany had a habit of chewing on sticks. End of lollipops, barbeque sticks, straws, anything she could munch on to 'do something else than driving'. So before they left the rest stop, Taeyeon grabbed a handful of straws and passed them to Tiffany. She leaned back, took one between her thumb and index, and began chewing.
"Where?" munched Tiffany.
"I'll show you."
"Yeah okay, but where? You're not seriously thinking about driving in your condition?" Taeyeon gnawed on the straw and found pleasure in doing so. She mumbled, "I'll be fine."
"No. The deal is I'm taking us home. I'm and us. Key words Taengoo bear."
Taeyeon sent Tiffany a playful glare. "Taengoo bear? What the hell is that?"
"Your new name if you continue to argue like this."
With the end of the straw in her mouth, she twisted it and bit it down harshly. She sighed and threw it out the window before taking a new piece. "Fine. We're going to the Grand Canyon."
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They continued their journey with the only fact that the Grand Canyon was 'somewhere up north'. With signs guiding them on their way, a post informing them of their location reminded Tiffany something. As Tiffany drove, they chatted for a while. Passing by a couple small towns, Tiffany blurted out randomly.
Her eyes trailed the outline of the houses carefully. "I had a boyfriend from Arizona once."
Taeyeon didn't say anything. They had talked about friends and family, but never about relationships. It didn't make her feel uncomfortable, but she stayed silent mainly because she didn't know what to say. She tried to end the conversation. "That so?"
"He was a nice guy."
Taeyeon leaned back and rested her head on the chair. "That so?"
"He got into a car accident and died a few years back."
Taeyeon opened her mouth to say the same thing, but she held it back. She grabbed another straw and placed it into her mouth, sighing through the small red tunnel before turning her head away. She blew the straw out of her mouth like a cannon and said again. "Is that so?"
It wasn't random that Tiffany blurted out about her past. When they passed the city limit sign, she realized she was in her ex-boyfriend's city. She wasn't angry at Taeyeon for saying the same thing. She knew it was offputting for her to say anything morbid like that, but suddenly the feelings of romance crawled up back into her skin and Tiffany found herself craving for the feeling again.
What Tiffany left out was that she mainly caused the accident to happen. That day, she bombarded him with loads of text messages that he was so focused in replying to them all he didn't see the red light.
"Tiffany!" screamed Taeyeon. Tiffany got back into her senses and slammed the brakes. Honks surrounded their car and Taeyeon pulled Tiffany's arm harshly. "Jesus, are you even awake?" The honks continued on. "Hurry up and get out of the way. Park on the side of that street. I'm driving." demanded Taeyeon.
"I'm sorr- I..I was thinking about something."
"Nevermind that. Focus. Let me drive."
"N-No! I can do this."
"Tiffany." This time Taeyeon fully forced Tiffany to look at her. "Tiffany, if I hadn't screamed we could have been seriously injured right now. Right now, I don't care if it's you or me driving, but I want to get us home safely." Tiffany stepped on the gas and drove ahead into more emptier streets. "I need you to be focused." Taeyeon said gently patting Tiffany by the shoulder. "For now, I want to take the road less traveled. Can you do that?" Tiffany swallowed her saliva, noticing how dehydrated she was, and nodded. "It's not that far from here. We'll go check the Canyon out, rest for a bit, then get on our way. We'll be back home by tomorrow. So for the time being.." Taeyeon took one of Tiffany's hands off the steering wheel and placed it ontop of the clutch, carefully placing hers ontop with a firm grip. "I need you Tiffany."
Tiffany studied Taeyeon's soft hands ontop of hers and a mini heart attack bloomed in her heart. She wasn't sure whether it was sadness from remembering her past lover, or whether or not it was a new feeling. But one thing was for sure, Taeyeon caused it and that much Tiffany understood.
Travelling for as long as they have, with the experiences they've gone through, Tiffany sometimes forgot why she decided to travel in the first place. Her default answer was always "For inspiration." but she herself knew it was a lie.
Tiffany could careless about inspiration. About her art career. She didn't care about that anymore.
But it also confused her because she didn't know what she was caring for. Because of this, she was often stuck in a rut.
They made it to the Canyon, a somewhat off-limits part of it. There weren't any tourist around because they had gone from a different direction most official tourist would go. They were rather close too. Tiffany had parked on a upwards slope that ended on a cliff. The two got out and looked at view. With the sun setting, orange filled the painting completely.
"Oh gosh." Tiffany mumbled to herself. "It's.." Taeyeon stood behind her and smiled. "Well, is this everything you've hoped for?" She twirled around and suddenly felt herself wrapped around Taeyeon's arm. She paused, stiffening in Taeyeon's one-arm embrace, but eventually learned to relax. Eventually, she hugged back too. Awkwardly, but returning the friendly feelings.
"It's not everything. But you can't deny that view though." She tightened her grip around Taeyeon's side. "You can see out into the distance from here...It's so far that my eyes start to hurt trying to see it all."
Taeyeon chuckled a little but fell silent soon after. "It's stuff like this that makes me happy I decided to travel with you." Tiffany gave off a nervous laugh and let go of the hug. "What?" Taeyeon grinned. "Ohhh, yeah I'm guessing that sounded a little chessy huh?" She laughed again. "Well, It's the truth."
Tiffany showed off her genuine signature eyesmile and thanked Taeyeon.
The two stood there for a while until they heard a strange crackling noise behind them. Quickly turning her attention, Taeyeon swung her head back only to realize their RV was rolling off the cliff. Pushing Tiffany out of the way, she ran to the car screaming, "NO!"
Taeyeon ran as fast as she could, but inevitably, the entire RV rolled off the cliff, crashing into the Grand Canyon below. The car didn't explode, but it definitely caused a thunderous clap of noise echo throughout nature as smoke started to spring up from the engine.
Looking at the scene, Taeyeon fell on her knees. Tiffany ran up to her, looking at their hopes and dreams all piled up and crashed at the bottom, and cussed.
"Tiffany, did you..like.. fuck - did you fucking put the handbrakes on?!" Taeyeon said in flames.
"H-H-H-Handbrakes?!" Taeyeon threw her body forward, catching her head as she sobbed into her hands. "No! Fuck! Why did this have to..." Eventually after mumbling and grumbling words that Tiffany would never dare to say to anyone, Taeyeon screamed and laid out on the dirt floor.
It took a long time but eventually workers that helped keep the Grand Canyon park in order found out about the crash and sent help over. A helicopter flew overby, broadcasting their failures on TV.
The fire department came, then the police right after with the ambulance. The complete package. Many people gathered up but were quickly dismissed by officials. Tiffany explained what happened, deeply bathing in guilt with full acknowledge that it was her fault. Then after everything she said, the men simply replied, "There's nothing more we can do."
"Nothing more you can do..?" Tiffany stood up. "Our belongings. Our clothes. Our food. Our phones. Our wallets. EVERYTHING! Was in that car!"
"I understand that but-"
"Where the hell are we suppose to stay!? Where can we stay? We don't even have money!"
"I'll try to make arrangements.." The man continued on but Tiffany was no longer in a mood to listen. She searched around and found Taeyeon in unneeded care of a paramedic. Tiffany approached her with immense care and massive guilt. Before she could utter a word, she was drenched in cold sweat due to nervousness and extreme panic.
"Taeyeon I-" Just as Taeyeon lifted her head, three women, uncared for by the officials, came walking up to them with apparent gifts in their hands. With no introduction whatsoever, they raised their high drunken-like voices together and said, "Helloo!"