Panther Hollywood Rain

Driving at night is one of my favorite parts of a trip, especially when it's raining. The headlights of oncoming cars kind of light up the rain and turns the water droplets into golden glitter. Driving in the rain reminds me of a really old Hollywood movie, with all the glitz and gold tumbling down against a dark backdrop. I sighed as I massaged my neck. After spending a whole day at research conferences, all I wanted to do was go home. That's another part of taking trips that I really liked, missing home. It's nice to have some place to return to, and a bed with soft and clean sheets that smelled like cat fur. I yawned and rubbed my face, rolling my shoulders to expel the tightness around my neck.

Without warning, the car engine started sputtering.

I groaned. I'm too tired to deal with this, I sighed pulled over, stopping the car before I leaned over and squinted at the gauges. Just as I thought, the oil gauge read somewhere between negative fifty and 'fuck you'. I sighed again, I seemed to be doing that a lot these days, with all the paperwork I'm buried under, I'm surprised I'm still living.

I undid my seat belt, cursing as I took in my surroundings, trees, road, and more trees. Great, I'm stuck in the middle of nowhere. I felt in my pockets for my phone, and flipped all of them inside out before I remembered that I had left it at home. Just great. I stretched wearily and yawned.

I grabbed my jacket and opened the car door, draping the soft material over my head as I stepped out into the rain. Mmm, cold, with just the right amount of freezing. I slammed the door shut, regretting it almost immediately when I caught the edge of my jacket with the door. After shuffling around and tugging quite a bit, I freed my jacket and observed my handiwork. The jacket sleeve was flattened and a little ripped from the mini war I had with my car door, because I was too lazy to reopen the door to free my jacket.

I locked the car before walking a little farther ahead, my one and only formal jacket getting soaked in the rain. But it still beats getting sick.

I stepped forward and held out my hand, thumbs up.

The cars passed my by, and the rain just kept falling. I was sick and tired of this day, and the dark forest was creeping me out. I have this relentless feeling that something was watching me, but it wasn't uncomfortable, guess I was too tired to care. Another car flashed by, effectively dousing my already soaked clothes with yet another layer of freezing water. I shivered and cursed, but what can I do? Chase the car down?

To my surprise, the car skidded to a halt, and the crazy idiot of a driver started to back the car towards me. I muttered under my breath, but took a step back nonetheless.

The car stopped just infront of me, and the windows rolled down to reveal a scantily clad guy behind the wheel. He only had neon suspenders and from what I could see, extremely tiny shorts. His nipples were pierced with silver hoops, and he had a single amber labret below his full lower lip. My foggy and sleep depraved brain was still trying to process all this when he suddenly broke into a toothy grin.

"Want a ride?" His voice and smile were very pleasant, but I was very uncomfortable with his near-nakedness.

"Um." I hesitated, is this safe? For the first time, I started doubting my choice to hitchhike.

His face dropped and his blue eyes widened. "Oh God! I'm so sorry, oh my gosh, I didn't mean that. I meant to ask you if you'd like to y'know, come with us so we can drop you off somewhere. Jesus Christ, I'm so sorry." He rambled and blushed, his lip piercing glinted in the dim light. Someone in the car guffawed, and the person in the passenger seat leaned into the light, laughing. "Sure, Adrian, that's totally not what you meant to say." He was, like Adrian, also dressed in clandestine clothing, except that he had shiny black straps buckled across his chest.

He thought that I-Oh. I fought to keep the blush off my face : "No No No, it's alright, it doesn't- I mean, I didn't even notice, and yeah, sure, I would love to bum a ride." I stuttered a bit, and my face went positively tomato.

"Oh, okay!" Adrian grinned again, his smile was infectious, and I grinned right back in relief. "And, um, about our, um, clothes, sorry they're a little embarrassing. We uh, just came back from a PRIDE parade, so um, yeah, we don't usually dress like this....so.....Oh yeah! I'm Adrian, this is Derek, and in the backseat is Brian. Do you want to go into the backseat? I mean, if you'd prefer the front seat or something-"

"It's okay, I'll go in the back. Thanks Adrian." I smiled in relief that I wasn't just about to be picked up by weirdos. Adrian is really nice, and the way that he babbles is kind of endearing.

I opened the car door to find, to my surprise, a guy dresses in a brown hoodie and a pair of jeans. I crawled into the car, dripping water everywhere, and stared a little at the surprising amount of clothes on Brian.

"Hey man, welcome to the straight club - wait, are you?"

That surprised a laugh out of me. "Yeah 100%," I said , nodding my head, " and by the way, I'm Christian, nice to meet you."

We drove along for the better part of an hour. While Adrian babbled and basically retold his life story. I've now learned that they are all college students at the same school, Adrian studied history, and Brian and Derek studied bio-mechanics. Adrian also has 3 cats, a lizard, 2 birds, and a hamster.

I gradually warmed up to the dysfunctional bunch. I was in University not long back, and at 29, I'm still not that old yet. Being with Adrian, Derek, and Brian was reminding me of those crazy days in Uni with my friends. The feeling was quite nice, but a little depressing too. I soon found myself laughing as Brian described a prank he's pulled on his professor that involved a lukewarm turkey.

We laughed ourselves silly, and continued the drive in silence, too worn out from laughing so hard.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?" Adrian screamed, slamming his foot down on the pedal.

"What? Who lit the fuse to your dildo?" Derek retorted, as Brian jumped in his seat, jolted awake from his sleep.

I had bumped by head on the window when Adrian screamed, I immediately looked out, squinting into the darkness. "What did you see?" I was more curious than mad. I've been freaked out by nothing too many times for me to count. Everyone makes these mistakes.

"THERE!" Adrian screamed, stabbing his finger at a spot in the forest, "CAN'T YOU SEE IT?"

We all looked, and looked. Finally, I turned back to Adrian. "Adrian, there's nothing-"

"DUCK!" Brian grabbed me by the back of the neck and wrenched me flat to the seat.

I slammed onto the seat, then looked up just in time to see a black silhouette hurl itself at the car.