Christine Rides Again

Chapter 1; The Funeral

“Hey… Leigh… Can I ask you something?” Dennis spoke, his voice cutting through the silence like a knife.

“If you must.” She answered.

“It feels like forever ago that we last saw each other, and back outside the church you seemed… I don't know… like you didn't wanna be talking to me.” He began, testing the waters before moving on. “Are you avoiding me?”

Leigh kept her gaze on the blur of trees and strangers as the car kept moving. She didn't dare to look at him. It was a good question, and in truth, she hadn't been going extra lengths to avoid him, but then again she hadn't bothered to visit or even call over the last few weeks.

“Maybe.” She shrugged. “I don't know.”

“Come on, that's not an answer.” He groaned.

“Dennis, we are coming back from your best friend's funeral. Do you really want to be talking about this now?”

“About what? I asked a simple question, that's all. I'm not meaning any disrespect to Arnie.” He sighed. She had given him his answer without even saying it, and to say that it stung would be an understatement. “Doesn't matter now.”

Leigh felt a pang of guilt. He was grieving Arnie just as much as she was, and he was the only one who truly knew and understood her pain because he shared it. He watched Arnie die, just as she did. She hadn't meant to twist that knife and suggest that he didn't care.

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way.” She quickly apologized. “I know you cared about him too.”

“It's fine.” He shrugged. “I guess I'm just confused.”

“Confused about what?”

“Doesn't matter.”

“Yes, it does.” She bit back.

“Are you trying to argue with me?” He almost laughed. “I don't know, I'm confused because up until Arnie was killed you were all over me and now it's… it's like you refuse to acknowledge me. Without him I- I'm lonely, and we went through all of that stuff together, you and I, yet somehow it feels like you stopped caring.”

As soon as the words left his lips, Leigh turned her head and looked at him with wide, pleading eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again and frowned. Then lost the control that she'd managed to maintain all day.

“Pull over!”

“What?”

“Stop the car!”

“Leigh, did I upset you? I'm sorry, I was just saying-”

“I said pull over!” She raised her voice.

Dennis caught a glimpse of her out of the side of his eye, then settled them back on the road and ahead and as the car in front turned off into a side road, he swerved off the road and pulled up along the side.

“I'm sorry, okay?” He surrendered. “If I upset you then I didn't mean-”

“You didn't!” She snapped.

“Oh, okay.” He muttered quietly. “Please can we just-”

Leigh didn't have the chance to register what she was doing before she stretched herself across the console between the driver and passenger seats, with his face in her hands and crushing her lips on his. Dennis's eyes widened and his hands slipped from the wheel. He hesitated before moving them to her waist, grabbing and pulling her over to the driver's side and into his lap. Leigh's hands slid down from his face to his chest, and she licked at her lips, then went in to kiss him again. This time, he closed his eyes and kissed her first, before she'd had the chance. After a minute, his leg started to cramp under her weight, still recovering from the break, and he shifted. Sensing his discomfort, Leigh leaned back and lifted herself onto her knees allowing him to move forward and as he went to kiss her again, she lowered her head. Though as he leaned forward even more, she leaned further back, and unknowingly, her backside hit the steering wheel causing it to let out a loud honk that startled them both.

“Heh, even the car knows how to be horny.” He chuckled nervously.

“What are we doing?” Leigh muttered under her breath.

“Leigh?”

“Arnie is dead! We buried him less than ten minutes ago and now we're here… doing this… What does that say about us, Dennis?”

Dennis exhaled and bit down on his lower lip, removing his hands from her waist as she climbed back over to the passenger seat. Another question without a good answer. They'd just come from his best friend's funeral, and he'd come seconds away from disrespecting his memory in the most disgusting way. It wasn't Leigh. His attraction to her was undeniable. But every time they were together there was a weight in the air between them. That weight's name was Arnold Cunningham.

“I don't know.” He answered uselessly. “Says we're human…”

“Pretty trashy ones at that.” She scoffed.

“Leigh, I have a question for you and I want you to be honest with me. Don't sugar coat it and please don't answer a certain way because Arnie is dead. I need to know this one thing. Please.” He pleaded.

“Okay.” She said calmly.

“If Arnie had survived that night, and you had to make a choice between me and him, who would you choose?”

“Oh, Dennis I-” She stopped, unsure of how to answer. From the beginning she had known that if Arnie had survived then a choice would have to be made. But he didn't, and at first that made everything seem so easy, until now. She had loved Arnie, and her feelings for Dennis had grown over the last few months, spanning back to when the former's behaviour had started to change, but she couldn't imagine having to choose between them now. “How am I supposed to answer that?”

“With the truth.” He suggested.

“Obviously.” She rolled her eyes. “But what if I don't know… Arnie is gone and he's not coming back, but if he were here without Christine then we'd probably be together.”

There it was. The truth that eased his guilt and made him feel worse all at the same time. He didn't know what to say, so he didn't bother.

“But Arnie is dead.”

“So… what?” He arched an eyebrow. “How am I supposed to look at you now, knowing that I'm nothing but your back up, your second choice and that if things had turned out differently, I'd have never crossed your mind.”

“I-” She tried, but didn't bother finishing. “Just take me home.”

“But Leigh-”

“Take me home. Please!” She cut in.

“Alright.” He sighed, twisting the key in the ignition.

Leigh was silent the rest of the drive to her house, and he didn't speak either. There was nothing left to be said, it was that simple. She opened the door as soon as he pulled up along the sidewalk, and only muttered a small word of thanks before she slammed it shut and hurried up the path and to the porch. Dennis didn't move until she'd disappeared through the door. Then smacked the steering wheel with a force that stung his hand. Arnie had left such an impact on their lives and his death even more so, and every time he thought back over the past year, he wished that he'd never stopped and reversed the day Arnie had first spotted Christine. He often thought about how different it would be if he hadn't stopped. His best friend wouldn't have bought that damn car, and he'd still be alive… and Leigh would have been his, because there was no doubt that if Christine hadn't changed Arnie, he'd never have had the courage to talk to her.

It wasn't the ifs that mattered now. He wasn't entirely sure that anything mattered anymore. Either way, he had lost. In a few short months, high school would be over and he'd be out of this town for good. He would carry what happened throughout the past year with him forever, wherever he ended up. That didn't mean that he couldn't move on from it. After all, that was the only thing left to do now.