Rhonda's View

We decided to follow AJ and Amber up to the cabin. Howie drove and I rode in the passenger seat – I had full control over the radio. Missy and Nick sat in the backseat. I turned around a few times to get suggestions for music and caught them looking at each other with puppy dog eyes. I rolled my eyes and remembered what it was like the first few days I spent with Howie.

We saw AJ pulled over at a grocery store. "Sorry guys but I need a pit stop."
"We should probably get some food before we get up there," Nick suggested. We grabbed a couple of carts and each went our separate ways. Amber, Missy and I went towards the alcohol, Howie towards the frozen foods, Nick towards chips and AJ towards the bathroom.

We all met at the cash registers. I must admit that Howie was the most logical out of all of us. He had "normal" food while the rest of us had junk food. AJ was the last one at the registers and brought a package of toilet paper. We all laughed at him. "Fine," he said, "you guys can use leaves. The toilet paper is all mine." After Amber and I waved a bottle of mudslide in front of him, he decided that he would share his toilet paper.

We loaded the groceries into the truck. I decided to drive since Howie was barely keeping up with AJ. Nick complained that his legs were sore from sitting in the backseat so Howie and Missy agreed to sit back there for the remainder of the ride. Nick threw on Kid Rock and we were on our way. I noticed in the mirror that Missy and Howie were writing back and forth in a small notebook.
"Whatcha' doin'?" I asked.
"Oh nothing – just playing hangman," Missy said. My eyes connected with Howie's in the mirror and I knew they weren't playing hangman. Howie pointed to Nick and I understood what he meant.

Missy's View

Howie and I were sitting in the backseat of the truck writing back and forth in a notebook.
"Howie – I'm really nervous about this weekend. I know you and Rhonda know what happened on the beach, but I'm still nervous.
"Don't be. You know that Nick adores you."
"I know – I just can't believe how things worked out."
"Well, things happen for a reason."
"Yeah, but I'm not that upset about JC."
"Well then I guess it means you never really loved him. You may have cared about him but that's different."
"I know – do you think Nick will be able to handle the fact that I have a son?"
"You know that Nick adores children. I think he would be great for Patrick."
"So when are you and Rhon gonna start a family?"
"I thought we were talking about you and Nick here."

I was grateful for the time alone with Howie so that we would talk. We continued to write back and forth in the notebook about how Nick and I felt about each other. It was nice to hear someone else's point of view. The drive was putting me to sleep. I finally got comfortable and I fell asleep as Rhonda continued to drive.

Rhonda's View

We were on the road for about two hours when it began to rain pretty hard. We found a little motel and pulled over. Missy was sleeping in the truck so we left her in there as we went to get rooms. There were only two vacancies left so we decided to give Amber and AJ their own room. Howie ran back to the truck with Nick so they could grab some clothes and Missy. Nick carried Missy inside of the room and laid her down on the bed. Nick decided to be a gentleman and sleep on the couch instead of in the bed with Missy. We dried off and went to sleep, or I should say tried to.

I kept flipping around in the bed unable to sleep because of Howie's snoring. I was so tempted to go sleep in the truck but the storm was getting worse. I heard Nick trying to get comfortable on the couch. He was laying there with a thin blanket covering him. He must have heard that I was still awake. "Maybe if you roll him over he'll stop snoring," Nick said.

"I can't move him, he's on the blanket and I can't get out of the bed." Nick came over to help me move Howie. We finally rolled him over and even though his face was in the pillow, it still sounded like there was a tornado in the room.
"How do you sleep with him?" Nick asked.
"I try to get to bed first!" I answered. "Well it looks like I won't be getting any sleep tonight."
"I'm up too – do you want to play some cards or something?" Nick pulled a deck of cards out of his jacket pocket and we proceeded to play SlapJack. After a few rounds, Nick said that he was getting hungry.
"All of the food is in the car Nick. Do you want to go out there in the pouring rain?"
"No…but I remember there being vending machines by the office," he said. Nick got up and found a bunch of change in his jacket pocket. We walked down by the office to get some pop and chips. The rain began to blow sideways under the awning and got us pretty wet.
"Great idea Nicky!" I said. We got to the door and looked at each other. "Where's the key Nick?"
"I thought you grabbed it!" We looked in through the window and saw it sitting on the table with some other things Nick had pulled out of his jacket. We began to bang on the door to try to wake up Missy or Howie. But apparently neither of them heard us over Howie's snoring.
"Which room is Amber's and AJ's?" I asked. Nick pointed two doors down from us.
We put the pop and chips down and ran over to their door. "Go away!" we heard AJ shout.
"J – come on! We're locked outside!" we both shouted.
"I said 'Go Away!'"

The rain began to come down harder and Nick and I were getting drenched. Nick banged on the door one last time but still no one got up to let us in. "Well," he said, "we could hide out in the truck for awhile."
"You leave our room key in our room but have the key for the truck?" I asked quite annoyed.
"The truck has keyless entry. We could stay in there until the storm passes a bit." I guess there was no other option at this point. We ran towards the truck and climbed in.
"Nick," I said, "We left the pop and chips by the door."
"Fuck! I'm really hungry!!" Nick seemed a little hard on himself for forgetting the food.
"Its okay Nick, we still have the stuff from the grocery store." Nick climbed in the backseat and handed me a Diet Pepsi and some pretzels as he began to make us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Nick and I talked for a long time about a lot of things, one of the topics being him and Missy. He confessed what happened on the beach at my birthday party and about what they talked about the night before. I knew about the night of my birthday party but I didn't let him know. Nick asked a lot of questions about Howie and I. I guess you can say we bonded that night.
"Look!" Nick screamed. Howie had gotten up and opened the door in his sleep. Nick jumped out of the truck and ran to catch the door before it closed. By the time I got into the motel room, Howie was already back in bed snoring away. Nick and I looked at each other and had to laugh. We were soaked from head to tow.
"Um...you can go dry off first," Nick said as he pointed to the bathroom. I went into the bathroom to dry off and realized that I had no dry clothes to change into. My other clothes were still wet and Howie had mistakenly grabbed his and Missy's bags only. I came out of the room and grabbed some clothes from Howie's bag and went back into the bathroom to change.
I came out of the room and told Nick about the mix up in bags. He decided to try to wear a pair of Howie's pajama bottoms but they were too small on him. "Well, I guess I'll dry off eventually," Nick said as he climbed under his sheet on the couch. "Good night Rhon, its been an adventure!"
"Night Nick."