Entwined - SF5 (13 page)

"How about I pick which of yours I want, and you pick which of mine you want?" Ryan proposed.

"Okay," Jamie agreed. "I pick the Explorer. The Xterra is cute, but it doesn’t look very sturdy."

"I pick the Lexus," Ryan decided.

"How come?" Jamie asked.

"No good reason," Ryan revealed. "I just don’t feel old enough to buy a Mercedes."

Jamie laughed at her reasoning, reminding her, "There’s no age requirement, Honey. I checked."

"That’s my choice, and I’m sticking with it," Ryan insisted, dashing downstairs to her computer to do a little research on the two remaining choices. She logged onto the Internet and did a few searches, obtaining the list price for each basic vehicle and the price of every possible option. She also found out that Ford was offering a rebate on the base model Explorer which brightened her day significantly.

When her research did not sway Jamie’s vote, they decided to go test-drive both cars. But just as they were getting ready to leave, Tommy called and asked if they could watch the baby. They conferred and decided that she wouldn’t be too much trouble, so they piled into Conor’s truck and went to pick her up.

Since Ryan called dibs, they went to the Ford dealer first. Their feet had barely hit the ground outside of the Boxster before an eager salesman descended upon them. "Hi folks," he beamed. "Lovely day to buy a new car, isn’t it?"

Jamie took the lead, telling him that she and her friend, pointing to Ryan, wanted to look at an Explorer. He seemed to hear her, since he led them over to the huge selection of Explorers in every color and with every option. Ryan said she was only interested in the four-wheel-drive base model, and that’s when she lost the salesman’s interest. She was bouncing Caitlin on her hip and the salesman kept telling her how cute the little darling was, but she noticed that they did not make their way towards the cars that she had indicated.

The salesman, Jay, kept chatting with Conor about the Explorer, trying to get Conor to declare his preferences. After allowing him to rattle on for a few minutes, Jamie pleasantly interrupted him. "Ah, Jay, my friend said she wanted to see the four-wheel-drive base model. Can you show us that?"

"Sure, sure," he said expansively. "I just was telling your husband that the next step up is well worth the price."

"He’s not my husband," she said, "and he’s not buying the car. We are," she said as she pointed again at Ryan.

"Oh, well, that’s fine. No problem," he said with a smile. He led them to a car that seemed to fit Ryan’s description, but he once again directed his comments to Conor, completely ignoring Ryan.

Jamie had finally had enough. "Jay,’ she said sweetly, "Ryan here is the one who is interested in this car. Why don’t you answer her questions?"

He turned to Conor and laughed a bit. Looking back at Jamie he said, "Your boyfriend and your baby would be a lot more comfortable in the Limited Edition. Why don’t we look at that first?"

Jamie stared at her shoes for a moment, then looked up at Jay with a deadly smile. "He’s not my boyfriend. He’s not my husband. That’s not my baby. But
she
is my girlfriend and
she’s
the one who wants to look at this stupid car. If she wants it, I’m buying it for her. So the only two people that you should be addressing are her and me!"

"Oh," he said, the light starting to come on. "Oh! Okay, so this is for just you two! Jeez," he laughed, finding the situation quite humorous. "Honest mistake. You can just never tell in San Francisco can you?" he said with a weak chuckle. "You girls just don’t look like…"

"Like what?!" Jamie asked, with fire in her green eyes.

"Uhh, like…uhh…like you are old enough to buy a car like this," he said with a weak smile on his sweating face.

Conor walked over to Ryan, picked up the baby, turned on his heel and began to walk away, calling over his shoulder, "I still say the Lexus is the better car, but I’ll leave you kids to your fun."

Jay was stuck with the now steaming Jamie and the less perturbed, but still miffed, Ryan. "Heh, heh," he chuckled nervously. "So…who wants to drive?"

Ryan decided to conduct the test drive. But she was thwarted once again by having to follow a prescribed route around the block--once. This tiny track didn’t allow her to take it over potholes or railroad tracks or any of the other normal hazards of city driving. The heavy traffic did not allow her to go over 30 mph, so she had no idea how the car accelerated. All in all, it was a frustrating experience that was exacerbated by Jay’s constant rambling from the back seat. Ryan’s head was throbbing by the time they returned to the lot. She tossed the keys over her shoulder, nearly hitting Jay in the head as she muttered, "We’ll let you know." Jamie trotted behind her, catching up as they reached Conor and the baby who were waiting by the truck. Jamie heard her mutter "fuck-head" as she got into the passenger seat, meeting Conor’s wide-eyed expression with a warning shake of her head. For a change, he didn’t try to make the situation worse, and they rode in silence to the Lexus dealer.

When they arrived, Jamie launched into her business mode immediately. She strode into the dealership and asked to speak to the floor manager. An attractive woman came out and Jamie introduced herself. "Hi, I’m Jamie Evans. This is my lover, Ryan O’Flaherty. We’re interested in buying an RX 300. We’d like to speak to someone who doesn’t mind working with women and who isn’t shocked by lesbianism. Do you have anyone who can help us?"

The woman laughed and extended her hand. "I’m Sandra Fletcher. I rather like working with women, and I’ve known a few lesbians in my life. I’ve yet to be shocked by them, unless they were purposely going for that reaction, so I can probably help you."

"Great," Jamie said. "We haven’t seen the car yet, so we want to see what you have, what options are available, and then we want to take a test drive. Ryan is quite the car buff, and she’s only interested in buying if we can go on a real test drive with a route of our own choosing. Can you arrange that too?"

"Sure," she said easily. "We trust our customers to take the cars wherever they wish. No problem at all."

Conor poked his head out from around the corner and asked, "Is it safe?"

Jamie laughed and motioned him over. "Sandra, this is Ryan’s brother and her baby cousin. He’s a little nervous about being treated like the brains in this organization, so feel free to ignore him."

"I bet you’re not ignored very often," Sandra said with a wink.

"I like this place lots better than the last," Conor said happily as they walked toward the lot.

The cars were remarkably similar, with very few options available. Every car on the lot came with leather seating and all had CD players installed, so the only choice to be made was color. "Which one do you want to drive?" Sandra asked.

"I like burgundy," Jamie said. Ryan had no objection, so Sandra went in to the office and came back with the keys. She handed them to Jamie and said, "Have a nice ride."

"You’re not coming with us?" Ryan asked.

"Nope. I just needed to copy your driver’s licenses for our insurance. We trust you."

"I’ll stay as your security deposit," Conor offered, giving Sandra a little grin.

She smiled back at him and said, "If they don’t come back, can I keep you?"

"You can keep me even if they do come back," he answered happily.

"Let’s go, Honey," Ryan said as she rolled her eyes. "This is getting painful."

Much to her regret, Ryan thoroughly enjoyed driving the vehicle. It rode very much like a car, but it had all of the beneficial attributes of an SUV. Jamie loved the ride and the numerous appointments that came standard, and she played with the moon roof and the CD player until she nearly drove Ryan to distraction. "Honey, can you leave the little buttons alone for just a minute?" she asked patiently.

"I like the buttons," Jamie replied. "That’s the best part of car shopping."

"You really like this car, don’t you?" Ryan asked.

"Yes, I do. Don’t you?"

"Yeah, it’s really nice, but I just feel funny spending this much for a car. We could get by so much cheaper."

"That’s true, but why not get what we want if we can afford it?"

"I don’t know. It just seems so extravagant."

"Is this you talking or something else?" she asked suspiciously.

"It’s partly me and partly my upbringing. It’s frowned upon to show how much money you have. The ‘poor mouth’ was invented in Ireland, you know," she added with a small chuckle. "If you win the Sweepstakes and someone asks how you’re doing you should say, 'Oh just barely making the ends meet. It’s a struggle every day.'"

Jamie laughed at her adorable brogue, but showed her understanding by saying, "If you really feel uncomfortable, we can buy something much less expensive. But your family will soon know that I’ve got money, so I don’t think it will be a shock for them if we have a nice car."

"Okay, let me think about it. You really are leaving the decision up to me?"

"Yeah. I choose this, but I don’t want to do anything that you don’t feel good about. You’re the one that will be driving it most of the time, so you need to get what you want."

When they got back to the dealership they went into Sandra’s office. Conor was already there, entertaining his captive audience. He was a hit, as usual, with Caitlin, but Sandra seemed to be enjoying herself also. "So, how did you enjoy the test drive?" Sandra asked as Ryan set the keys on the desk.

"We both liked it," Ryan admitted, "but I need to think about it for a few minutes. Conor, can I talk to you?"

"Sure," he said as he hopped up and handed Jamie the baby. "Hang on to this for me, will you?" he joked as he followed her out.

"What’s up?" he asked as they walked around the showroom.

"Jamie really likes this one and I do too, but I’m uncomfortable spending this much money on a car. What do you think the rest of the family will think if we start spending money on things like this?"

"Are you really worried about that?" he asked, somewhat surprised.

"Yeah, I am," she admitted. "I don’t want to look like we’re lording it over everyone else."

"I think everyone is very fond of Jamie, and I think they know she has bucks. I mean it’s kind of obvious after you’ve been around her for a while. She just looks rich," he said with a smile. "I don’t think they’d want you to live like everyone else if you’ve really got it. That’s almost insulting. It’s like you’re saying, ‘We’ve got money, but we act like we’re poor because we know you’ll be jealous.’ I don’t think that would go over well, Sis."

She slid her arms around his waist and gave him a firm hug, "Thanks, Conor. That helped a lot."

As they entered the office Jamie piped up, "Did you know this and the Mercedes are the only two SUV’s that have side impact protection systems? Caitlin would be much safer...."

Ryan sighed, still feeling a little sick to her stomach. "You don’t have to sell me on the car, Jamie," she said. "I like it…I really do. It’s just so much money…"

Now Sandra jumped into the discussion. "Jamie tells me that you were also interested in the Explorer. Would you feel more comfortable if I could sell you a Lexus for around the same price?"

"Uhhh…that would be nice," Ryan drawled. "Would we get a title with it, or is it hot?"

"It’s not hot, of course," she assured her. "And it’s already been broken in."

An hour later the twosome was cruising home in their gently-used, one-year-old sand-colored Lexus, both happy with the outcome of the negotiations. "Don’t you love this?" Jamie asked excitedly as she once again punched every available button.

Ryan gave her an indulgent smile and admitted, "It’s absolutely marvelous. I’m as excited as I was when I bought my Harley."

"Remind me to call my trust officer and ask him to make an income distribution to cover this, will you, Hon?"

"How did you pay for it?" Ryan asked with a frown, unaware of the financial negotiations since she'd been changing Caitlin’s diaper during much of them.

"I charged it, of course," she said happily.

"You charged it!"

"Yep. I charge everything for the airline miles, Honey. This little baby," she said fondly as she patted the dash, "just got us a free trip to Europe!"

The rest of Saturday was spent giving Ryan’s uncles rides in the car, and much to Jamie’s amazement, each cousin was allowed to take it for a test drive. She had assumed that Ryan would be protective of her first car, and would not let another driver within ten feet of it, and she was pleased to see that her partner was more concerned with her cousins' feelings than she was for her car. When the last of the test drives was completed it was a little after nine o’clock, and minutes after getting horizontal Ryan was sound asleep, the owner's manual for the Lexus spread open on her chest like a tiny blanket.

This is so cute
, Jamie giggled softly upon emerging from the bath.
She’s just like a kid with a cherished new toy
.
I bet that manual is memorized by tomorrow night!
She gently removed the book from her chest, turning off the bedside lamp as she did so. Ryan murmured something unintelligible, and made an uncoordinated attempt to hold on to the manual, but Jamie tenderly patted her and assured her, "Don’t worry, Love, your little book will be right here in the morning, just waiting to be devoured."