Wrote this for rain--transformed. Turned out a little sadder than I'd expected...
“You want to go where?”
His grip on the dark blue receiver was loose and he leaned against the wall in his temporary lodging. Impatient tones rattled on on the other end, on and on. Snake sighed, running a finger along the side of his nose. He’d be fighting a throbbing migraine for about a week now.
“I guess…I don’t, I don’t drive, PM.”
The voice on the other end got loud for a moment and he trapped the phone between his shoulder and ear. Both hands free, Snake gripped the bridge of his nose.
“Well, if we just stopped beating around the bush here—“
He was cut off and let her drone on for a few more minutes.
“Fine. Six. I’ll be in front of the commissary.”
Without waiting to hear her response, he hung up. Whether Para-Medic was being sincere or not, she had kept him entertained for hours back in Tselinoyarsk. However she managed to get a hold of him, Snake figured the least he could do was watch a movie with her.
…And if he was being completely honest, he’d missed the sound of her incessant talking.
Six eventually rolled around and he stood outside of the commissary, fiddling with the sleeves on his sweater. For late December, it wasn’t too cold, but just enough that he probably ought to have worn something more.
A sleek light blue convertible with the top up pulled up to the curb and the window whirred loudly as it disappeared into the door. The brunette leaned over the passenger’s seat to smile at her ex-comrade.
“We need to hurry if we’re going to get a good spot!”
He hunched awkwardly to get into the car, feeling somewhat cramped in its sleek interior. As he shut the door, she rolled the window back up.
Snake didn’t bother with his seatbelt and Para-Medic scowled as she pulled away from the curb, watching him free a cigar from his pocket.
“Not in my car,” She warned, and with a huff, he put it away. “I can’t believe you still smoke those things. I’m sure you’ve heard of cancer?”
“I have bigger things to worry about.” Was his short response, and he let his eye trail across the car’s fancy interior.
“Well, I’ve been going to this really great drive-in, and tonight they’re showing Doctor Zhivago. It’s a dramatic romance.”
Snake half expected her to go on, but there was a long silence.
“Well, I haven’t seen it yet. So it’s not like I can tell you what it’s about.” She laughed, realizing why he hadn’t spoken yet.
“Are you sure there’s nothing else…?” As if there was any movie that he was remotely interested in seeing, but a dramatic romance? That would probably be at the bottom of his list.
“You’ll love it. Trust me. Besides, what else did you have planned for the night?”
He thought for a moment about the direction his life had taken and what had become habit. There had been a can of tuna in his cabinet, just begging to be eaten.
“Exactly,” she laughed, eying him sideways. “The seat goes all the way back, so if you just can’t stand it, take a nap.”
The drive-in was pretty crowded when they arrived, but Para-Medic seemed to have very little trouble securing them a parking spot. “Come on, we have to get snacks before the movie starts.”
“Ya know, I think I’ll wait right here.”
She sighed, and shut the door a little too hard behind her. Snake fiddled along the edge of the side, trying to figure out how to make it recline. Eventually, he gave up, taking up watching people walk around outside their cars, carrying armfuls of popcorn and fancy-looking ice creams. Everyone seemed to be holding hands, smiling.
Occasionally, someone would look over towards him and immediately shuffle faster to their car.
He went back to work trying to find the lever to make the seat go down. By the time Para-Medic got back to the car, he’d gotten himself into a slightly more obtuse angle.
She dropped a bag of popcorn in his lap. He looked down at it like she’d handed him a diamond.
“It’s popcorn. Heated corn kernels, covered in butter and salt? Oh my god, you ate snakes, just eat the damn popcorn.”
He picked at it, one popped corn at a time until he developed quite the appetite and started shoveling it down.
“It’s been, what? A year and a half?” Para-Medic finally spoke again. “I know you retired, but I figured you liked me enough to write a letter.”
He watched the large white screen a few hundred yards away suddenly light up, and speakers beside the car came to life. Animated food on the screen sang a song. “I’ve been trying to move on.”
Unfortunately, she was associated with all of the things that he was trying to get away from. It was simply by miracle that she’d happened to find out where he was staying. Up until last week, he hadn’t even been in the US.
“Well, I’m glad that I could finally drag you to a movie, at least. The first and last one you’ll ever see, I’ll bet,” she chuckled, popping a piece of popcorn into her mouth. After that, she didn’t say much else as the movie had started. After the first ten minutes, he stopped following the plot. Another twenty minutes and he couldn’t help but wonder how long these things usually lasted.
She seemed quite enthralled by it, but maybe that was because one of the main characters was a doctor or something.
Regardless of the movie or the current circumstances, Snake wasn’t not having a good time. He wasn’t social anymore, not that he’d really been social to begin with, but now most of his time was spent in dark rooms. And if there was anyone from FOX that he had to sit in a car with, he was glad it was her. That last mission had been hell on earth, but she’d been pretty good at keeping the mood light, even if he had no idea what she was going on about half of the time.
Snake reached into an empty popcorn bag and crumpled it up in his lap. Quietly, he looked over at her, completely taken away by the movie, and he couldn’t help but smile a bit and it hurt his face. Her own eyes shifted slightly, and she scowled, but there was no missing the faint reddening of her cheeks.
“Snake, you’re supposed to be watching the movie! See, Yuri and Lara are in love, but he’s married to…” Her voice trailed off in his ears as he looked back at the screen, still smiling.
When he got back to the hotel, the room was dark.
