2020-01-17 - End of the Road

A fair bit of the morning had been spent enjoying each other's company in the nice, king sized bed before it was time to pick up the trailer and start making their journey back to Washington. Kelsey had her feet up on the dash, cradling her laptop on her lap- working up a rough draft on an article - half singing, half humming to the song currently playing through the radio.

"We got...what, about 4 hours to Boise now?" Kelsey asked, peering at the clock and then over at Jaime, flashing a grin. "Do we stay over in Boise or drive straight through to Seattle?"

Jaime was quiet for a while, just letting her work and listening to the music as they drove back, lazily reclined in his seat as the highway slipped beneath the wheels of the big rig. It was a comfortable sort of silence, the kind that one slips into when just idly enjoying the travel. "About that," Jaime agrees, glancing at the clock. "We could," he considers, "Though I'm going to need a nap at some point. It's another 8 hours from Boise to Seattle. With an hour nap that'd put us in after midnight." He glances over at her, "In a hurry to get back now?" His brow ticks upward, but his expression is amused.

"You ask the girl who tried to make you detour to Texas ." Kelsey teased as she settled back in her seat. "I was just curious really." Giving her toes a wiggle. "Sounds like it might be better to just stay over in Boise again. Maybe we can drive by that prison just to get a glimpse." She pondered. "Then we drive to Seattle, grace the city with our presence and finally, eventually, get back to Gray Harbor the next day." Is her proposal. "Do you like to dance?"

"Or we can stay somewhere between Boise and Seattle, though there's a whole lot of nothing between those two. But, can always pull over in some small town and find a place along the way," Jaime says, not seeming to mind much either way. "And we can just hop from Seattle back home. That's just the stop off where we'll leave the truck and pick up my truck to bring back to the house. What do you prefer?" he asks as he glances over in her direction. Though when she asks if he likes to dance he nods, "I do."

Kelsey debated the options as she typed out a few more lines in her word document. "We can find a place inbetween Boise and Seattle. Sure. Maybe it'll even be a ghost town." She winked to him and chuckled again. "Will make the getting home not take as long. I've enjoyed this whole trip quite a bit, but I am missing my bed. And my dogs." She grinned. "Cool, I don't really go dancing often or anything but, maybe we could dancing some time. Could be fun."

Jaime nods and says, "Sure. When you get a break, see if you can find us something along the way. We don't even really need to stop in Boise at all if we're just going to head back, so we can always take a different route back and find something between here and Seattle." The truck had been loaded up with the books to go from Salt Lake to Seattle, so there wasn't anything for them to do there. It was just a convenient stopping point on the way back.

"Sure thing, cowboy. I'll see if there might be anywhere interesting to stop over." Kelsey agreed and, after typing out a few more lines, pulled out her phone so she could google some potential spots. "Maybe there's a cool restaurant or something tucked away. Definitely something on my bucket list. Hitting up some of the restaurants I've seen showcased on Food Network."

"Drive ins, diners, and dives is one of my favorite shows on there. They're always going somewhere that has amazingly terrible for you food," Jaime grins as she looks up a spot to stop, but aside from that, he doesn't seem to have any particular opinions on where they go. His job is to get them from point A to point B on time -- everything else in between, he seems content to leave up to her in that kind of laid back way that he has.

"Yeah it's great. Sometimes I wanna try replicating some of the things I see on there." Kelsey laughed and then busied herself lookin for a place for them to stop at. "Jesus, you weren't kiddin' There is a whole lotta nothin between Boise and Seatle." She tsked as she browsed. "Thoughhhh we are going to be passing by a literal ghost town called Lime." A few thoughtful noises. "I think our best bet will be Baker City. Which is little ways past Lime and a couple other unincorporated communities. Looks big enough to at least have some kinda motel near i."

"Alright, well, we'll check out Lime and then we'll head to Baker City and see what we can find and hope there isn't a giant geode convention or something there that's taking up all the rooms," Jaime says with a grin, plugging the town into his GPS and switching off their current path to head in that direction. It's a generally uneventful drive punctuated by bits of conversation and a rest stop or two along the way for fuel and the acquisition of snacks and drinks before they are once more on their way to Lime.

Kelsey felt just a hint of unease settling in as they neared closer to the town. Maybe it was the fallen over sign a few miles outside or the whole horror movie waiting to happen'vibe that it gave off as they rolled in to said town. Even so, she tried to swallow it down because she was still curious about it.

Lime seemed to primarily consist of just a main street with crumbling buildings. Dust and sand everywhere. There were a few side roads that likely led residential areas. Kelsey looked over to Jaime then, "this is kinda surreal. I've never seen an abandoned town before."

Jaime seems entirely unaffected by the creepiness that is driving down a road toward a town that has been long abandoned, even though there is definitely a creepy vibe going on. "I'm kind of afraid just driving down these roads in this rig is going to knock some of these buildings down." It's true enough, the heavy weight of the truck does cause things to shake a bit, shaking some dust loose here and there, possibly making some things fall inside as well. He stops the truck on the main road, though, not daring to take it, fully loaded, down a residential street. "There could be potholes the size of a buick in there, and I don't really want to get stuck out here." He laughs. "Want to go wander around?" He glances over at her.

"I also have zero desire to get stranded out here." Kelsey laughed, looking back out towards some of the buildings. Taking a shallow breath - "Yeah, sure. Let's take a look around. Maybe there's something cool left over in one of these buildings." She climbed down of the truck and walked around to meet Jaime in the middle. "This place kinda gives me the creeps." She laughed.

Jaime hops down from the cab of the truck and locks it, not because he thinks that anyone is there, necessarily, but out of habit. He wanders around in front to meet her and grins, giving her a nudge with his shoulder. "Well, if we see anybody, we can always head back to the truck and head out." He then glances around, and begins to head down the main street, just taking in the abandoned buildings, the boarded up storefronts.

"If we see anyone, I'm running back to the truck." Kelsey mused. Only half joking. "I'm not gonna be part of any Hills Have Eyes sequel." She laughed, nudging him back lightly. She walked closer to one of the storefronts -some kind of general store type place - to try and peek inside. "Do you ever drive through places like this on you runs?"

"Nope, but then I'm usually by myself, so going to abandoned places alone isn't really a good idea, particularly if no one knows I'm there," Jaime points out. "But since there's two of us, I'm alright sticking around for a little bit and just having a look." He shrugs his shoulders. "Unless it's like a place with an official tour or something where there's other people there, that sort of thing." He wanders along with her, glancing into the store, and gives the door a try but it's locked.

"Fair enough. And the GPS likely takes you around places like this." Kelsey looks ever so slightly disappointed when the door is locked and maybe tempted to try and break the glass. But she resists! Because it doesn't look like there's really anything inside anyway. She instead turns to continue walking down the sidewalk. "It's good fodder for a story...wondering where the people got to. Why they left, that kind of thing."

"Lots of places just shut down when whatever industry that supported the town dried up. Mining towns often suffered that fate," Jaime says as they wander around. There are some shops where the glass has been blown out, or where doors are hanging off the hinges, allowing a view inside, though the structural integrity of the buildings is likely questionable at best. He eyes these and wanders into one or two, but anything worth looking at is long gone, likely picked clean far closer to when the town was abandoned.

"But it's way more fun to think up a Salem's Lot scenario where everyone gets turned into Vampires." Kelsey grinned. She maybe takes a step inside one or two of the places to snap some pictures but otherwise stays close to Jaime. When they've seen just about all that there is of note to see - "Ready to go back to the truck?" Her unease has quelled for the most part, but this isn't the kind of place she wants to linger at longer than necessary .Even if it is cool to see.

Jaime grins over at her and says "Who says they haven't all been turned into vampires. It's daylight. They could all come up out of the ground at night." He glances back over his shoulder toward the the locked shop, "Or maybe they're all in there sleeping." He gives her a grin and a waggle of his brows, before heading back toward the truck. Fortunately, maneuvering out isn't too difficult, and they are on the road again soon enough. There is a motel that has a room for them. It's not as nice as the other rooms they'd stayed in, but it sufficed for grabbing some sleep before finishing up the remainder of the journey.

The ride back to Seattle was largely uneventful, and the truck was returned to the company for its regular post-run maintenance, leaving Jaime and Kelsey to hop in Jaime's old beatup pickup for the last leg back to Gray Harbor, the shortest hop of the whole trip.

On their way back to Gray Harbor, Kelsey found herself looking forward to being back. She had decided not to count that whole terrible week-long trip experience as leaving town so this had been the first time she'd really be out of the Harbor, much less the state, since moving here. And...she missed the place. Missed her dogs, her bed. Her rough draft had been finished by the time they reached Seattle so she was just relaxing now in another comfortable silence.

Her head tilted a bit to look over at him, "Let me know when you're free next and I'll make dinner for you."

"You owe me a night out dancing, too," Jaime reminds her with a grin as he glances back, as they finally make their way back into Gray Harbor, past the familiar sign that marks their return. "And I'll bring the mac'n'cheese." He chuckles. It doesn't take too long to get to her place, and this time he drops her off in front of it since he's in a vehicle that he can maneuver a little bit more easily. "Thanks, Kels.. for coming on this trip with me. It was a lot of fun."

"Dinner always precedes the dancing." Kelsey grinned. "After all, I need to keep some kind of excuse on hand to see you." Teasing a bit. When they pulled up to her house she turned to look at him. "Thanks for letting me tag along. I had a blast." She hesitated just a beat before leaning in to steal a kiss. "I'm looking forward to the next one." Because there would surely be a next time down the line. Then she was hopping out of the truck and gathering up her duffel and laptop bag. She'd give him one more wave before heading inside the house!

"You need an excuse?" Jaime asks, with that mischievous grin, but then he returns the kiss that she steals, with one of his own, before letting her slide out of the truck. He gives her a wave as she heads off, and waits to make sure she can get inside, before he rumbles back down the road toward the Kelly House.