146Here is the next installment, it's not even half of what I had hoped to write for this chapter, so there will be two more chapters after this one! But the most important part: the winners are posted at the bottom! Woo hoo!
Christine groggily blinked her eyes open at the sudden lack of vibration as she felt and heard the engine of the car shut off.
"Why did we stop?" she asked, arching her back under the seatbelt trying to stretch.
"I pulled over," Erik said hastily.
"Why? Is something wrong?" She sat up straighter in the seat, her mind already spinning through a hundred different emergencies. She knew riding with him had been a bad idea. "Did the tire blowout?"
Of course the tire isn't flat, you would've felt that, dingus!
Erik shot her a look before shaking his head. "I was swerving…a little," he admitted under his breath.
Christine smirked and turned to face him. "Swerving? What happened to Mister 'I don't need sleep'?"
Christine laughed a little as she remembered their earlier conversation. She could tell that his eyes had been getting droopy, though she didn't dare mention anything involving his face after his reaction to her mention of his mask. He had swerved just slightly into the other lane, and Christine simply couldn't pass up the chance to poke at his driving skills again. After a few minutes she had even offered a civil trade off: that she would drive for a while and he could sleep in the passenger seat! That offer had proved to be another mistake as he had snapped back that he 'didn't need sleep', and that he could go 'days without sleep'.
A part of her felt like asking just how many days he'd gone without sleep before this trip.
Erik gave a 'hmph' and reached behind her to the back seat to grab something. Christine took the time to let her eyes focus on things outside of the car, surprised to see that they weren't just pulled over on the side of the highway like Christine half expected they were. Instead they were parked in front of a long, two story building. The beige paint was peeling off the sides a bit, and the sidewalk in front of the building looked like it had seen it's fair share of literal elephants at the size of some of the cracks and potholes.
"Where are we?" she yawned, continuing to survey her surroundings by the light of the car's headlights.
"Where do you think we are? It's a motel," Erik explained as if she were blind, unbuckling his seatbelt.
A motel?
"Wha— where are you going?" she was alert, looking at him now instead of the run-down structure in front of her.
He paused and stared at her for a moment before answering. "It's a motel," he stated. "I'm picking up my dry cleaning." Sarcasm dripped from his voice.
Christine crossed her arms.
"I'm seeing if there's any rooms available, what else would I be doing?"
She raised an eyebrow. "You really think after so many hours in a car with you— I'm going to share a room with you too?"
He sighed, fixing the hat he had grabbed from the backseat onto his head. "I never said I was getting a room for us…."
For some reason, that made Christine madder than the idea of him assuming she'd share a room with him.
"So I can guess you can stay in the car. You can recline the seat—"
"No, I'm coming in with you!" she declared, quickly unfastening her seatbelt as well.
Christine watched Erik roll his eyes as he opened the car door before opening her own door and getting out. Her joints cracked a bit in protest as she stood up, but her legs were so glad to have a chance to stretch after so many hours of sitting. She raised up on her tip toes and stretched her palms out in front of her— it felt so nice! She reached in and grabbed her purse before shutting the door.
"I never realized how badly I missed standing," Christine chuckled as she walked around to his side of the car. Erik had shut the driver side door but opened the backseat door, currently digging around for something. Finally, he pulled out of the car holding two of his suitcases from earlier.
And his mask was different.
Instead of his black mask he'd worn all day he was wearing something akin to a flesh tone. It blended in quite well, but she could tell.
Don't mention the mask, don't mention the mask….
So she mentioned the next thing she could think of instead.
"Can't you just leave those suitcases in there?" Christine spoke up, zipping her coat up.
Erik shook his head and slammed the car door shut. "I told you, precious cargo. I can't afford to leave them out in this car where they could get stolen. They're coming inside."
Christine gave him a suspicious side eye. He had told her he was a music professor, so her earlier musings of him being some hardened criminal had left her mind, but they were slowly making a reappearance at his sudden need to take in the suitcases.
"Whatever, as long as it's not a bomb," she muttered under her breath, following him towards the entrance of the hotel lobby.
"What'd you say?" he turned his head around to look at her from over his shoulder.
"Hmm?" Christine raised her eyebrows. "Nothing!" she said, an innocent smile planted on her face.
Erik squinted his eyes again— he did that a lot she noted — and then continued walking. It was a simple glass door with a generic motel name and a generic motto underneath, certainly nothing that caught her eye. What did, however, catch her eye was how Erik opened the door, and then held it open for her. Her eyebrows crinkled at his action. Where had his manners come from? She hadn't had a door held open for her in…well, she couldn't remember when. The point was, she didn't make it a point to wait for the men in her life to open the doors for her, she was perfectly capable of opening them herself. Both physically and metaphorically.
But she didn't feel the need to tell him that. Didn't feel like questioning his motives or putting up a fight. Instead she just gave a nod.
"Thanks," she mumbled after they were both through the door.
The tile floor was due for a good mop, and the fluorescent light above them was flickering every few seconds. Christine held her hand up to shield her eyes, not yet ready for the bright light.
"Good evening! Do you have a reservation?" a voice greeted them from behind the wooden counter on the other end of the small room. Christine looked over at him. He a was a short, balding man with a grey mustache that was in need of a trim up.
Erik walked closer to the desk and she followed.
"No, I need to make one— do you have any vacancies?"
Christine almost did a double take. The voice that was coming out of him was different. Well, different wasn't the right word exactly. Perhaps his tone was what had changed? No matter, she found herself hanging on to every last word, unlike she had in the car.
She could see that the man behind the counter also seemed to give Erik his full attention.
How strange….
Oh, you're just tired, Chris, it's probably his version of a customer service voice.
Her thoughts appeased her wandering imagination for a moment, but a part of her wasn't sold on her mind's explanation of her sudden need to listen to him talk.
"Yes," the man answered. "You're just in luck— we have one room open."
Plop!
"Sorry," Christine said, bending down to pick up her purse that she had dropped at the man's statement.
One room? If she hadn't been in a bad movie before, now she definitely was.
"One room?" Erik repeated, setting his suitcases down. "It has two beds, I assume?"
Christine nodded along with him, desperate for the man to say yes. Sharing a car had been bad enough, but sharing a room? And possibly a bed?
She shivered.
Surely this was all a bad dream and she was actually still happily asleep in the car, going 100 flipping miles down the free way with Zorro beside her driving.
"Hmm, let me check," the old man said, turning to the computer beside him.
The clicks on the keyboard certainly sounded real, and the room looked real…
She reached over and gave her arm a pinch.
"Ow!"
Erik glared at her from over his shoulder at her yelp. She gave him a half smile and rubbed her arm.
Yup, she was awake.
"Well…according to this thing, there aren't any rooms available with two beds…" he said, staring at the screen over his reading glasses.
"Are you sure—" Erik started only to be cut off by the older man.
"It seems that the only room open is the Honeymoon suite on floor two."
The sudden need to throw up was very apparent.
The man looked up at them over his glasses. "That shouldn't be a problem for a fine looking couple like yourself?"
Christine snorted and Erik's eyes had gone wide.
First of all— fine looking? Could the man not tell that Erik was wearing a mask? It was good, but not that good of a skin tone match.
Secondly— couple? This was a cliché as her life could get, right? Stranded in an airport, lost luggage, riding in a car with a stranger only to end up at a hotel where the only room they had was the honeymoon suite?
Sleeping in the car was sounding better and better by the minute.
"Do you have any cots that could be brought up?" Christine said before Erik could get another word out.
"Afraid not, ma'am," was the answer out of the hotel clerk's mouth.
She grimaced.
"I can offer extra pillows and blankets though!"
Erik glanced in Christine's direction with an almost apologetic look before motioning for her to turn around a talk to him for a moment.
"We don't have to stay here, I can keep driving, really. I'll be awake from the shock for hours," he said, glaring over his shoulder.
"I'd prefer to be uncomfortable than dead on the side of the road because you fell asleep at the wheel," she said, sighing in defeat.
He was quiet for a second.
"You're sure?"
"Mhm."
"I'll sleep on the floor," he assured her before squeezing her shoulder and turning back around.
What had she gotten herself into?
"We'll take it."
Hi again!
So unlike my other stories THIS IS NOT THE END! There are at least two more chapters to go, but I didn't want to keep anyone in anymore suspense over the winners. This year was incredibly hard to decide on the winners so I had a little help from last year's winner Gloriana Femina on some of them. Another "first" this year is that there is a tie for first place! I know that last year I said I hate giving ties for first place but I couldn't decide this year. Both stories were AMAZING and both had so much detail and hard work put into them that I thought it'd be an insult if I had to put either story anywhere other than first place.
BUT EVERY STORY WAS AWESOME!
Here are the winners! (Reminder, the category winners are placed in alphabetical order by category name, not by numerical favorite!)
First Place
Fifteen Christmases by LittleLongHairedOutlaw
AND
Revéillon by tasteofthebitchpudding
First Runner Up (Second Place)
Christmas 1881 by Riene
Second Runner Up (Third Place)
No Peace in Quiet by Pensez-a-Erik
Best Angst
Once Upon Another Time by Child of Dreams
Best Christine
Scandalous by edka88
Best Erik
Cold Christmas by E.M.K81
Best Fluffy Fic
A Child is Born by Starwatcher2018
Best Modern
Knitting Needles by Katlyn Rose
Most Christmas Spirit
The Angel of Music's Twelve Days of Christmas by The English Phantom
Most Original
The Most Wonderful Time of the Year by Riene
Congrats! I'll be PMing the winners! In the meantime I hope you all stick around for the remainder of this story and keep an eye out for the Valentine's Contest in February!