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They’d finished the repairs on Greased Lightning since she’d been ripped up at Thunder Road, and it was time to take her for a spin. Kenickie let Danny drive. After all, he knew how she handled better than anyone.
It was after dark, and once they put the car through her paces, they ended up parked at Overlook Point. The place was pretty deserted tonight and neither of them were ready to go home yet.
As they sat together in easy silence, Kenickie couldn’t help but think about all the couples that had parked here, and what they did together. What he had done with Rizzo. It also got him to wondering about his best friend.
“Hey, you and Sandy ever...?”
“Sandy?” Danny laughed. “No way.”
Kenickie hadn’t expected that.
“So, are you a...?”
“No,” Danny said, bending his head to light a smoke. “Me and ChaCha used to do it all the time.”
“Then why’d you break up with her?”
Danny shrugged and exhaled.
“Turned out she was doing it with everyone else too.”
“Oh...” Kenickie said, not really sure what else to say. At least his best friend didn’t sound too cut up about it.
Danny looked over at him with a smirk.
“I know you’re not. Thank God that turned out to be a false alarm, huh?”
“It was just that once,” Kenickie said, feeling like it was important Danny understood that. “It’s like, how can you know if you like something until you try.”
“Wrong flavour for you, Kenick?”
“Guess so...”
“Well,” Danny said, leaning back and taking a drag of his smoke. “Maybe try a blonde next time.”
Danny exhaled, the cloud of smoke wafting around his dark hair. No, he didn’t want a blonde and Danny had missed the point.
“Hey, Zuke?”
“Yeah?”
“Why’d you hook up with Sandy anyhow? I mean, she ain’t exactly our type, is she?”
“I dunno,” Danny shrugged. “I was there, she was there. My ma wouldn’t get off my case.”
“Your ma?” Kenickie frowned.
“‘We’re on vacation, Daniel’,” Danny parroted. “‘Stop moping about.’ Want some?” Danny finished, holding out his smoke.
Kenickie took it, trying his best to ignore the tingle where his fingers brushed Danny’s, and the thought that his mouth was now where Danny’s had just been.
“Didn’t you wanna go to the seaside?”
A vacation sounded nice to Kenickie, but his mum would never take him. All she ever did was work.
“I dunno,” Danny shrugged again. “I guess I’d kinda been looking forward to summer hanging out in Rydell.”
“What?” Kenickie laughed. “You’d rather stay in Rydell than go to the beach?” That was crazy, even for Danny. All summer in Rydell had involved was working at Bargain City six days a week.
Danny pulled out another smoke and lit it before he answered, surrounding himself in another cloud of smoke.
“It has it’s good points...” Danny said, slouching down and leaning back against the seat, ignoring the fact that his hair was gonna get ruined.
“Like what?” Kenickie said, finding it hard not to sound cynical. Rydell was an okay place, but it was certainly no Malibu.
“Auto shop, Apollo burgers, you...”
Danny rolled his head to the side, blue eyes fixing on Kenickie’s. He really had stopped giving a damn about his hair.
Kenickie wasn’t sure how to answer. He knew what he wanted to say, but if he had this wrong, he might lose Danny forever. And life without Danny around, well there was only so much a guy could take.
“So, you missed me, huh?” he said, rubbing the back of his neck and trying to make it sound like a joke.
“I guess I’ve gotten used to you being around.”
Danny was acting a little strange tonight, but graduation had been only a couple of days ago, and maybe that’s all it was. That summer could have been their last together. They had been best friends since seventh grade after all, and now suddenly they didn’t have a set reason to see each other everyday. Now that school was done it was going to take some effort to stay in touch. And the question was, would they both be willing to make that effort?
Kenickie certainly was, and from the sounds of it Danny wanted to as well.
“I’m not going anywhere, Zuke.”
Danny’s brow creased a little as he thought it over. Then his hand stretched out touched Kenickie’s knee. It was such a simple gesture, such a small thing, but it set Kenickie’s heart to racing.
“That’s good,” Danny said, letting his hand fall away. He left it resting on the seat between them, and Kenickie stared down, fighting the urge to reach out and take it, still scared that he was reading this wrong. He wanted it so much, and couldn’t trust himself not to read too much into Danny’s actions.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do next,” Danny sighed, echoing Kenickie’s very thoughts. “I think I should want to go to college, but I don’t.”
Kenickie’s hope withered. For a second there he’d thought they were on the same page.
“I guess, you just do whatever you feel like. It’s your life, Danny.”
Danny straightened up and turned more fully towards him, something more determined on his face now.
“What if it’s something I’m not supposed to want? Could you live like that? Always having to hide who you really are?”
Kenickie got the feeling this question wasn’t hypothetical, so he answered it as honestly and as clearly as he could.
“I already do. Sometimes, you don’t have a choice. You know? Like you can’t control how you feel, or what you want, or who you love.”
“Exactly!” Danny agreed. If nothing else, this was the most real conversation they’d ever had. “So you think I should stop fighting it?”
“I think you should do whatever you want. I could never think any less of you. Nothing you say or do will stop me being your friend.”
Danny was watching him, weighing his options, and Kenickie didn’t want him to hold back anymore.
“I mean it, Danny. Whatever you feel like doing, do it. And do it now.”
“Promise it won’t change anything between us?”
If it went the way Kenickie hoped, he didn’t want to make that promise.
“I promise it won’t change things for the worse.”
Danny shot him one of those dazzling Danny Zuko smiles, and Kenickie dared to hope that all his dreams were about to come true.
Danny slid across and slipped his arm around Kenickie’s shoulders, his other hand hitting Kenickie’s chest like it was a little further away than he expected it to be.
Kenickie couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face.
“I don’t have boobs, Zuke.”
“Shut up,” Danny growled, squashing his embarrassment by pressing his lips to Kenickie’s. And suddenly it all made sense, why the other kids in school wanted to make out all the time, because kissing Danny was pretty swell.