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Elite Fan
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 29,917
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 What were you guys doing in the last thread? I'm a' go find out.
And here's to reposting the paperback transcript that January made so that my comments don't seem out of nowhere.
Quote:
Dylan had a long evening ahead, and it would give him an opportunity to do a lot of thinking.
Generally he was an early riser because he didn't want to miss the good waves. His sleeping habits sometimes made it tough to stay up late, which normally didn't matter because he wasn't much of a party animal anyway. But this entire Kelly thing had upset his balance more than he pretended, and he needed to speak with Brenda, to hear her voice. Because of the time difference, he's probably have the best luck catching her around midnight, Beverly Hills time.
His present fixation on Kelly wasn't a case of loving the girl he was near when the girl he loved wasn't near. Kelly was as special in her own way as Brenda. Dylan understood that Brenda could rightfully expect a certain amount of loyalty - no question. He just didn't know if he was strong enough to resist a temptation as strong as Kelly Taylor. He hoped that hearing Brenda's voice would strengthen his resolve to be faithful, to remind him that she was a real person; he also needed to be reassured that she hadn't run off with some french dude.
He forced himself to wait until exactly midnight so he wouldn't get Brenda out of bed, and then he punched in the long international phone number of the Hotel Casanova. He had to do it twice because he messed up in the middle the first time. An older woman answered the phone - probably the house mother - and in his rusty French, Dylan asked to speak with Brenda Walsh.
He was concentrating so strongly on hearing Brenda's voice that he was surprised when Donna came on the line. His heart sank. This was more than a social call. Hearing Brenda's voice right now was necessary if he was going to get a grip on himself. He and Donna exchanged pleasantries in French and then he asked where Brenda was.
"She went, er, sight-seeing," Donna told him.
"Bright and early, huh? You didn't go?"
"No. I'm going shopping."
Some things never change, Dylan thought, and smiled. "Who'd she go with?"
There was a moment of silence, and while he listened to transoceanic static Dylan wondered why that was such a difficult question.
"She, ah, left here alone," Donna assured him.
Dylan had the feeling that he wasn't getting the whole story, but maybe it was difficult to explain an entire summer in a sentence.
"I just kind of wanted to hear her voice right now," he admitted.
"I'll tell her you called."
"No, don't, okay? She'll just want to call me back, and I'll probably be asleep." Or out with Kelly. Or who knew what? "How's she doing?" Dylan asked, thinking about suave French dudes.
"Great. But I know she's really looking forward to going home."
"Yeah, me, too." He and Donna said their goodbyes, and after hanging up, Dylan sat with his hand on the receiver. Brenda wasn't required to sit around waiting for his call, and going sight-seeing did not reveal a flaw in her character. But as far as Dylan was concerned, her absence did make his life a whole lot more difficult.
The next day he went to the beach club. He didn't intend to hunt for Kelly, but deep down he knew that she was likely to be there, and they were likely to run into each other.
He was walking casually across the tanning deck when he saw her. She was reading Cosmo and hadn't seen him. He could just pass her by, and no one the wiser. But he suddenly had a wonderful idea, and an overwhelming urge to share it with someone. Without considering his actions further, he went to Kelly and put out his hand. "Come on, girl. I know a better way to spend the day than toasting in the sun."
She wouldn't go with him at first, but he joked and kept at her until she couldn't help laughing, and she could no longer refuse him.
Despite her many questions, he would not tell her what he had in mind. "Just pretend you're being abducted by a UFO," he suggested.
They drove a few miles up the beach, and when they got to Paradise Cove, Dylan rented a wetbike, a sort of motorized scooter for the water. At first Kelly was dubious about the safety of riding on the thing, but Dylan demonstrated, and soon she couldn't wait to get aboard. She wrapped her arms around Dylan's waist and they were off. They swooped up and down the bay, throwing a great plume of spray behind them. Kelly held on to him tightly and shrieked with delight into his ear.
"Faster," she cried. He went faster.
Frankly, the speed and the water and the physical contact, even the vibration of the wetbike, excited Dylan sexually. After they rode up onto the beach and began to towel off, he still pulsated with just being alive. Kelly was one good-looking woman, and she had the same taste for adventure that he had. She could not stop talking about how good riding the wetbike made her feel.
"Anytime you want to do it again, let me know," Dylan said. He looked around for the jug of hot coffee he'd brought along.
Kelly threw her towel out flat and sat down on it. "Aren't you forgetting one thing?" she asked as she gratefully accepted a cup of coffee from him. "We're both going to turn into pumpkins in a few days."
"Brenda, yeah." The truth was that he had forgotten about Brenda for a moment out there on the water. But now she was back, once again a third presence at their little party. He dropped down next to Kelly with his own coffee and shook his head. "But we're not doing anything wrong. We just had fun. I like having fun with you. Don't you like having fun with me?" He knew he was evading the issue, but part of him had grown not to care anymore.
"You're crazy," she said.
"I've been accused of worse," Dylan said. He tickled her ribs, and she playfully slapped his hand.
But they stayed on the beach for a long time, just talking. On the drive home Dylan couldn't remember all they'd talked about, but he knew he was getting dangerously close to this woman.
******
Since the wetbike episode, Kelly found herself seeing Dylan more frequently. She hadn't made a conscious decision that seeing him would be all right, she just kinda sorta fell into it. Of course Brenda was still a factor, so they didn't kiss much. But just being near Dylan was a pleasure. It was enough. It would have to do.
Dylan drove her to the beach club one morning and they found Steve in his car listening to David's music on his stereo. It was so loud, Kelly could hear it from the other end of the parking lot. The amazing thing was that Steve seemed to be so impressed with David's music that he didn't believe it was David's music. Steve made her and Dylan promise not to say anything to David about his opinion of the tape, and then drove off in a big hurry.
"Somebody here is crazy," Kelly said.
"Excuse me?" Dylan said as he reamed out one ear with a finger. "I seem to have gone a little deaf."
They both laughed and went to the Taylor-Silver cabana. Kelly was pleased to see that nobody was home. While she complained about how dry her skin became in the summer and smoothed aloe on her arms, Dylan went to the bathroom. The aloe was cool, and she always liked the cucumbery smell. When Dylan emerged, he came up behind Kelly and helped her spread aloe on spots she could not reach. His hands felt good on her shoulders and back; she closed her eyes and relaxed into him.
While he rubbed, Dylan invited her to spend the night with him at Paradise Cove, the place where they had such a wonderful time on the wetbike. "Two sleeping bags," he promised. "No fooling around."
Kelly knew if Dylan promised there would be no fooling around, there would be none. "Then why bother?" she asked impishly. Leading him on seemed like such an easy thing to do.
He laughed as he continued his massage. "It's beautiful up there. Far enough away from the city lights and the smog that you can see shooting stars."
"Stop it," Kelly pleaded. "You're tempting me."
"Then come," Dylan encouraged. "We'll have a chance to talk. Maybe we can figure out what we've been doing the past few weeks."
"I know what we've been doing. That's why I'm not coming."
"You'll miss out on my cooking. My hot dogs are legendary."
"I bet they are," Kelly said, and then indicated a spot he'd missed with the aloe. Instead of rubbing it with cream, Dylan kissed the spot.
Kelly was startled but not displeased. "You are so bad," she said, not very convincing at being grumpy.
They were standing with Dylan's lips on her shoulder when the door suddenly opened and David walked in. His eyes got big, and he immediately backed out, enormously embarrassed.
Kelly knew that David could not help but get the wrong impression. "Wait, David," she cried. "It's not what you think!" While she ran to the door it struck her that this situation was exactly like the time she'd caught David with Nikki. She wished she had been more sympathetic.
She was too late to catch David. She turned to Dylan and shut the door with her back. Despite what she had called, she knew the situation was exactly as David perceived it. "We can't go on like this," she said sadly. Her own embarrassment brought back all her guilt at playing around with Dylan while Brenda was in Paris. "We're being stupid," she went on. "And somebody's going to get hurt."
Dylan didn't say anything, but he looked chastised, a guy whose own guilt had come home to roost at last.
She asked him to take her home, and he did. They didn't kiss, they didn't touch, they barely spoke, though the silence made both of them uncomfortable. Kelly didn't think David would tell anybody what he'd seen - he'd been too horrified. Her only worry was that they had already gone too far for her or Dylan to act normal when Brenda returned.
Later she was in her room reading - or at least staring at pages - when David came in, looking anxious. She guessed that he wanted to talk about what he's seen in the cabana that afternoon, a subject that Kelly felt needed to be cleared up anyway. But he wouldn't let her explain. He just kept promising that her secret was safe with him.
Kelly finally managed to get a word in. "There is no secret, David," she said with exasperation. "He was just putting lotion on my back."
"Whatever," David said. He looked around as if he feared someone might be overhearing them, and it occurred to Kelly that David was here not for her benefit, but for his own. He wanted something in exchange for his silence.
"What?" Kelly asked.
"I'd like to propose a deal," David said. "I won't tell Brenda what 'didn't happen' between you and Dylan if you don't tell Donna what 'didn't happen' between me and Nikki."
Kelly could not help being amused by David's offer. Apparently he had noticed the same parallels in their situations as she had.
Kelly's smile appeared to distress David, so she stopped. "It's a deal," she said. She remembered something else that had happened that afternoon, and told David about meeting Steve.
David seemed very pleased that Steve liked his music, though she could not understand why. He explained that Steve and his mom had important connections. "They'll help me get a record deal."
"Yeah right." Kelly was relieved that the subject of illicit affairs had been cleared up, and they were back to something Kelly felt confident about - hating David's music.
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