Misfit Kids

Kia Ora?

(DISCLAIMER: This isn't a representation of all New Zealanders)

Out of the corner of his eye Jay saw his fiancé bouncing one leg and drumming her fingers on the other.

"Your nerves are putting off my driving Lee," he said half jokingly as they were distracting.

"Sorry babe," Riley apologised, ceasing her bouncing but still drumming her fingers.

He knew things were estranged between her and her parents but he had never seen her so nervous. In all their years of pranking, adrenaline seeking and several arrests (they were let off because Jay's uncle was on the force) Riley had never seemed more wound up. Gazing back through the windscreen to focus back on the road, he tried to reassure her.

"Hey, out of the two of us I'm the one who should be scared," Jay said, trying to lighten her mood. "I'm meeting my future in-laws for the first time ever not to mention I'm driving on the other side of the road in a country I've never been to before."

Riley let out a laugh before saying "Oh come on, New Zealand has like the least traffic in the world and I did offer to drive but you said I had 'rest because of jet lag'."

"Hey you were tired though!" he said in defense but felt relieved when she smiled. "Anything I should definitely remember from what you told me?"

"About driving?" she asked, raising an eyebrow in question.

"No the parentals," Jay said, wincing when he saw her face turn into a scowl at the mention of them.

Oops.

"Well my mother will criticize everything and I do mean everything, Dad might try to ask some questions about the stock market but then ignore us and read the newspaper. Oh and if my cousin is there she'll probably try and get in your pants," Riley finished with a slight growl.

"Sounds like fun!" Jay mused with joking enthusiasm. "Don't worry, if you hate it that much we can make an excuse after dinner about jet lag and go to bed early, k?"

She smiled weakly and held his hand that he offered her, soothed at the reassuring squeeze he gave it. She rested her head on the seat and gazed at her fiancé. After their engagement they told his parents to their joy but not surprise and went straight to visit them for a celebration. With reluctance Riley had been persuaded to contact her own parents that asked the couple to fly out, their treat. Needless to say she was terrified of how they were going to act.

'It's nice to be back though,' she thought, letting the feel of the green country in the middle of winter fill her mind.

The earthy smell of wet grass and the sea. The slightly cloudy sky leaving a noticeable chill in the air as the sun hid behind them. Sheep grazing in the occasional paddock, neighbours to some suburbs. Soon her coastal home town came into sight, small with a few shops and a primary school but mostly houses and a wide view of the sea with various islands.

"Nice area," Jay remarked, scanning around at an intersection. "Where to?"

"Uh you take a left here then a right two streets down. It's the brown house," Riley replied, bouncing her legs a few times before remembering she should try and calm down.

It was easier said than done and her state was near hyperventilation as Jay stopped outside an extremely familiar and daunting house. Two stories with dark upstairs windows and only a faint glow from downstairs in the early evening light. The grass wasn't that well kept (her mother always badgered her forgetful father to do it) and it was starting to snake onto the path that led from the door to the footpath. Riley gulped as she eyed the 'pathway to hell'.