Burning Out

51- adrenaline

Song- Under My Skin by Briston Maroney

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"Move over, Jesus fucking Christ," Leonardo grumbles, nudging his arm aggressively into Olly's side.

"It's not my fault I have such a big bum," Olly shrugs defensively, glancing at Leonardo squished in the middle seat.

"Why did I have to sit here anyway? Why couldn't you have sat in the middle?" he asks, directing the question to all four of us sat in the taxi, not just Olly. "Or, why couldn't Farrah have sat in the middle? She's the smallest out of us all."

"Because you need to be the one who can see where we are going, you're the one who has been here before," Olly replies, seeming a bit too smug with the situation.

"Okay, so then why aren't I sat in the front directing the driver and Noémi sat back here?" Leonardo continues bitterly.

Noémi flips around from the front seat with a happy smile, "Because I called shotgun."

"This is such a pisstake," Leo grumbles and slouches back into his seat.

"How come we are in a taxi anyway, I would've thought you guys could've organised something a bit more... private," I turn to look at Olly from across Leonardo, adding to the conversation for the first time since we got in the taxi after getting out of the airport.

We landed in France about twenty-minutes ago and we're now travelling in the direction of the office situated in Paris. Apparently there's a few apartments situated around it which are usually occupied by employees who travel between the bases. Leonardo's stayed in them before when he's had to do a job over here, and that's where we are heading now.

"Well considering it was probably four-am when I called needing to book a driver, nobody answered because they were all asleep. And we really needed to get out of the airport as quickly as possible when we arrived so couldn't wait around for a private driver," he explains, glancing out the window to the city moving beside us.

It's about 12pm now, adding on the time difference and the flight time. Apparently the job isn't until tonight so when we get to the apartment, we have the whole afternoon to kill.

France is just as beautiful as everybody says it is— especially in late June. With the sun nearing its peak in the sky, the whole city is filled with a special summer buzz that leaves me craving the scent of the air and the sound of chattering people from within the confines of this taxi.

"Oh, also," Olly chips in with a grin so wide that practically all of his teeth are on show and I can already predict the words to follow, "It's my birthday so I don't have to sit in the middle!"

He reminds us for the thousandth time today. Over and over he's repeated that it's his birthday as if we suddenly forget the second he's not telling us. We don't.

A harmonious groan spills from Leonardo, myself and Noémi as we all drown in the sound of Olly's voice scratching out those two syllables.

"Le premier à gauche," Leonardo instructs the driver as he leans forward onto his knees to get closer to the front of the car.

"You know we gave him the address of the apartment right? He has it on his sat-nav," I ask Leonardo with amusement chirping through my voice.

"I don't care," he grumbles, throwing me a look from his seat to my left.

I raise an eyebrow at his bitterness, silently reminding him that I'm not the one he should be mad at right now— to be honest, none of us are the ones to be mad at. Regardless, he sends me a quick apologetic look that I would've missed if I blinked. It's progress, I suppose.