❝i love the exploration of someone who has such a different background from you. that exploration runs to compassion and to cracking yourself open and creating more understanding of how weird and amazing life is.❞
―rachel mcadams

Skeeter had never been more nervous in her entire life.

She could open someone's abdomen using a scalpel without breaking a sweat or win a surgical award yet facing a seventy-something year old woman caused her knees to bounce and the palm of her hands to sweat. It wasn't just any seventy-something woman ─ it was Keanu's mom. It was ─ very much in fact ─ a big deal. Over the four-person dinner table, Skeeter had managed to suppress her laughter into a small smile, her eyes meeting Keanu's as his mother went on with her story about her then young boy who thought that a floating jacket was a ghost.

Sandra instantly took a liking to Skeeter and the doctor caught the wiggling eyebrows the actress shot at her best friend when they walked through the door. After dinner, Sandra and Keanu were the ones to clean the table while their guest of honor and his mom have drinks in the patio in the cool Los Angeles air.

Sandra leaned against the counter as she watched her best friend dry the dishes with a towel. "Skeeter doesn't look like she's freaking out over meeting your mom." She told him. "I don't know what you were so worried about."

"Oh, she's freaking out." Keanu replied in a matter-of-factly manner. "You just don't see it but Skeeter has a tell."

"Aren't you freaking out?"

He finished the dishes and faced her, crossing his arms. "A little. I'm terrified my mom's going to scare her away."

"I think Patricia likes her." Sandra smiled when she noticed how his shoulders relaxed at the statement. "She's impressed about the whole doctor thing. I bet your mom's going to talk to Skeeter about your smoking to convince her to tell you to cut it down."

Keanu scratched the back of his neck. "I barely smoke a pack now!"

"Would you listen though?" She pressed on. "Would you listen if Skeeter told you to stop smoking?"

He was silent for a minute, pondering on his scant stubborn streak about his smoking (but it didn't end there; he was also very adamant about riding his motorcycles for the rest of his life). Humming, he replied. ". . .Maybe."

Sandra smirked and coughed. "Whipped." She teased in-between her coughing fit.

"Shut up." Keanu failed to hide the smile on his lips and threw the towel at her which she had clumsily dodged.

⊱ ──────ஓ๑♡๑ஓ────── ⊰

A squeal echoed throughout the car as they settled in. Keanu jumped in his seat at the high-pitched sound and looked over to see Skeeter's face buried in her hands (though it didn't muffle the sound any less).

"Skeeter?" Keanu queried. "You okay?"

Her head shot up from her hands and she turned to him with a sweet smile on her face. "I'm great!" She replied. "Fantastic!"

"Are you freaking out because you met my mother?"

"Uh-huh! It's been so long since I met a boyfriend's parents so I don't ─ " She blinked owlishly. "Well, it's been so long since I even had a boyfriend period." Skeeter leaned her body closer to his. "I think I deserve a kiss. Or two Disney movies perhaps?" Which would eventually turn into a make-out session on his couch; they both knew this.

"Perhaps." He cleared his throat and caught the movement of a curtain from the window. "You should settle down, mon amour. We're being watched." Most likely by Sandra's two small children who enjoyed meeting their Uncle Keanu's new friend.

Skeeter laughed and leaned back, buckling her seatbelt. She relaxed in the front seat as Keanu started pulling the car out of the driveway. "Hey, can we go to a beach before we head back?"

He knew exactly which beach shore to take her.

Redondo beach was mostly known for where Baywatch was filmed. It was a coastal city and was located a little by the South Bay region of Greater Los Angeles region. To Keanu, it was one of the places where he felt he could really think ─ away from all the busy streets of LA and the glamour of Hollywood. It helped that he knew a place that was pretty much secluded from the whole beach; it was towards and he was happy to bring Skeeter there, flashing her soft gazes as they walked hand in hand in silence.

Sighing, Skeeter laid her back on the sandy ground with Keanu following suit, positioning his head right by hers but his lower extremities facing the opposite direction. They were met by the dark-blue night sky adorned with millions of glimmering stars.

"You never told me you lived in New York." She stated, keeping her gaze on the sky.

"I lived in a lot of places growing up." He replied. "New York, Australia, Canada ─ I was all over the place. I was born in Lebanon. As you've noticed by my mom's posh accent, she's from Britain and my dad was from Hawaii."

"That's so exciting!"

"For awhile it was but then I didn't have a place to really call home, you know?"

"Don't you consider LA home?"

It was his turn to sigh. "Hm. Not really. I mean, you've seen those unpacked boxes in my house, Skeet. I haven't been able to entirely move in because of all the traveling around and shooting a movie in Boston."

"And then you met me."

When he turned his face to look at her, Skeeter was already meeting him halfway with a cheeky smile on her lips. "And then I met you."

"I don't know but I just find it exciting how you've seen so many places around the world plus it comes with you being an actor and all." She shrugged disparagingly. "I've somehow managed to end up in the same place I grew up in. I've lived in other places but it was a small town in Wyoming. He had suggested living there."

Keanu didn't need to ask who this 'he' Skeeter was talking about.

"My shrink told me it was to isolate me from my friends and family. So that they wouldn't be able to catch on about the ─ uh ─ abuse going on."

"Is that why you moved back to Boston?"

"I guess so. Aside from the so-called comfort my family gave me, Boston had more opportunities. I exceeded the small town's standards."

Keanu smirked. "I bet you did."

"Does it bother you?" She asked, propping her elbow on the sand and her chin on her palm. "Not having a place to really call home?"

He could feel Skeeter's other hand inching closer to his shoulder as if she was just dying to touch him; he really wished she just would do it. Keanu's smirked developed into a smile once he felt her fingers sift through his dark hair. He hummed in delight at the calming action.

"It's difficult being uprooted and having to change your environment." He told her sincerely. "It's hard moving to new places, making new friends, and leaving behind your old neighborhood. But it's part of growing up."

Skeeter's brows shot up challengingly, the movement of her hand through his hair momentarily pausing. "Are you insinuating I've never truly grew up?"

"Please." He retorted. "You're basically a child stuck in an adult's body."

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"But anyway, going to all those different high schools was not that heavy, now looking back on it," he continued. "I wouldn't say it was a traumatizing experience. I was a loner in high school. I wasn't like a lot of my peers."

"I was student body president when I was in high school."

"Yeah. . .that doesn't surprise me, Skeet. Were you prom queen too?"

Skeeter laughed, the sound blending perfectly with the sounds of the waves hitting the shoreline. "Nah. Braces and acne aren't really prom queen qualities."

"Still. I bet you were the prettiest girl in the room."

"Very charming. But, I didn't even go to my prom. I spent the night watching re-runs of M*A*S*H."

"At least you finished high school."

"At least you've lived a life." .

"How do you even live a life?"

"Travelling." She closed her eyes. "You live it through seeing places, learning cultures, meeting new and different people. You can't live a life by staying in just one place, Chuck."

"Even if that one place has enough beauty for one to stay in?"

Skeeter smiled at him and he felt like such a winner at seeing the genuineness in her smile. Her hand smoothly traveled from his dark hair to his face as she cupped his jaw. "We're really different people who've lived different lives, huh?"

He kissed the palm of her hand. "But not too different to not get along." She chuckled and he continued. "Maybe I'll consider staying in one place someday."

"And maybe I'll become a globe trotting doctor. Tell me, Chuck, what has been your favorite place so far in your long list of homes?"

"Paris." He answered her.

"Oooh." She mused. "The City of Love. Take your girlfriends there often?"

"Nope. It's just a really beautiful city."

"I heard it smells like urine."

Keanu laughed. "It does but it's the people that draw you in."

"But ─ "

" ─ I'll take you there." He said decidedly. "Don't worry."

"I wasn't worried." Skeeter kissed him tenderly. "But thank you."

They'd spent a few more hours just laying on that beach and looking at stars and talking about anything ─ from Skeeter's time in Harvard and his sister Kim who inspired him to donate to charitable organizations. All was well in their little bubble of love and happiness.

♡ 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗳𝗼𝗿
𝟭𝗸 𝗳𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿𝘀! 𝗺𝘆
𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝘂𝗹𝗹. ♡