Page 169 of Untouchable

Harp snorts. "I'm not that creative. I just know you're gonna guess where we're headed if you can see the roads I'm taking."

Although, now that he mentions it, the idea of Parker this weekend in nothing but a blindfold is something he decides to file away for safekeeping.

Parker huffs impatiently. “If I guess it, will you tell me?”

Harp makes a non-committal noise.

* * *

“Are we… going winter camping?”Parker asks. He feels unmoored without his sense of sight, as though he’s suddenly been thrown into zero gravity, despite feeling the truck rumbling all around him. It makes him feel so much more aware of his other senses, and he reaches across the cab and puts his hand on Harp’s leg.

“Are we… going… cross-country skiing?” Parker tries. Harp says nothing, and Parker pokes him in the side, a little harder than he means to because he can’t judge the distance. “C’mon, at least tell me if I’m getting warmer or colder.”

“You are very bad at being patient,” Harp says fondly.

“Well, duh,” Parker says. “Maybe next you can tell me about how the sky is blue or Bo is the best wiener dog. Oh—oh, I know, we’re going ice fishing in the reservoir. Wait, but that’s not iced over—hm. Ice fishing on… another body of water?”

"You're very cold and we're almost there," Harp says.

* * *

They're only headedten minutes away to The Stewart, a historic resort that the town is known best for. It's touristy and elegant all at once, and Harp isn't sure if Parker has ever spent the night there, but it's the closest place he could find where he felt he could spoil Parker sufficiently.

Still, he doesn't really want Parker to guess where they're headed, so he'd improvised a blindfold.

They ride in affable silence for a while, and he knows Parker is brewing up more guesses.

"Did you want to go camping?" Harp asks.

“Er, I mean…” Parker says.

“Let me put it this way,” Harp says. “We aren’t going camping, but is that something you would have wanted to do?”

Parker laughs.

“Okay, thank god. I wouldn’t mind winter camping, I’ve done it before, but… yeah. It’s, um. I need at least two weeks of mental preparation to get myself psyched up to wake up in the morning with frost on my eyelashes.”

As they get closer to The Stewart, insecurity plagues Harp. Maybe this isn't as fun of a surprise as he'd thought. Maybe Parker would've preferred a real surprise, the type you have to leave town for. Maybe he's stayed at The Stewart a hundred times and it's not even fun for him.

Harp punches down the fears and pulls out of traffic, making sure the view from the truck frames the old hotel perfectly. It's already decorated for Christmas, looking like something out of a storybook.

"Are we there yet?" Parker teases.

In answer, Harp leans over and gently removes the blindfold.

* * *

Parker looksup and sees The Stewart displayed before him, draped in lights and ribbons and evergreen boughs. It’s lovely, stately and elegant and romantic, and it’s clear, especially now, why The Stewart lured tourists to Mink Creek from all over the world.

Parker glances at Harp, who’s watching him expectantly.

“Wait, are we parking here? What, um... what are we doing now?”

"No, we're—this is the surprise. It's not—I mean—I know it's just a place in town so it's not that big of a deal—"

Everything clicks, and Harp can’t finish his sentence because Parker makes a loud, excited yelp and launches himself across the cab at Harp, flinging his arms around him.

“Oh my god, really?” Parker says in between the kisses he’s planting on Harp’s cheek. “Really? This is so fancy—I’ve never been, oh my god Mindy is going to be so jealous thankyouthankyouthankyou—“

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