Ferris Bueller's Night Out

"Like two fire hydrants, Mary. I ran through two napkins at lunch. Soaked right through 'em."

She nodded her head, flipped the right turn signal and made for the far shoulder, and when she stopped the car she unfastened her seatbelt and leaned back, looked him in the eye. "If you don't get over here and kiss me right now, well, I'm gonna die. I'm just gonna lay back and die."

And Ferris took his seatbelt off and crawled over the center console and kissed her. Semi-trailer drivers honked their horns as they passed, and still they kissed. A few years later she came up for air, then leaned over and ripped her sneakers off, scratched the bottoms of her feet...

"When I get horny, I mean really, really turned on, the bottoms of my feet turn to pure fire."

"We'll make an interesting couple then, I think. We can use my sweaty palms to soak your flaming feet."

"You think we'll make a couple, you and I?"

"I sure hope so."

"Oh? Why's that?"

"I haven't fallen in love since second grade, and I was kinda hopin' I might one more time, before it's all over, anyway."

"You're falling in love, Ferris Bueller?"

"You had me at the whole Disneyland thing."

"It's been fifteen years since someone made my feet itch like this."

"So, what's it gonna be?"

"Let's go ride a few rides, then what say we fly up to Vegas and get married?"

"Sounds like a plan to me..."

A moment later she pulled back into traffic and drove on to Anaheim, both of them lost in furious thought, both of them wondering if they'd really said the things they'd just said. He looked over at her bare feet and smiled, then he wiped the palms of his hands on his shorts and knew he was lost, a total goner.

She, of course, belonged to the 33 Club and pulled into a reserved lot and up to a valet stand. Park Security met the car and escorted them to a special entrance, and they were escorted through the park to the French Quarter, to that storied gray door next to the Blue Bayou, and their escort rang the bell. Another girl met them and walked with them up the broad, curved stairway to the dining room, and they sat quietly and had a light dinner, not once speaking about what was now magically dancing in the air between them. She'd ordered Grand Marnier soufflés ahead, and they sat with their coffees looking out over river and the crowds below...

"You know, they have rooms here," she said. "For people who need to – take a rest."

"Bedrooms? In Disneyland?"

"Yes. I, uh, well, I booked one. Just in case."

He looked at her and he couldn't help but smile at the insecurities playing over her face.

"What are you grinning at?" she said, her lower lip sticking out about a mile and a half.

"You. You're so goddamn cute it's driving me nuts."

She reached down, untied her shoes as she stood and turned to their waiter. "Jimmy, could you bring the soufflés and coffee to my room, in about an hour?"

"Yes, Miss Simmons."

"Ferris? You'd better come with me..."

And he did. Several times, as a matter of fact.

+++++

"Do you want to keep teaching?"

They were sitting in the driveway in front of Cameron's house in Malibu, and it was almost two in the morning; they'd been talking – and holding hands – for at least a half hour when she asked that, and he leaned back and looked up at the night sky.

"I can't imagine not teaching now," he said, "and not doing research. It's who I am, I suppose."

She nodded her head, though she hadn't mentioned flying to Las Vegas since that first wild kiss. "Is there room for someone like me in your life?"

"'Someone like me?' What does that mean?"

"I'm needy, Ferris. Clingy, possessive, self-centered. And I've lived alone for a long time. I don't want to live like that any more, but I don't want a part time husband, either."

"Okay. What's your point?"

"What I'm saying, what I'm asking you is simple. If you want to teach, if you want to go on with your work, would it work for you if I moved to Hawaii? If we moved in together?"

"I know you were joking earlier..."

"No, Ferris, I wasn't."

"Oh."

"And it doesn't matter much to me now where I live. It's a four hour flight, and I could keep my house for a while, for when I'd need to be here for work."

"Did Cameron tell you about Jeannie? My little sister?"

"No?"

"Oh. Well, Cam and Sloane got married last Sunday so she could be there. They got married in the living room at my folks house, by the way, so my sister could be with us. She passed away on Tuesday..."

He heard the sharp intake of breath, the whispered "Oh, God...no..." then: "Ferris, I'm so sorry. This must all be so confusing..."

"You know, Mary, the only thing not confusing right now is how I feel about you..." and he felt her hand then, squeezing gently, so gently, and he felt Jeannie's hand squeezing his and he wanted to cry again...but no, not now. Please, not now... "So, the truth of the thing, Mary, is that sometime in the last few hours everything changed. My life – changed – and you changed it. I'm afraid I really don't care about anything right now – except you. You being a part of my life, and me, being the center of your universe. I don't think I could ever be happy again without you, and I know that sounds silly and infantile..."

"Ferris?"

"Yes?"

"Ferris, shut up and kiss me."

He went around and opened her door, pulled her out and carried her to the front of the car; he pulled her shorts down and hoisted her up on the hood in one easy motion, then put her legs over his shoulders and went down on her, while fifty feet away traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway zoomed by blissfully unaware that two time Academy Award winning actress Mary Simmons was getting laid ON her car, and that her feet were "fuckin' on fire" so many times she lost count.

+++++

"So, how was Oregon?" Ferris asked when he saw Cameron in the kitchen early Friday morning.

"Fuck Oregon, Ferris. What's up with you and Mary? Pictures of you two all over the tabloids, a grainy video of you two screwing – in my driveway, no less?"

"Oh? I missed that one. Is it any good?"

"I'd give you a six on form, maybe a 10 on longevity, but hell, Ferris? On the hood of a new Mercedes? Have you no sense of decency? You probably scuffed five thousand bucks of paint off the resale value!"

"On the other hand..."

"You're right. The notoriety alone made the value of that car increase by at least fifty grand. Maybe I should take Sloane out front...?"

"What? On the Impala?"

"Right again. That wouldn't do, I suppose."

Sloane padded into the kitchen, yawning and rubbing her eyes. "Coffee?" she moaned.

"Brewing," Ferris replied, checking out the dark circles under her eyes, the bow-legged walk.

"What's with all the paparazzi out front?"

"Ferris and Mary, sittin' in a tree..." Cameron sang. "First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Ferris with a baby carriage."

"Screw you."

"Ferris? So the stories are true?" Sloane added, rubbing her eyes as she reached for a coffee cup.

"I'm going back to bed," Bueller said.

"No you're not, Paco." Cameron said, looking at his watch. "Airport, in two hours. You packed?"

"Last night. Ready when you are."

"Can I come too?"

"You've come enough already," Cameron grinned. "Sure you're UP to it?"

"If you are?"

"Oh, God," Ferris groaned, "get me out of here."

"So," Sloane said as she poured a cup, "is it true? Is Ferris Bueller finally in love?"

He looked down into his coffee as if divining an answer, then he simply shrugged. "I don't know, Sloane. Maybe. It kind of feels that way, but..."

"But?"

"I guess looking at the stars for so long has taught me to be patient. To evaluate things, prove the theory sound..."

"Ferris," Cameron said from across the kitchen, "love's not a theory. It either is or it isn't. You either feel love..."

He nodded understanding. "That's not it, Cameron. If I went by what I feel we'd have gotten married yesterday, but I've known the woman for five days. I'm to old to be this impulsive, there's too much at stake to be irrational."

"Is there, Ferris? Really?" Sloane said, looking him in the eye. "Is love ever really rational?"

He shrugged again. "Maybe. Maybe not. We've agreed to let things simmer for a week or so. She's coming over next weekend, and we're going to take a look at things then..."

The doorbell rang and Cameron went to a panel and looked at the video feed. "Sorry, Ferris," he said, "she's here."

"What?"

"At the door."

"Fuck-a-doodle-do!" he said as he jogged off towards his room. "Would you let her in...I've got to get dressed..."

He went and got in the shower, yet not a minute later he heard the bathroom door flying open, and she came into the bathroom.

"Bueller? Bueller?" came her voice from within the steam...

"That's me."

The shower door opened and she stepped in – still half dressed, then she slipped into his arms.

"I wasn't ready for you to leave just yet," she said as they came up for air. "I'm not ready for a life without Ferris Bueller in it."

"I see."

"I'm not sure you do, Ferris, so I want to make things clear..." She was doing weird and wonderful things with her hands just then, and he was suddenly finding it hard to think of anything else, yet her eyes were so close now, her breath a needful caress, and he held her close – "closer than forever," he sighed. Her breasts pressed against his, her tongue mingling with all his hopes and dreams – then he felt himself inside a fleeting moment and he wanted to hold on to the feeling – forever.

"There's nothing to it now, I suppose." he said after a long while. "Will you marry me?"

Her's was the face of a little girl on a Christmas morning full of love and warm puppies, and he saw water running off her nose as he looked into her eyes, then he kissed her forehead.

"So?" he said a minute later.

She nodded her head, kissed his chin – then took a playful bite.

"Closer than forever," she whispered. "I like that."

"What?"

"You whispered that, just a moment ago. I like the way that sounds, the way those words feel."

"I love the way you feel."

"Do you?"

"I do."

"You'd better get used to it then, because this is where I want to be. Right up against you, with nothing between us. Ever."

+++++

And so it came to pass that not a month later, in a house on Walden Road not far from the shores of a lake in the fair state of Illinois, a man and a woman held hands again, and they repeated sacred words in the living room of that house.

Not far from where the man and the woman stood there was an empty chair, and in the chair there was a little scarf neatly folded, and across the scarf a single white rose. When the ceremony ended, the assembled guests took their white roses and laid them with the first.

When he returned from the reception later that evening, Ferris Bueller took the scarf and the roses upstairs to his sister's room, and he flipped on the light switch and went into the room of a thousand memories and he stood there for a time. The room hadn't changed much over the years, even Ed Rooney's tattered necktie was still neatly folded on top of her copy of Kate Chopin's The Awakening. He stopped then and smelled the roses, then laid the scarf and the roses on top of her pillow before he turned and left the room.

Sloane was waiting for him out in the hall, and she wiped a tear from his cheek then kissed him just once, if ever-so-gently, on the lips – before she took his hand and led him down stairs. His parents were waiting for him there, as was his best friend – and his wife. They walked out into the snow and headed for cars and the drive to the airport, but Ferris stopped before he got to his father's Audi, and he turned to look at the house he had grown up in one more time, and then at his parents.

Would he ever see this image again, he wondered? In his mind, perhaps, in another memory, stored away with Jeannie sitting in the living room by the Christmas tree...

He felt her arm sliding around his waist, felt her by his side again and she came over him as a breaking wave of relief.

"Are you ready to go home?" she asked.

He looked at the house and the snow, at all that ever had been – and all that was yet to be – then he turned to her and kissed her forehead.

"Yes," Ferris Bueller said, "I'm ready."

Two Years Later

He was just out of the shower, wiping steam off the mirror in her bathroom, getting ready to lather his face and shave, and he thought about the evening before. With Cameron and Sloane, at the old Bistro in Beverly Hills. How good those two looked together, how everyone stood and applauded when Mary came up the stairs into the main dining room. She'd won her third Academy Award the night before, for her portrayal of Charlotte Vale's mother in Now, Voyager, and the restaurant's patrons were almost beside themselves that she was there – her star now shining brighter than ever.

After dinner they'd all gone down to Cam's house in Malibu, and sitting on his deck they had watched the stars out over the Pacific. Mary surprised them all by letting slip she was ready to retire, ready to call it a day. She'd never been happier than she had been these past two years, never felt more alive than when she was with Ferris at their new house in the hills overlooking Honolulu – looking at the stars together, walking rainforest trails or snorkeling off the surf.

Cam was disappointed, however. He had several roles in mind for her, but Sloane had simply shut him down, cut him off, and Mary looked grateful for the reprieve. They were of course best friends now, the two of them, which was only fitting.

He leaned forward and looked at himself in the mirror: a few more gray hairs here and there, especially in his beard, but, he thought, what did he expect? "Life's like that, I guess. You roll with the punches, and meet each day with an open mind," he said aloud, if only to himself.

"Did you say something?"

"No, just rattling on, talking to myself."

"You do that a lot, don't you?"

"Always have. Suspect I always will." And, as if talking to himself once again he looked in the mirror and continued: "And you meet each day with an open heart, because you never know who's around the next bend in the road."

He thought of the North Rim, of saying his goodbyes to Jeannie one more time, and he thought of snow falling on a house by the lake in Winnetka. Snow, falling like petals from white roses. Falling like tears into a canyon. Snow falling, falling like love.

*

(C) 2016 Adrian LeverKühn | abw | Ferris and his friends are the creation of John Hughes, and he first appeared in 1986s Ferris Bueller's Day Off. This story is an original, crazy-headed sequel based on the original screenplay by Hughes.

Merry Christmas, and I hope you enjoyed the night.