By the time I opened my eyes it was nearly noon and I groaned as I realized I had missed the morning news once again. I cursed, the sharp throbbing in my skull reminding me of the poor choices I had made the night before. I had made a fool of myself and the embarrassment was almost enough to make me never want to leave the room. I sat up to find a tall glass of water and two tylenol on the nightstand beside the bed. A cold chill ran down my spine; he had been in the room after I had fallen asleep...again. I had let it go the first time because it had been Hank who actually did the waking; and Sam had brought me coffee so I dismissed it as him being thoughtful. But while I had been a terrible guest, that certainly didn't give him any right to enter the room while I was still asleep, lack of social skills or not. After twenty minutes of waiting for it to kick in finally passed I made a quick trip to the bathroom, then made my way bravely down the stairs. I was relieved to find the house empty and I stopped when I found a note folded in half waiting on the kitchen counter.
~Kitty Kat,
Still stranded. Breakfast is in the microwave.
~Sam
I sighed, grateful I didn't have to meet him face to face just yet and pleased to find hash browns, fried eggs, sausage with a mug of coffee. Although I wasn't happy about the new nickname, we weren't intimate enough for him to call me anything other than Kat, there was an irrational part of me that kind of liked it. I pressed three, tossed the note in the trash and took a good look around. Out the kitchen window I could barely see Sam's legs sticking out from what seemed to be my car. Had he been working on it all night? I knew from the water at my bed that he had been back inside the house at least once after I went to sleep. I could hear country music playing loud enough that it echoed in the woods. When I finished my meal I made my way out to him, as Hank ran up to greet me I could hear his siblings howling from their cage. I gasped when I approached the garage and found my car in a million pieces littering the floor. He had said the car was worthless but it still stunned me to see it in such disarray. Sam slid out from underneath the car with a giant smile on his face, turned the music down and wiped his hands on the rag sticking out of the his coverall pocket.
"Morning sunshine! So, I was out in the Yard last night and realized I got the exact same model out there, different year, but I figured until the roads are clear, it wouldn't hurt to try and swap some pieces, see if I can't get this heap running after all." I opened my mouth only to quickly shut it. Was he just going to pretend the night before had never happened? While he'd pushed me on my ass, the only thing that was bruised was my ego. I was usually pretty good about knowing when someone is attracted to me, but his reaction told me this time i'd gotten it wrong.
Did he even remember? We drank quite a bit of wine after all. Better question was, did I want him to? Or maybe he dismissed it as wine induced? He had pushed me away as if I had revolted him and now he was trying to replace most of my car's insides.
"Is there any way I can help?" If he wasn't going to bring it up then neither was I. I wasn't even sure how I would explain my poor behavior or deal with the sting of his rejection. He pointed over at the tool box.
"You know anything about tools?"
"Actually I do. Dated an auto nut in high school who spent hours fixing up an old challenger his father left him." Sam looked skeptical but nodded and disappeared back underneath the car.
"I need a â…ž socket wrench," he announced. After a quick inventory I grabbed the tool and passed it to his outstretched hand.
"So this auto nut, did you help him too? Or just watch him do all the work? Lemme see a 13/16 please."
"I helped just like I'm helping now, I can read the tools, and I know what most of them are. But I know very little about actual cars themselves," I confessed. I heard a loud grunt followed by the sound of grinding metal. He handed me the bolt he'd managed to remove, it was covered in grease and I placed it where he indicated.
"There's a system, helps me remember the order to put all this back. You date this 'auto nut' long?" He was trying to sound casual, but failed miserably. Why did he even care? He was the one who shoved
me
away, why did he want to know so much about my dating life?
"Just most of my sophomore year; I got tired of taking second place to his car." Sam's outstretched hand deposited a few more bolts and I waited for what seemed like his inevitable next question. But instead he surprised me and asked about my father instead. What did he do for a living? Did he ever remarry after my mother's death? How did he meet my mother? I answered his questions easily; my father was a professor, after my mother's death he semi-retired to writing books and taking care of me. When he needed money he would occasionally speak at a few seminars, but for the most part, I had been his entire world. Just talking about him was starting to make me feel homesick and Sam suddenly declared a break for lunch. After several minutes of washing, he managed to get the grease off his hands with the help of a giant container of Fast Orange he kept under the kitchen sink.
"Anything in particular you're hungry for, Kitty Kat?" I clenched my teeth and chose to ignore the pet name; he seemed rather amused with it.
"Since I'm the guest, I am at your mercy; however, I
can
make a salad to go with whatever you do decide to make" I announced. As a child it had been the only way for my father to get me to eat vegetables. Enough dressing and you could hardly taste the stuff. He decided on grilled ham and cheese sandwiches with a creamy tomato soup. I thought it was a little too warm to eat soup, but I knew it was a quick fix and I smiled as Sam led me onto the back patio to eat, the night before seemed to be fading into nothing more than a bad memory.
"So, what's the story with all the dogs?" I asked in between bites as Hank curled up in a sun spot nearby.
"Their mother lived on the property when I bought it, few days after I moved in I found her wandering around, looking for food, belly swollen with pups; she was a bit feral, but seemed to understand that I only wanted to help. I couldn't very well leave her in that condition, so I took her in, fed her, helped her give birth even. She died few weeks later protecting them from coyotes. So naturally I took them in; Hank here is more docile than the rest so I had to keep him inside to protect him otherwise the others would have tore him apart, but the others are just hunting dogs now."
"What do you hunt?" I asked curiously. I had an uncle and some cousins who went hunting; they hunted everything from deer to bears, storing the meat and selling the fur. My father had taken me hunting one when I was 13. In our family, it was almost a right of passage, but when it came time to fire and take the creatures life I found I couldn't do it. Picking up styrofoam plates of meat at the store was a lot different than staring the animal down and killing it yourself.
"Mostly Elk and Duck, depends on what's in season really. I usually go with my cousins, store the meat in the freezers, sell the skins in town; not much goes to waste around here."
"You said you got into mechanics through an apprenticeship; who trained you?" He seemed a little hesitant to share the information, but after all the personal questions he had been asking me, he very well couldn't keep dodging them and stay polite.
"My Uncle Hank actually, I lived with him and my Aunt Mariam during the school year. I was a bit of a troubled kid, and my cousins picked on me a lot so I spent most my free time with Uncle Hank in the garage. Cars have just always made sense to me; Part A fits with Part B and so on, Uncle Hank and I would spend hours tinkering away on whatever his newest project was. And when you find your life passion, you just
feel
it." I finished my bowl of soup and offered to grab his finished dishes as well.
"Careful now, I could start getting used to this," he teased as he fed his crust to Hank.
"I assure you, it's only because I'm a guest. Normally I have far less manners."
"What a shame. Then I am glad to have you as my guest for the time being. How about if you wash, I'll dry." he replied as he followed me into the house. As we neared the last glass he seemed to stall, as if there was something he wanted to ask, but couldn't quite find the courage to do so. It was several awkward minutes later before he finally managed to spit it out.
"If you're interested, I could use your help again." he announced, doing his best to sound casual. So, how was it he could be sweet and coy during the day only to reject me so forcefully at night? I could have asked, demand the answers for peace of mind, but that would have simply make an awkward situation even more awkward and I wasn't sure just how long I was going to be stuck with him.
He's just being nice and polite, keep your hormones in check
.
"I'd love to." After drying my hands, I followed him outside and towards the large fenced off area just behind the garage.
"I assume this fence goes all the way around?" Living so far out of the way I wouldn't think that he'd need the extra step in security but he simply nodded and began to unlock the chain from around the gate. It was large and a bit rusty, but he brushed the orange stains onto his coveralls and motioned me forward. The fences had to be almost twenty feet tall with razor wire around the top. There were a few dozen cars, spanning the rough area of a football field; all of them parked neatly in rows at least the ones in good condition anyways. And most were in decent condition, despite the waist high grass growing around and through it.
"Do any of these things still run?"
"'Fraid not, most of them were scrapped for parts, a few got into accidents," he motioned to the half crushed ford truck in the nearest corner. It looked as though it had rolled over several times, compacting more with each hit into the ground. My eyes went wide as I searched, looking for the car that was similar to my own.
When I finally found it, it was in terrible condition. The drivers side window as broken in, allowing the weather to damage the inside.The seats were covered in moss and mildew, the outside paint and body having eroded under the elements. I felt almost sad to see it in such condition knowing the same fate awaited my car if this plan didn't work.
"You sure the parts are any good?"
"The ones we need should be, and no harm in checking am I right?" I nodded in agreement and waited for him to back his tow truck into the Yard where he had me hook it behind the back axle. I followed on foot as he pulled out and to his garage. He dropped the car and started gathering the tools, the jack and the ramps to hold the car high enough to get underneath. I handed him the tools he asked for and we worked mostly in silence, listening to the Oldies playing on the radio. Before I knew it the afternoon had passed and we headed back inside for dinner.
While he tossed the steaks on the grill I made a fresh salad inside. With the nice weather we ended up eating dinner on the patio again.
"Would you like a beer?"
"I'm not sure that's a good idea." He sat down and turned towards me suddenly looking very serious as he took a deep breath before speaking.
"I've been avoiding it all day like a coward, but you deserve an explanation for last night. I was raised to believe that
