Breaing and Entering with Steele

"AJ, I really need you to come get me as soon as you read this message. My mom found out what I was working on, and she kicked me out of the house last night. Slave, Abbey."

AJ hurried to rip his PJs off and yank on pants, a shirt, and socks. Slave? He thought. Her mother and father must have really been on a tear, telling her to do everything and blaming her for everything. He knew the feeling well. He slid his phone into his pocket and hurried upstairs, trying his best to ignore his father and Melody, but it was unavoidable. He grabbed a tart out of the food pantry, grabbed a can of soda, and headed for the front door where his keys hung.

"AJ! AJ, come here," his father said, seeing him as he hurried across the front room.

"What's up?" AJ asked, trying to not get held up. His father was naked, save for a stretched-out pair of tighty-whities, his gigantic belly and back coated with a thick matting of black curly hairs. He looked like a grizzly bear suffering from Alopecia.

"When I came home last night, what did I tell you about her?" Jaxson asked expectantly.

"Who?" AJ asked.

"Mom. Your mom. What did I say to you?" Jaxson said, holding a hand out toward the interior of his bedroom.

AJ cringed. "You said something about...uh...coming upstairs..." He divulged reluctantly.

"Yeah, yeah, see? I told you," Jaxson said, shouting into his bedroom. "You were awake-"

"I was ASLEEP!" Melody roared back at him.

"Pretend sleeping!" Jaxson said, his face turning red. "There is no way you were sleeping. Your puss was sopping wet, and you were laid out on the coffee table, ready for fucking!"

"I-"

"Dad, I've got to go," AJ said, grabbing his keys.

"Don't play games with me!" Jaxson shouted at Melody. "Why would you clear the table off? Lay out there? Half-naked, ready and willing? What are you trying to seduce AJ?"

"I would NEVER!" Melody screamed at him.

"Then stop being a bitch!" Jaxson shouted at her. "You wanted it, you planned it out...maybe you fell asleep before I got home, but the way you were moaning and groaning, there was no fucking way! ...you slept through that."

AJ opened the front door and stepped out onto the porch as Melody came out of the bedroom, pulling her nightgown around her middle and hurrying down the hallway. He heard her say something about Jaxson fucking her in the ass, brutally, without having the decency of waking her up so she could go to the bathroom, and AJ had to swallow to keep from throwing up.

He closed the door and hurried to his vehicle, sliding behind the wheel and firing up the engine. He pulled out and headed down to the cafe, and once he was safely parked, he grabbed his phone out and called Abbey.

She picked up.

"Are you okay? Where are you?"

"Yeah, I'm okay," Abbey said, sounding bored. "I'm just...walking the streets like every other homeless person," Abbey added. "Maybe I should try and buy some crack and dance in the middle of the street for a while."

"Where are you? I'll come pick you up," AJ said, putting his car in drive.

"No. Don't bother. I'm waiting for a ride."

"A ride? From who?" AJ asked.

"Your Momma," Abbey replied in a snarky tone.

"Oh, okay," AJ said, not wanting to sound like he was some control freak. He didn't need to know who this "friend" was, right? Or did he? Did he? "So, uh...when...when will I see you next?"

"Soon," Abbey said. "I gotta go get my shit. My stuff. I'm certainly not leaving my fucking vibrator behind. After that... ehhhh I suppose I should take my clothes. Can't walk around naked all day every day. Or can I?"

"Abbey, what the fuck is going on?" AJ asked her then.

"Well, you already know I got kicked out. What more do you want to know? I got kicked out. Booted. Given the eviction notice. Outta my house. Well...I kinda left on my own. Before they could have me committed. They're trying to send me back to that fucking hell hole called Saint Margarets."

"No fucking way," AJ said.

"Yes, fucking way," Abbey replied.

"So, you're on the street, just walking around, but waiting for a friend? That doesn't make sense."

"Nothing makes sense!" Abbey said, her voice sounding a bit hysterical. "I'm walking between streets because I don't want the cops to see me. Fucking cops. Pigs. Pigs in blue. Well...they do have those really nice clubs... You know what? They don't even have those clubs anymore which is bullshit. You used to be able to get off with a stiff clubbing and then just walk it off, but not anymore. Too much police brutality. Too many sadomasochists figured out how to pass the psych exam to become cops."

"Abbey, focus," AJ said.

"I am focused! Fucking Saint Margaret's has connections AJ. They have orderlies who will come get you out of the back of a fucking police car, claiming you ran away from there. And if they don't get you right away, they just wait till you;ve been booked and then they come take you out of the holding cell. Straight jacket and all. They call it a psychiatric hold, but you get the fucking idea."

"So you're hiding. From everyone. And you don't want me to come pick you up?"

"I already told you, my ride is on her way. She'll be here in a minute."

She? AJ thought, relieved by the revelation. It was a girl coming to pick up Abbey. Surely a girl was...okay.

"Dude!" Abbey said then as if finding something of value on the sidewalk. "I'll be okay. I'm not violating the contract. Plus, I don't need you trying to fist-fight my dad. Hold on. That might be fun to watch. No. Better not. Cops. Tasers. God, I need a taser."

"What do you need a taser for," AJ asked, chuckling.

"What? A girl can't dream about being tasered every now and again? Everyone acts like it hurts but, so does love. Oooo! Love and Tasers. They wrote a song about that."

AJ listened while Abbey sang a few lines of a song she was clearly making up right then and there.

"Love and tasers, love and tasers,"

"Go together like...mashed potatoes."

"This I gotta...tell you,"

"You don't wanna get tasered in the..."

"What body part rhymes with you?" Abbey asked.

"I don't know," AJ replied.

"Oh! Rides here. We're going to my parent's house to get my things. After that...I'll be over."

"Wait. You're coming here?" AJ asked as if he were sitting in his front room.

"Fuck yeah. I'm moving in bro. Going to run that fucking place. Beat your mom's ass. Lick that Candy's ass. Fuck that ass. Sorry babe. Didn't mean that, unless you want me to."

"What?" AJ asked.

"Gotta go!"

"Okay. I'll...talk to you later," AJ said.

The phone hung up and AJ sat there in his car, replaying the conversation over and over again in his head. What in the hell was going on? He didn't know, but he hoped Abbey wasn't in some kind of trouble, like real trouble. She sounded like she was having a mental breakdown of some sort. He had so many questions and no answers. He needed answers.

He shut the car off and went inside, sat down, and ordered a coffee and a donut. He ate slowly, tapping his phone, thinking of all the things he wanted to ask Abbey.

Why did she get kicked out? If she left before her parents could kick her out, had she really been kicked out? And if they were trying to have her committed, had she really been kicked out at all? Who was this friend? Why didn't she just call him to come pick her up? He winced. She had, kind of. She'd texted him. He went back to his hidden text messages and re-read the last one he'd received from Abbey. It was right there, in black and white. "Come get me". And he didn't. He didn't even see her message until this morning. He re-read the message again. His mouth spoke the words as he read them. "Last night."

He saw the text had come through this morning, but he knew there was no telling what time the text had actually been sent. He was used to his father sending messages the night before, or even days before, only to receive them well after whatever he needed AJ to do, had passed.

Without anything else to do, and no plans for the day, AJ decided he was just going to go home, but as soon as he was back out in his car, his phone rang. He pulled it out quickly, thinking it might be Abbey, but saw it was his father instead. He picked it up.

"Hey, dad."

"Hey AJ. I need you to come do a job with me."

"Okay," AJ said. "When?"

"Right now. You know where Nitro Electronics is?"

"No," AJ said.

His father rattled off an address, and then gave him directions that included "turn at the dairy farm" and "third long driveway on the left."

"Great," AJ said.

"Bring the tools," his father said.

"The toolbox? Or like, all the tools?"

"What did I say?" Jaxson said, his temper flaring.

"Yeah, I was asking," AJ retorted.

"I'll see you there," his father said and he hung up the phone.

AJ swore and slammed his hands against the steering wheel. Why in the fuck was he bringing the tools and not his father? Jaxson had the truck. Jaxson was at the house! Unless he wasn't, and in that case, then AJ might be closer. Or, his father was just being the typical lazy shit that he was, and wanted AJ to do all the heavy lifting.

AJ drove home and found it completely vacant of lifeforms. He had a feeling that was going to be the case. He opened the garage, loaded the gigantic toolboxes, all three of them, into his car's back seat and trunk, and then grabbed a few more things he thought they might need, like the angle grinder and the pry bar. Purely on afterthought, AJ stepped into the basement through the side door and changed laundry loads after washing his hands in the laundry basin, and then hurried back out to his car, locking everything up on the way.

Finding the destination took longer than he anticipated, and only after three Google searches did he find the correct place. As he pulled into the parking lot, he saw his father standing at a truck, bullshitting with a man who most likely worked at the place.

"Here he is now," he heard his father say as he opened his car door and got out. "Can't follow simple directions now?" Jaxson asked him, opening the back door of his car.

"Yeah, I can," AJ said, popping the trunk. "You know how many dairy farms are on this road?"

"Third dairy farm on the left!" Jaxson shouted at him.

"No, you said turn at the dairy farm, and it was the third drive on the left! I turned! There aren't any drives down there!"

"And somehow, you ended up here," Jaxson said as if AJ's presence was proof he'd given him the correct directions.

"Only because I had my phone. I googled it and then used the map to find the place. And it's not Nitro Electronics, it's Nitrous Gaming Systems."

Jaxson turned to the man he'd been speaking with. "What's the fucking name of this company?"

The man smirked. "He's got it right. Nitrous Gaming Systems."

"Same fucking thing," his father then said dismissively. "Come on. Grab the fucking tools and follow me."

AJ grabbed two tool boxes, one in each hand, and the pry-bar, and walked to the front door where his father then directed him to go around the building, to the back, and wait at the back door for them to open it. AJ nodded, and waddled across the front grass, around the corner, all the way down to the back of the building, only to find a twelve-foot fence blocking his way.

"What the fucking fuck-fuck!" AJ shouted, and then pressed his face against the fence, looking around the edge of the building. He thought he saw a back door, a loading dock maybe, and he swore. His father had sent him in the wrong direction. Huffing, he picked up the toolboxes again, and hauled them back to the front, and then circled around the other side of the building, all the way down the side, and halfway to the back, he stopped, seeing the fence again.

"Mother fucker!" He turned around and saw the man, the employee, waving for him. AJ picked up the toolboxes and hurried back to the front.

"I'll take you to the back," the man said. "Jaxson didn't know there's no access to the back of the building from the outside."

"No doubt," AJ said.

"So is that guy your boss?" the employee asked, holding the front door open for him.

"Yeah. My boss and my dad," AJ explained.

"Ahhhh, he didn't tell me that, but I figured."

"Yeah," AJ said.

"Here. Use this," the guy said, pulling a rolling cart close. AJ put the toolboxes on top and the lower level and made a "whew!" sound. "Pretty heavy?" the guy asked.

"A lot," AJ said.

"Well, I'm Angelo. If you guys need anything, let me know. I'm in charge of making sure you guys have everything you need. I'll be in my office, but I'll come check on you every once in a while."

"Thanks," AJ said, and Angelo nodded, and then led him through the building, a series of twisting narrow rooms with hot humid atmospheres that stung his eyes and made him want to cough constantly.

"Don't breathe any of this stuff," Angelo said in a warning tone. "Unless you want to have lung problems for the rest of your life."

"What is it?" AJ asked as they passed through another room that was lined with steel tubs filled with, what looked like, circuit boards.

"These are motherboards," Angelo said, waving his hands. "We use a substrate and dip them into a solution and coat them with copper. After that, our machines scrape the copper off, and what's left are the traces, and then the board gets coated with the green stuff which is an insulator. Back and forth, copper, insulator, copper, insulator. We can get ten layers on the board if we need. The problem with going that thick is heat and electrical interference, so most places stick to two or three layers."

"Cool," AJ said.

"The liquid is acid. Nitric, sulfuric, hydrochloric, hydrofluoric. Nasty shit. Bad shit. Don't get any of it on you. Don't touch it, don't breathe it."

"Got it," AJ said, pushing the cart along.

"Alright, here you are," Angelo said, waving a hand toward the wide open space at the back of the building. AJ smiled and pushed the cart forward, and saw his father leaning over a vat of greenish-blue liquid, and nodding as he spoke with three more men who were explaining something to him. The men were all dark-skinned and dressed in all white, but what was most surprising, especially given the environment they were in, all three men wore flip-flops on their feet. If any of the acids splashed on them, they'd be in for a world of hurt.

"No, no, no. You cannot use anything less. We have to have the 316 stainless. 308 doesn't work," one of the men said.

Jaxson turned and saw AJ and then turned back to the men. "You got it. Anything else?"

"The top part. Where the hook goes through. It needs to be thick. They keep making these baskets with really thin top parts and they break. Then we have to use polycord which sucks."

"That will be more money," Jaxson said. "You still want 316 for the handles?"

"Yes. Definitely," the man said.

Jaxson nodded. "Have the boss write it up. We'll just add the cost of the rod to the project."

"How much for the labor?" the man asked.

"Ten bucks," Jaxson said.

"Ten per? Okay," the man replied.

Jaxson waved AJ forward. "Grab all this angle iron here. Stack it over there. Neat piles. 4 pieces in each. We need a count. After that, we'll count the T's and we'll get the rod on order. Remember 316 not 308."

AJ nodded and hurried to do as his father had instructed, not wanting to the men to think they were lazy or anything. His father was always bitching at him about making a good first impression, and AJ knew this was the most important part of the job. When AJ was done laying out the angle iron, they had ten stacks and a ton of other pieces.

"You have enough for ten baskets, but I'll need to get angle for the tops, the hook platforms, and the rod for the hooks. I'll need angle for the shelves, rod for the shelves...you want angle down the middle of the shelves?"

"Can you do a thicker rod instead?" the lead man asked.

"Sure," Jaxson replied. "Whatever you want boss."

The man nodded, obviously liking what his father had to say.

Jaxson told AJ to go find a broom and a dustpan to sweep up the area and then continued talking to the three men for another half-an-hour as AJ did the dirty work. Once the place was immaculate, Jaxson waved for AJ to leave everything where it was, and they headed back through the complex maze of rooms, to the front offices, where they sat down and waited for someone to speak with. It was Angelo.

"Hey guys," Angelo said, smiling and sitting down. "So, the men explained what we need?"

"Yup," Jaxson said, nodding.

"So what do you think?"

"Well, the baskets are no problem. I can make baskets all day long. The 316 isn't really an issue but, the original quote was for 308. 316 is more money."

"How much more?" Angelo asked.

"Whatever market value is. I won't charge you extra, You can buy it yourself if you want."

"No. Just, we'll put it in the paperwork. Market value."

"And the hook-eyes. The guys said the baskets they have are cheap. They want sturdy hook eyes."

"Well, we have big rolls of nylon or polypropylene they can use. They just don't like to reach over and hook them."

"I mean," Jaxson turned to AJ and then back to Angelo. "If my son had to lean over a vat of acid to try and hook a bundle of polypropylene, rather than just hooking an eye-bolt or a hook-eye...what happens if someone slips?"

"How much is that going to cost?" Angelo asked.

"I told the guys twenty-per and they said that was fine."

AJ kept his face absolutely blank. Angelo looked from Jaxson to AJ and back and then nodded. "Twenty-per. Well...it is a safety issue and I won't say no to safety. Okay."

"The guys also asked if they could get angle for the middle section of the shelves, I said thick rod would be cheaper. Save you money."

"Good thinking. Will it still hold the weight?"

"Absolutely," Jaxson said. "With the angle on the sides, the shelves will hold whatever you put on them."

"Excellent," Angelo said. "Do you have a figure?"

"I only do the hourly for the labor and the cost of materials that are used, and wear and tear."

"So, do you have a roundabout number?"

"I mean, I can give you a ballpark number, but it's going to be sky high. I don't want to scare you into backing out of the deal. Welding is 40 an hour per person. Materials are market value. Wear and tear on the welder is going to be three...times two...six hundred. The wire, I don't know how much 316 wire is right now. I'll need gas. Let me think."

Jaxson turned to AJ and asked, "How long do you think it'll take us to make one of those baskets? Eight hours? Six?"

"Probably six," AJ answered, thinking it was the right answer. Truthfully, he didn't have a clue.

"Six? Are you out of your mind?" Jaxson said, turning back to Angelo. "Six is we want to do shit work. I'd say ten hours, both of us welding, per basket."

"So, approximately eight hundred, plus materials," Angelo said.

"I'd go a thousand, just to be safe," Jaxson said. "You don't want to tell the boss and then have it cost more."

"I agree," Angelo said, and he got up and handed both Jaxson and AJ a stack of papers. "Please sign those. It's our safety pamphlet, just letting you know about the dangers of working around the vats and things like that."

"Do you want us to make them in our shop and then bring them here?" Jaxson asked.

AJ sat, stony-faced. They didn't have a shop unless his father was talking about their garage, which was filled with garbage and an old car his father was never going to get around to restoring.

"The transport costs," Angelo began to say.

"No transport costs," Jaxson said.

"What about the size? Will they fit through the doors?"

Jaxson pulled out his tape measure. "Let's see."

AJ sat while his father and Angelo went off to measure things and almost an hour later, they returned.