Chapter 7 #2
“That motorcycle has three wheels,” he said excitedly, his face practically plastered to the back window. “Did you know they had those?”
“I didn’t,” I replied, starting the car. “Turn around and put your seat belt on.”
He spun and dropped into his seat, his neck still craning to look out the window. A few minutes later, Cian climbed back into the car.
“Go,” he ordered as he buckled his seat belt.
“What did they say to you?” I asked as we pulled back onto the road.
“Nothin’, really,” he said, looking in the side mirror. “Just small talk.”
I focused on the road and kept going.
“We’re gonna take the right at that intersection up there,” Cian said, pointing to a four-way up the road. “Near that—”
His words cut off as we ran over something big in the road that I hadn’t even noticed.
“What was that?” Saoirse yelped, turning to look out the back. “I think it was a tree branch.”
“It’s okay,” I started to say. Then I felt the telltale thump, thump, thump of a flat tire. “Fuck.”
“Fuck,” Cian echoed me. “Pull over.”
“We’re so close,” I said as I pulled to the gravel on the side of the road. “Maybe we could just—”
“No fucking way,” Cian said as he whipped off his seat belt. He glanced at the back seat. “Stay where you are, Ronan.”
I turned off the car and followed him outside to check the damage. My tire was completely flat.
“You can’t drive on this without bending the rim,” Cian said angrily, kicking the flat tire. “You have a spare?”
“I think so?”
“Come on,” he ordered.
We emptied the trunk, setting the bags and cooler on the ground beside us and stuffing the blankets and keepsake boxes onto the passenger seat. By the time we were able to pull up the carpet of the trunk to get to the spare tire I was sweating, and my anxiety was through the roof.
It felt safe inside the car like we were in our own little bubble. Standing outside on the side of the road, even though we hadn’t seen a single car yet, made me very nervous.
“Jesus Christ,” Cian spat as he pulled the tire out. “How the hell is your spare tire flat?”
“I don’t know,” I cried defensively, my heart pounding. “I didn’t even know it was there!”
“Richie’s a fucking moron for not taking care of this.”
“Don’t blame Richie.”
“He let you drive around with a fucking flat spare tire in your trunk,” he barked at me, his face getting redder by the moment. “What the fuck?”
“Maybe it’s not as flat as that one,” I said desperately. “If we change it, maybe we can drive on it.”
“It’s flat,” Cian said darkly. “Completely flat. You can’t drive on it.”
“Well, then, what?” I threw up my hands. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
Cian tossed the tire down and put his hands on his hips, staring at the ground. I could see the muscle in his cheek flexing furiously.
God, I was such an idiot. I’d driven them all the way out here on a hope and a prayer that our aunt would take us in, left our entire lives behind, and then ran over a stupid stick in the road, and now we were stranded twenty minutes from our aunt’s house with no way to reach her.
Richie was right. It was a stupid fucking plan.
“I’ll walk this to that gas station,” Cian said, pointing to a sign in the distance. “They always have air pumps. I’ll fill this up and bring it back.”
“That’s too far,” I argued. “No, you can’t go all that way by yourself.”
Cian just stared at me.
“I’ll go.”
“I’m going,” he said stubbornly, closing the trunk. “Get in the car and lock the doors. I’ll be back in a little while.”
“I’m sorry,” I choked out. “I’m an idiot.”
“No,” he sighed. “You’re not. The Kellys just have rotten fuckin’ luck. I’ll be right back.”
He picked up the tire and threw it onto his shoulder as he started trudging down the road.
“Get back in the car,” he called, not even looking at me.
“Where is Cian going?” Aisling asked as I climbed back inside. The car was sweltering because I’d turned off what little air conditioning we had.
“Roll down the windows,” I ordered as I rolled mine down. “He’s going to fill up the spare tire.”
“I wanna go,” Ronan said, leaning forward.
“You’re staying here.”
“Why does Cian get to go?”
“Shut up, Ronan,” Saoirse snapped.
I clenched my jaw and willed myself not to cry as I watched my little brother carry the spare down the road. I lost sight of him as he grew too small to see, and my leg bounced with nerves as I waited for him to start back up the hill we were on.
The kids bickered in the back, but I tuned them out. Ten minutes later, Cian came back into view, slowly but steadily carrying the tire back up the hill.
I let out a breath of relief.
Then, the motorcycles showed up again, somehow louder this time. I looked behind us just as the first one pulled off the road and parked behind us.
“Oh, my god,” Saoirse said in horror. “Aoife?”
“I see them,” I replied.
For a terrified second, I wondered if it would be better to stay in the car, but Cian was still walking toward us, the windows were down, and it wasn’t as if the car could move anyway.
“Stay here,” I ordered as I climbed out of the car.
“Hey, nice to see you again,” the biker called out, smiling at me. “You need some help?”
He was huge. He was huge and wearing a leather vest with patches on it—and I wasn’t a moron, I knew what those meant—and he was off his bike and striding toward me. The other bikes were parked behind him, but the men stayed on them.
“We’re good,” I called back, walking to the back of the car so I could put myself between the men and my siblings. “Thanks, though.”
“You sure?” he asked, tilting his head to the side.
My heart was thudding in my chest so hard that I had to keep myself from pressing my hand to it.
“Uh, yeah,” I said. “All good.”
The biker looked past me at Cian.
“Got a flat?” he asked, even though he already knew the answer.
I nodded. “We’ll change it. Thanks for stopping, though.”
“You know how to change a flat?” he asked dubiously.
In any other situation, I’d be offended that he thought I wasn’t capable of changing a flat tire.
I mean, I didn’t have a clue how to do it, but he didn’t know that.
For all he knew, I was a freaking mechanic, and I changed flat tires all day.
But I wasn’t offended. I was trying too hard to act like I knew what I was doing and he and his friends could be on their way.
“Hey,” Cian called, out of breath as he hurried toward us. “Get going.”
I swallowed hard.
My little brother was trying to boss the biker, shooing him away like a thirteen-year-old boy was any kind of threat. Cian was just as afraid as I was, I could tell by the way his voice had thickened with the accent that each of us had lost in our first year of grade school.
“Go on,” he ordered as he reached me. He dropped the tire and took one step in front of me, his shoulder pushing me back.
The biker in front of us lifted his hands in surrender, taking a single step back.
Meanwhile an old man in the back climbed off the motorcycle that Ronan had been so fascinated with and started toward us.
One of the other men said something I couldn’t hear, but the old man just shook his head and kept coming.
“Thought you might need some help with that tire.”
“I’ve got it,” Cian ground out.
“Cian,” I murmured, putting my hand on his arm. He looked ready to take all of them on single-handedly, and I knew the first one would flatten him before I could blink.
“Alright there?” the old man called, making his way through the bikes.
Cian and I both jolted, looking over at him.
“Said they want to change the flat themselves,” the big biker said, not looking away from my brother. With good reason, Cian was still bristling, his chest puffed out.
“We’ve got it,” Cian repeated, looking at the old man.
“Ach,” the old biker said, waving his hand in dismissal. “Take the help. He’s been changin’ tires since before you were a twinkle in your da’s eye.”
My mouth went dry.
It was wrong somehow, like it was mixed with something else, but the cadence of his voice was achingly familiar. It had been so long since I’d heard an Irish accent that it was a little disorienting.
“You’re Irish?” Cian asked suspiciously. “What are you doing out here?”
The question was funny coming from a kid whose accent at the moment was decidedly Irish.
“Could ask you the same thing.” The old man grinned. “Live here now. Haven’t been home for a very long time.”
“Our dad,” Cian said, glancing at me as if for permission. “He was Irish.”
“Gone then?” the old man asked.
Neither of us answered him.
“We need to get goin’,” one of the other bikers called.
Cian shifted nervously beside me, and I made an executive decision.
“We’d appreciate the help,” I said, tightening my hand on Cian’s arm.
The old man looked at me in surprise.
“Interestin’,” he said softly.
The biker closest to us held out his hand. “I’m Will.”
“Aoife,” I replied, shaking it.
The old biker grinned happily. He looked like a rough version of Santa Claus as he lumbered toward us and shook my hand, too. “Patrick,” he said kindly, a little out of breath.
“Cian,” my brother said, reaching out to shake.
“Ronan, Aoife is going to kill you,” Saoirse screeched from inside the car as our little brother tumbled out of the driver’s door.
“Hi,” he said, smiling huge as he scrambled to his feet. His face was red and sweaty as he gave a little wave.
“Crap,” I muttered to myself.
“They should all get out,” the big biker—Will—said. “That car’s at least a hundred degrees by now, and we need to jack it up.”
“Saoirse,” I called. “You guys can get out.”
Both of my sisters were sweaty and miserable looking as they climbed out of Saoirse’s door.
“Hi, I’m Ronan,” Ronan said to Patrick, reaching out to shake his hand.
Will chuckled. “Hey, Tommy,” he called over his shoulder. “Come give me a hand.”
“Why me?” another biker called back as he pulled a leg over his motorcycle. “It’s always me.”
“Good to meet ya, Ronan,” Patrick said.
“You’re Irish!”
“I am.”
Aisling came over and wrapped her arms around my waist.
“Me too!” Ronan exclaimed happily. “Sort of.”
“Half,” I corrected. “We’re half.”
“The best half,” Patrick said conspiratorially.
“That’s my sister Saoirse,” Ronan said, pointing. “And that’s Aisling.”
Patrick nodded at both the girls, then closed his eyes and tilted his face to the sun for a moment.
“You wanna watch so you can do it next time?” Tommy asked Cian. He was much smaller than the guy named Will but still pretty scary. Aisling tightened her arms at my waist.
“Whoa,” Saoirse muttered from my other side. Her gaze was caught on one of the bikers, but I couldn’t see who.
“What?” I asked. She just shook her head, her cheeks growing even rosier.
We took a few steps to the side so Cian and the men could jack up my car, and all three of us watched as they showed him how to change the tire, letting him do most of it.
“Thank you,” Cian said, throwing my old tire into the trunk when they were done.
“You coulda figured it out,” biker Tommy said, slapping him on the back. “You ever need a job—”
Will laughed.
“What?” Cian looked back and forth between them.
“Got a garage in Eugene,” Will said, still smiling. “You wanna be a mechanic, come find us.”
“I will,” Cian said, wide-eyed with hero worship.
I tried not to scowl. Cian going to find those bikers was a worry for a different day. I didn’t care how nice they were, I’d murder him if he tried to ride a motorcycle.
“See ya later,” Will said to me as he walked away.
“Thank you,” I called back.
Tommy waved.
“It was very nice to meet you all,” Patrick said, his eyes roaming over our group. “Aoife, Saoirse, Aisling, Ronan, Cian.”
My eyes watered as he turned and walked back to his motorcycle.
“He said our names right,” Saoirse whispered hoarsely as I led the girls back to the car. “He said them perfectly.”
“I know,” I muttered, wiping my nose on my sleeve.
“He was Irish,” Ronan said as he climbed into his spot. “Didn’t Dad sound like that?”
“He did,” Cian said, standing by his door while he waited for me to get in my seat.
“It was good luck that they saw us, right?” Ronan chattered on.
Cian, Saoirse, and I were quiet. Hearing Patrick’s accent hit a little different for the three of us. A million memories of my dad played through my mind as I started the car again. I almost didn’t notice the sound of the motorcycles roaring to life behind us.
I pulled out onto the road, and Cian quietly reminded me where to turn.
The group of bikes turned in the opposite direction.
“Sign of good luck, you think?” Cian asked me softly, turning to look at them over his shoulder.
“If it was, I’ll take it,” I replied. “Now where am I going?”
Fifteen minutes later, we were on a long gravel driveway, cringing with every pothole and bump we ran over, praying that we didn’t get another flat.
“Shit,” Cian said, leaning forward to look through the windshield. “It’s a fucking RV.”
“There’s nowhere to pull over,” I replied anxiously, looking for anywhere that I could pull my car to the side. The driveway would never fit the two vehicles side by side and there was no way I’d be able to back up all the way to the road.
“Why isn’t it moving?” Cian asked in confusion as the motorhome just kept coming at us.
“Maybe they know where the road gets wide enough,” I said, still rolling forward. “You’re sure this is the right road?”
“This is the street she wrote on the birthday card,” he replied. “I double-checked it. It’s the right place.”
I just kept driving forward because I didn’t really know what else to do, until eventually I had to come to a stop because the RV was right in front of us, blocking the entire driveway.
I looked up, leaning forward next to Cian so I could see the driver.
Aunt Ashley was staring at us, her eyes and mouth both wide with surprise.
“It’s the right place,” Cian breathed with relief. “Thank the good Lord.”