Chapter 1 #3
I was also horrified that she’d gone months hearing a sound and didn’t once think to get it checked out, and she’d seen smoke coming out from her hood and still hadn’t had any inclination to see what the issue was, until the lawyer told her to.
If she was this oblivious, then she probably shouldn’t be driving at all.
I decided to choke down my horror for the moment.
“At any point did your check engine light come on?” I asked.
I could easily check myself once I got the car keys, and I would run a full diagnostic regardless of her answer, but it was good to know how long a problem had been persisting, especially because one problem with a vehicle could easily cause another if left unfixed.
“Check engine light?” The old woman looked puzzled for a moment before understanding dawned on her face. “Oh, is it that weird little orange anvil that popped up behind my steering wheel?”
Orange anvil. I fought the urge to shake my head in disapproval, and instead I nodded.
“Yes,” the woman continued. “The little anvil has been there since before the first weird noise started.”
Oh, my god. This woman had been driving around with a check engine light on for months?
“Let me see your keys,” I said as I quickly stretched out my hand. “I’ll take a look at your vehicle and see what the issue is.”
At this point, it would be seeing what the issues, plural, were, because I was certain her overuse of a dying engine had already caused more than one.
“Which key?” The woman’s face twisted into one of confusion as she pulled out her car key and what looked like a house key.
Patience, I reminded myself, and I took a deep breath before responding.
“The car key, please,” I replied. “Also, may I have your name?”
“Shannon.” She plopped the key in my hand, and I thanked her and directed her to sit in our waiting area and help herself to a beverage and popcorn.
Then I went out to retrieve her car. It’d survived the drive over to our shop, so hopefully it would survive the ten seconds it would take me to pull it into our garage.
Though, with my luck, we’d end up having to tow it in like Mr. Pearson’s car.
Shannon’s car was a Honda Accord, simple, well-made, reliable, and very obviously abused. I could see all the little nicks and dings, more than likely caused by young grandkids, and it was in desperate need of a car wash.
I was not looking forward to seeing what sort of damage she’d caused to the internal structure of the car.
I unlocked the vehicle, stepped inside, and started the engine. It revved to life with a high-pitched whine and a plume of blue smoke that temporarily blocked my vision.
Holy shit, she’d ruined this poor thing.
Once the smoke had died down enough to see, I slowly pulled the car into an empty space in our garage, right next to where Jesse was working.
“Holy shit, dude,” he said as I shut the car off and stepped out. “What the hell happened to this thing?”
He eyeballed the car like it was a monster.
“The customer said she drove it around on a check engine light for months,” I explained. “It was making weird noises, and she thought the light was a little anvil.”
“Let me guess,” Jesse replied sarcastically. “She was like, ninety-five years old.”
“Give or take a year,” I laughed. “What do you say we trade? I’ll work on Mr. Pearson’s hand-cutting engine, and you can take this one.”
“Fuck, no,” Jesse snorted. “That’s your problem now.”
Damn.
It was worth a shot.
Despite all of the car’s issues, finding the cause only took about two minutes. The car had practically no oil left in it, and the remaining oil was practically congealed. I wasn’t sure if she’d ever once changed the oil since owning the car. It sure didn’t look like it.
Changing the oil wouldn’t be a problem, but the real issue was how the lack of oil had affected the car. The engine had burned too hot, the coolant was too low, and some of the plastic had even melted.
And that was just what I could find right off the bat. It’d take me even longer to do a more thorough search, but I was sure I’d find a whole lot of damaged bearings and potentially ruined pistons. It was actually a miracle that her entire engine hadn’t seized up.
I returned to Shannon with my findings, and it took almost half an hour just for me to explain everything in a way that she’d understand, but we eventually got on the same page, and she told me to go ahead with the repairs and replacements where necessary.
It would take me, at minimum, three days to get things fixed and get the parts I’d need.
That was if everything went exactly as planned, which things rarely did, even without aliens hovering overhead.
So, Shannon left her keys with me, as well as her contact information, and then she called her kids to come pick her up.
Then I got to work.
I didn’t even stop working to eat lunch, because the damage was extensive, and I wanted to make as much progress as possible in case we got more jobs to do.
There were two other guys who worked in the garage with Jesse and I, and we all alternated days off.
But even between the four of us, the garage could get pretty busy at times, especially when we were given in-depth projects like Mr. Pearson’s and Shannon’s cars.
Since Mr. Pearson hadn’t put a time limit on his project, Jesse had taken all the other customers so I could focus on the job for Shannon.
Fortunately, all the other customers we got needed simple things like oil changes or tire rotations.
And of course, it helped that a lot of people were too scared to come outside, so there was no need for their cars to be serviced.
I worked uninterrupted for my entire shift.
The one nice thing about being busy at work was it made the time go really fast, and before I knew it, Jesse was tapping me on the shoulder to let me know it was time to close up.
Jesse and I stopped by one of the few fast-food restaurants that were still open, on the way to the gym.
Right after the alien ships appeared, a lot of restaurants and businesses closed down.
Not because the owners wanted to or were too scared to open, but because all of their employees were too scared to come in to work their shifts.
You can’t really run a business without workers.
Fortunately, there were still a few places where the employees either didn’t give a shit, or weren’t into the whole ‘hiding and waiting for death’ thing. And Papa Danny’s Diner was one of those places.
It had started as a family-owned business, but eventually it got so popular they had to hire out, so now it was mostly run by a bunch of broke college students who cared more about being able to pay for school and bills than getting murdered by aliens.
I really admired that about them.
Jesse and I both slid into a booth, and our usual waitress came to take our order. Her name was Tiffany, and she had bubblegum-pink hair, dark eyes, a spattering of freckles, and a willowy figure.
She was cute, but not really my type. Jesse, however, had always seemed very interested, today being no exception, because he kept glancing up at her and stumbling over his words.
Once she’d walked away with our orders, I turned back to my friend.
“You should ask her out,” I said.
“Yeah, right,” Jesse snorted.
“I’m serious,” I insisted. “What’s holding you back? You’re a good-looking dude, even if you do look like white trash.”
“Uh, impending doom?” He ignored my joke and replied in a ‘no duh’ sort of voice. “Did you forget the aliens that are hanging around our city like a bad wart?”
“That’s even more of a reason to ask her,” I replied with a frown. “If that’s your mentality, then you don’t really have much to lose.”
“Okay, smart guy,” Jesse shot back. “Why don’t you take your own advice then?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I feigned ignorance.
“Uh-huh, sure you don’t,” Jesse scoffed. “I’ve heard the way you talk about the girl in your apartment building.”
“That’s different,” I argued. “She and I have barely spoken, and you see Tiffany almost every day.”
“The most we’ve ever interacted is a polite greeting and me telling her my order,” Jesse said. “I’m sure you’ve had more of a conversation with Sadie than that.”
He had me there.
“Okay, fine,” I conceded. “How about this then? You ask Tiffany out, and I promise to ask Sadie out.”
Jesse stared at me for a long moment before he finally replied.
“Fine,” he grumbled. “Deal.”