Unexpected Mate

The Fix

By the time they were all three in Brian’s pick-up, thankfully an extended cab and not one that would force the three of them to be hip-to-hip on a bench seat, Alex had convinced herself she’d imagined the whole thing.

Okay, the man was tall and he had dark hair and the name Caleb, but that was a super common name, and she’d probably seen him around the neighborhood when she was out for a run, considering one of her usual loops took her past the shop.

She might have even heard him called by name sometime in the last two years she and Staci had shared that apartment.

So her brain had put a real face and name onto the man she’d been dreaming about; that didn’t mean she’d been dreaming about him.

And they probably wouldn’t have even looked that much alike if she wasn’t so sleep deprived that it was probably a good thing she wasn’t driving around and running errands today after all. Didn’t they say driving tired was as bad as driving drunk?

“So, when did you get the flat?” Brian asked as he turned right at the stoplight she’d indicated.

“Today after work is when I noticed it. I walk to work, but I get off early on Mondays and usually run errands after,” she explained. “I probably haven’t driven it since Monday of last week.”

“Okay,” Brian said.

Kitty leaned between seats. “I can’t wait to get my license,” the girl said. “I’m going to drive Every. Day.”

Brian shot her a look, but Alex smiled. “That’s how I was right after I got my license,” she said. “Even begged my mom to let me take the car to pick up groceries and whatever. Now I’m really glad that I can just walk to work.”

“I’d still drive,” Kitty said. “But we don’t live close enough to the shop to walk there anyways.”

“So you work there?” Alex asked, still confused by Kitty’s role. More now that it seemed like she really was only fifteen, or maybe even younger.

“Yes,” she said, even as Brian said, “No.”

“I do,” Kitty protested. “I can because even though I’m young, my family owns the place and I’m working with people over 18.”

Alex didn’t really know about labor laws, but with the conviction in the girl’s voice, she got the idea that this was a fight she’d had with her brother—brothers, maybe—rather than official company policy.

“Kitty can get a job at the shop if she wants to when she’s sixteen,” Brian said, the words clearly more for Kitty than Alex.

“But that’s still months and months away,” Kitty whined.

“Three months,” Brian said. “But if you keep up with this behavior, we’ll make you wait until you’re sixteen and a half.”

It shut Kitty up, and Alex was reminded of how her parents had worked to get her to agree to their terms, or tried to.

Brian pulled into her lot, parked in a visitor’s spot, and once they’d all climbed out, Alex led them over to her small red Jetta with the poor flat tire.

Brian bent down to inspect the wheels. “Are you looking to get this one fixed if we can and then buy a spare to keep in the car, or do you want a whole new tire?”

“I’d like this one repaired if I can,” Alex said. “I don’t know why it’s flat, but ideally we could patch it and I could get one of those donut spares or whatever they’re called.”

“Well, I know what you need now. Why don’t I pop this tire off and bring it back to the shop with us? I’ll see if we can repair it, and if we can then we’ll drive back over and put it back on for you.”

“That would be great,” Alex said. “Really great.”

Alex rode back to the shop with Brian and Kitty rather than waiting next to her car, and she tensed when she walked back into the store, alert for any sign of Caleb, but there was nothing. If he heard them come in, he never came out to see if they were customers in need of help, although Kitty left pretty quickly, and maybe she told him they were back.

“You can take a seat while I check out the tire,” Brian said, his stocky body handling the weight from the tire with ease.

Alex sat down in one of the small chairs in the little lobby, took out her phone, and stared blankly at the screen.

She didn’t even open one of those dumb gaming apps.

Caleb was here. Caleb. But he couldn’t be, because Caleb was just someone she’d dreamed up. If she’d unknowingly based dream Caleb off of a real man named Caleb, that didn’t make him real.

An hour later, Alex was finally picking up groceries and had successfully put all thoughts of Caleb—real or dreamt up—away.

She wouldn’t think about it; wouldn’t worry about it. And next weekend, she was going to find a guy like Jason at a bar and spend all night exorcizing Caleb from her system.

She told Staci about her tire mishap, but mentioned only Brian and Kitty in the story. Brian was the one who’d brought her here and done all of the work, after all. She was going to drop her car off tomorrow morning after work to get the tires balanced—free of charge.

“Is he single?” Staci asked.

“Who?”

“The guy. Bran.”

“Brian? I have no idea.”

“You should have asked. Stable job, gets along with his family.”

“He was arguing with his sister,” Alex reminded her.

“Everyone argues with fifteen-year-olds,” Staci said. “And you said he was good looking.”

“I didn’t say how he looked at all,” Alex argued.

“Okay, I assumed he was good looking. Come on, when’s the last time you dated? Like, saw the same guy on the regular?”

“When’s the last time you dated?”

A casual shrug. “You’re the relationship type, not me.”

Alex didn’t why she found the comment offensive, but she felt herself bristle. “I don’t need a relationship to be happy,” she said. “I’m perfectly happy.”

“I never said otherwise. Just that you’re the type to enjoy that…stability.”

Maybe it was because Alex had turned down Jason at the club, but the direction the conversation had turned made her very uncomfortable. “I don’t want to date right now,” she said. “I don’t want anything serious.”

Another shrug. “All right.”