Next - Second Chances

CHAPTER 4

Nick clenched her jaw and frowned in an effort to focus her thoughts, but it was no use. The sight of Rick's haggard features and the memory of the best s*x she ever had, had thrown her for a loop, and she knew she wasn’t going to be able to get back to the focus she needed to work on this car.

She pushed away from the hood and wiped her hands on her thighs, then went into the break room and grabbed two beers from the small fridge. She popped the tops off, then sauntered out to where Rick was moving the crumpled car into an empty bay. When he came back out to the forecourt, she wordlessly handed him a bottle of beer.

He held the neck and offered her the base. She clinked her bottle against it and they both took long drags of the cool refreshing beer. Without uttering a word, they both ambled over to the small knee-high wall that circled their forecourt and sat down facing the street, the back to the work waiting behind them.

The garage was on the outskirts of Madison, a mid-sized town a couple of hours west of Chicago. They pulled in plenty of work from the town and the surrounding areas, enough to live well, and since they could pretty much fix anything that moved or had a plug, those tough startup years were behind them, and they could finally take it easy.

There was a small strip mall across the road with the diner they ate at almost daily, a hairdresser neither of them had seen the inside of, a karate training dojo, and a paint specialist store for home decor. Madison wasn’t the best town, but its small size offered a sense of safety while still allowing for a degree of anonymity. They watched the traffic go by for a while, in silence before Nick spoke.

“Bad?” she asked, a single word conveying all her thoughts.

“Bad.”

She tipped her bottle up into her mouth and finished the dregs of her beer. He did the same and then leaned against her shoulder in a silent gesture of support. They stayed like that for another moment, then he jostled against her and stood up.

“Going out tonight?” he asked as he reached a hand down and gestured for her to give him her empty bottle.

“You know it.” She smirked and gave him her empty. “Friday night is goin’ out night.”

“Fancy drinks in Ryan’s?” he suggested as she stood and they both walked towards the garage office.

“No way, that place is way too old. One of those men will snap a hip if I bring him home.”

“What a way to go!” Rick chuckled as he tossed the bottles into the trash and grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair. “How about the Pig Pen?”

“No, I went there last week, remember? When you went to the cubs game.”

“Did you score?”

“Please.” she scoffed as she grabbed her jacket too and slipped it on over her overalls. “I sent you the photo of the dress I was wearing, of course I fuckin’ scored.”

Rick chuckled and led her out of the office, then waited for her to pass through the door before he closed it and locked up while she put the key in the shutter button and activated it to slowly sink to the ground.

“Right, of course you scored. So Pig Pen is on the no-fly list for how long?”

“At least six months.”

“Jeez Nick, you are ruining all the good bars in town.”

She chuckled and shrugged without an ounce of sheepish shame. “Maybe we need a spreadsheet, so we can keep track of where we can go out.”

“If only there was some sort of app, where you could sign up for hook-ups and then just meet people wherever, so you don’t have to ruin all the good bars.”

He stepped away from the door and waited for the shutter to finally lock in place then led her over to his car and opened the passenger door for her. It was a beat-up ford truck that he had owned since he was sixteen, and it still purred like it was brand new. When they packed it up for the move west, she wasn’t sure it would make it, but not only did it survive, it was thriving.

“You know I don’t like apps. I wanna see the eyes.”

“Novel idea…get them to send a picture.” He buckled in beside her and started the engine, then put his hand on the back of her seat as he looked over his shoulder to reverse out of the spot.

“Yeah, you have no idea what it’s like being a woman on those apps,” she said with a mirthless chuckle.

Rick faced forward and grinned at her. “Let me guess… d**k pics?”

“So many!” she exclaimed. “Honestly, if I wanted to see a d**k I’d use Google. Or one of the many free porn sites. But a random stranger d**k, from a strange angle, with bad lighting, when it’s only half erect? No thanks.”

“Half erect?” Rick was laughing now as he pulled out into the street. “Who is sending soft d**k pics?”

"You would not believe some of the s**t they think will “convince” me to meet up with them,” she muttered, complete with the air quote gesture.

“Ok, ok,” he said and waved his hand at her to stop her talking. “Enough talk about stranger d***s. Where are we going?” He turned off the main street and took a few side streets to get to her apartment block while she mulled over her options.

“I haven’t been to the new bar that opened up a few weeks ago on Lincoln.”

“Where the post office used to be?”

“Yeah.”

“What if you score, then this new bar is burned for six months.” he pulled up outside her building.

It was a three story single use building with nine apartments in it, three on each floor. Mostly older couples and one student who was writing a thesis and never left home.

“By then it will be more established and with new clientele.”

Rick chuckled and shook his head. “Fine. Meet there in a couple of hours?”

“Sounds good. See you then.”