The Mechanic

-Chapter Fourteen-

Location: Central

In a moment of stupidity, the first thing I did this morning was count money for something that I know I shouldn't be buying. But just because I shouldn't be buying it doesn't make it any less desirable to buy. And it doesn't make me any less stupid.

I should know better.

But even as the money jingles in my otherwise empty pocket, I feel nothing but ecstasy. I wish she was mine, I wish she loved me, but I guess I'll just have to curb my wants.

"Stop it," I grumble to myself. "They're just flowers."

Stop it yourself, man. You don't just buy a friend flowers and expect her to take it well.

"I'm going to help Matt and Spero in the store. I might not even see her."

Yeah, sure.

I growl, walking faster. It's starting to get warmer these last few days... like a kiss of springtime. The handful of baby trees that litter the sides of the roads are getting little powder-green leaves, and there are dandelions popping up between the cracks in the sidewalk.

But the sun is just downright hot. I take my jacket off and tie it around my waist.

The door of the store opens, and a mother with several children walks out. I catch the door before it closes behind her and slip inside.

The bell clangs noisily behind me.

Matt looks up from his books of payment records and grins. "Pary! What brings you around this fine morning? It's taken you long enough to get tired of being by yourself. What do you do over there that always has you so entrenched in backbreaking work?" His grin gets a slightly devilish gleam. Or on a normal person it would be devilish. But Matt can't even be stern, effectively. Scary is where Elena comes into the picture.

His kids are going to mow him over when the time comes to discipline.

"Oh, there's not much to keep me busy. I just stay away from here." I shoot a teasingly spiteful smirk his direction.

He raises both eyebrows. "Well, well. Someone spilled some sass in his drinking water this morning. What happened to that gloomy shadow you were hauling around last week? Did you ditch it somehow?"

I shrug. "Who knows? I'm never the same, day by day. Things change, bro. Good luck keeping track of me."

"This is true," he admits, grinning. "Hey, Spero!" He raises one eyebrow at me as he does so, looking like he should be getting an earful.

He's not capable of being truly evil, but does he ever try...

"Paris is here!"

"Paris is here?" Spero inquires, a huge crate of canned vegetables in his skinny arms. "Oh, he wasn't kidding. Hey!" He sets his load down on the counter.

"Of course I wasn't kidding," Matt grumbles. "I never kid."

"Tell that to my face. Last week when you said Capri was here, I moved too fast, and—"

"Last week doesn't count," Matt says quickly, cutting him off.

I look between the two of them, almost laughingly. But Matt is such a jokester, and I don't know how Spero has survived this long being around him all of the time. What with his almost constant job at the store, and then the fact that he spends almost half of his nights sleeping in the back room among shelves and shelves and shelves of canned vegetables.

"Whatever, whatever." I step forward and rest my elbows on the counter. "I came to help today. What do you need done that this kid can't handle?"

"I can handle everything in the store!" Spero exclaims. "Don't challenge my manhood."