damn thing crapped out on me yesterday on the way to the reception,” I sighed. So much for avoiding Brendan. “You look like hell, Brendan. Go back to bed. I can have a friend pick me up.”
“Nah, I gotta swing by the station to fill out some paperwork anyways.” Brendan was already dressed and ready to go, he was just running at about quarter speed.
“You sure? It's not a big deal.” Even as I said it I knew there was no talking him out of it. In his mind, his baby sister needed saving again...
“It's fine, the church is on the way, we'll see if we can bring it back to life one more time. Coffee's on you, by the way”
“Alright,” I said, texting Children's Hope to let them know I was running late.
Brendan loaded up his pickup truck and we left. I knew what he wanted to talk about but it had been a long time since we discussed Dad, Mal or what happened. Every time he broached the subject I diverted him.
Everyone else had picked up their car which left Juan Carlos all alone in the middle of the lot. My poor red Jetta looked abandoned when we pulled up.
“You have your key, right?” Brendan pulled his toolbox out of the bed.
I checked my pockets, but came up empty. My head lulled in defeat, I wanted to cry. My head was all over the place this morning, of course I forgot my key.
“Seriously?” Brendan leaned on the hood and shook his head. The spare! I reached my hand under the frame, opened the lock box and grabbed my spare. Brendan just shook his head again. “Alright, open her up. Let's see what's up.”
I unlocked the door and popped the hood. Out of habit, I slid the key into the ignition and turned it over. Juan Carlos started right up. I was shocked.
“You said there was something wrong with this right?” Brendan asked, checking the fluids and connections.
“There was yesterday.”
“From the way you described it I thought it was a spark plug issue, but these are new. It looks like you just had them changed.”
Only I knew for a fact that I didn't. Cars didn't magically repair themselves. There was grease on the back of Mal's hand last night. I racked my brain trying to remember what he said. He was doing maintenance work on a friend's car.
Did he mean my car? Had he fixed my car while I was at the wedding?
“Looks like you don't need to take it out back and shoot it today.” Brendan closed my hood and loaded up his tools.
“Thanks anyways, Brendan.” I clasped my seat belt over me and was about to make a speedy get away.
“Hold up.” He reached through my open window and turned my car off. That pit in my stomach expanded tenfold. “We still need to talk. I know you saw him last night.”
“So?” I should've been more insulted about Brendan prying in my personal life, but to be honest, it was too soon to tell if Mal was back for good or not.
“C'mon, Kait. You're smarter than that.” Brendan hung his head. “What would Dad say?”
“He'd probably say not to guilt trip me,” I said coldly. Brendan could be so mean sometimes when he was trying to get his point across. “Mal's not his mother.”
“No. He's worse.” Brendan raised his head to look at me, anger hardened his gaze. “ He came back.”
I looked away.
“Do you even know how many girls he slept with in high school? Because I do. Mal was a fun guy and a good friend for a while, but even I knew that he didn't give a fuck about women. They were just toys to him.”
Mal was with a lot of girls in high school and it made me crazy jealous. We never dated, though, so wasn't that okay? We only ever even kissed once and that was right before he left.
“I don't know what his game is, but I know he didn't come back for you. He's using you for...fuck I don't know. Maybe he just wants to fuck you because he never got the chance when we were younger.”
“How can you say that?” I shot back defiantly. Brendan was getting under my skin. It felt like the bad times again, just before dad died. Right before it
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