Anything? No. He looked up at her then. Brief assessing. You come far Atlanta, she said.
He nodded slowly, looked back at the engine, moved to the battery connections, checked the coolant reservoir, did something to what she thought might be the alternator. She genuinely did not know. When's the last time you had this serviced? 2 months ago. Another look, this one slightly longer.
It's a 2009, she added for reasons she wasn't entirely sure of. I can see that, he said. There was something in his voice, not unkind. Ry maybe, like he was trying not to smile and mostly succeeding. Battery connections are clean.
Coolant's good. She's got oil. He stood up straight and looked at her directly. You sure it just stopped. Or did it?
Maybe. He paused, choosing his words. Need to stop for a while. Victoria felt heat climb her neck. I'm sorry.
He looked at her the way a person looks at something when they're deciding how honest to be about what they're seeing. Then he looked back at the engine. Then he looked at her again. Nothing, he said. I've got some tools in the truck.
Let me run a diagnostic. He turned back to his truck and she watched him go and she thought he knows. He absolutely did not know. He couldn't know. But something about the way he'd looked at her unhurried, unimpressed, entirely without the difference she was used to had made her feel for one unnerving second like she was standing in front of someone who could see through walls.
She crossed her arms over her chest and watched the sunrise and told herself to get it together. His name, she learned, was Marcus Carter. He told her that while he was under the hood, not as introduction, but as answer she'd asked, trying to fill the silence, and he'd answered without ceremony, the way people answer questions that don't require performance. Marcus Carter, he said, I run a shop about 4 miles east. Carter's Auto, Victoria, she said, and caught herself before the last name.
Wells. The alias came out smooth as water. She'd practiced that much at least. Victoria Wells, he repeated. You visiting somebody out here.
Or just driving. Just driving, she said. I needed. She stopped. Started again.
I needed to get out of the city for a few days. He didn't push it. He didn't feel the silence with the reflexive small talk she was used to from people who were nervous around her. He just went back to the engine. That silence didn't feel empty.
She noticed. It felt like he'd made room for her to say as much or as little as she wanted and had no particular investment in which she chose. She wasn't used to that. You find anything? She asked after a moment.
Working on it. A pause. Where are you staying? You got somewhere to be? Mil Haven.
The Birchwood Inn. Susan Greer's place. Good choice. He glanced at her sideways. She does those peon waffles on Saturday mornings.
You timed it right. Victoria almost smiled. Almost. How long do you think? Could be quick.
Could be. I need to get her back to the shop and look harder. He straightened up again and wiped his hands on a cloth he'd pulled from his back pocket. Best I don't promise you something I can't keep. She looked at him.
The way he'd said that best, I don't promise you something I can't keep. Was so plain and so unbothered that it lodged somewhere in her chest like a splinter. Her last three relationships had been with men who promised her everything and kept almost none of it. That's fair, she said. You want to ride back with me?
It's early. The shop won't be open yet, but I got coffee. He pulled out his keys. Or I can call you a cab if you'd rather wait. She looked at the old Honda.
She looked at the empty road. She looked at Marcus Carter who had offered her a ride to his shop the way someone offers a neighbor a ride to the grocery store without calculation without ceremony, without any of the particular energy she'd learned to identify in men who wanted something from her. I'll ride with you, she said. He nodded and started for the truck. She grabbed her bag from the back seat, pulled the hood shut, and followed him.
The cab of his truck smelled like motor oil and coffee and something else, something warm and lived in. There was a kid's jacket on the back seat, small pink. A drawing on the dashboard taped there with scotch tape, a crayon sun above a stick figure house. The way children draw houses with a triangle roof and smoke curling from the chimney. The name AVA was written in the corner in large, careful letters that spoke of a child who was old enough to write.
But still proud of the doing. Marcus caught her looking. My daughter, he said, "She made that about 2 years ago. I keep telling myself I'm going to frame it proper. " He glanced at it. But then it seems fine right where it is.
How old is she? Eight. The single syllable landed with the full weight of a man's entire world. Third grade. Loves dinosaurs and hates math homework.
Victoria looked out the window as the trees started to thin. She with her mom this morning? A beat. A beat that was just 1 second too long. Her mom passed.
Marcus said four years back. I'm sorry, Victoria said, and meant it in the way she almost never meant things in those situations, not as filler, not a script. I'm genuinely sorry. Thank you. He said it simple and clean.
The way people say things when they've learned to carry grief like something that belongs to them, not something that's happening to them. Her name was Dana. She was good people. He didn't say anything else. He didn't need to.
Victoria sat with that for a while. The shop was a low, wide building set back from the main road with a handpainted sign above the bay doors. Carter's auto in red letters, the A slightly larger than the rest. Like whoever painted it had started bold and then reconsidered. There were three bay doors, a small waiting area visible through a front window, an American flag hanging still in the morning air.
Marcus unlocked the side door and held it for her. Inside the office was clean and practical, a coffee maker on a counter along one wall. A desk with a computer that looked like it was born around the same time as her Honda. Framed photos on the wall. A younger Marcus at what looked like a high school graduation.