The ETA From You to Me (7 page)

“Hey Jess, thanks for the ride,“ he grinned, buckling himself in, “One of the drivers is supposed to be fixing my car this week, so hopefully this won’t happen that much.”

Jessica stared at him for a long moment before she started the car. “Sure is a nice guy, fixing your car and all.”

“Oh my god, you don’t even
KNOW.
” Grant cried, throwing his arms out. “I swear this dude is like, inhuman. He’s totally got this creepy ‘
hello, Clarise
’ stare then he’ll turn around and be all nice and shit. But he hates being nice so when he does it you have to act like you don’t even realize he’s being nice. This one time--”

“At band camp?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Jessica burst into laughter, reaching out to pat Grant on the leg sympathetically when he crossed his arms and slouched into his seat. “I’m sorry, Grant, you set yourself up for that. Continue?”

Grant huffed, but continued anyway, because all of these emotions were building up inside of him with more force than a mentos meeting a bottle of coke. “I don’t even know, Jessica. He’ll act all irritated at me when I’m sending him on some calls, but then he’ll be super nice-but-not-really and do shit like bring me curly fries. He brought me curly fries, Jessica! I had to shove my money at him just to keep from feeling guilty!”

Smothering a grin, Jessica turned at the light and shook her head. “You really sound like you’ve got your hands full. I haven’t heard you this worked up since that time Alyse said you were cute.”

“Okay, dude, legitimate reason for a freakout. Nobody calls me cute, everyone calls me a spazz and--and a chipmunk! But never cute!”

“A chipmunk?” Jessica asked incredulously. Grant choked, his face doing that lets-start-our-own-internal-combustion thing again.

“Clayton said I look like a chipmunk when I’m eating," he admitted weakly. Jessica laughed, the sound filling her car and making Grant wish that he had a bucket of shame to put over his head.

They talked about classes for the rest of the ride, breaking only for Grant to rant more about Clayton and his ass that could rival Hercules’, until they pulled up into his driveway. Grant gathered his things, slipping out of the car with a farewell to Jessica when she rolled her window down to call his name.

“Hey, Grant!” Grant turned, and Jessica gave him a wide, knowing grin. “Chipmunks are cute.”

“Oh my god, get out of here!” Grant yelped, flipping her his middle finger and then practically stomping his way into the house.

His dad wasn’t home, already out for the night shift, so Grant scribbled him a message that he needed a ride into work the next morning before hiking upstairs to shower and wind down before bed.

His lack of sleep from the night prior made it easy for Grant to climb into bed after a good online gaming session, jerk off, toss his soiled tissues in the trash, and pass out entirely.

The next morning was greeted with far less bed-intruders, until Grant's phone rang at a quarter to eight and he scrambled to answer it after seeing Clayton’s name on the caller ID.

“Are you awake this time?” Clayton asked, his voice just shy of jesting. Grant fumbled to finish buttoning his pants, tripping over his backpack in his mad dash for the window.

“What? Oh my god, dude, are you here? Why are you here?” Grant shoved his fingers into the blinds, prying them open to see Clayton’s truck idling in their driveway.

“… because you don’t have a car and you’re on my way to the shop?” Clayton said slowly, like he was attempting to talk to a man who had suffered a head injury and wanted to hop in his car and drive off into the sunset.

“Oh… have you been waiting for very long?”

“Yes?”

“Oh. Okay. Be right out.” Grant squeaked, scrambling off of his bed and shoving the rest of his things into his bag before he tripped his way downstairs. His dad was asleep on the couch, still in his uniform and apparently waiting for Grant to wake him up so that he could drive him to work. Grant felt painfully guilty--his dad had probably gotten off work less than two hours ago, which made Grant an awful son for wanting to rely on him for transportation when he probably could have taken the bus if he was really desperate.

Grant approached his father, gently shaking his shoulder until he groggily looked up at his son. “Hey dad, I got a ride. You can go to bed.” Grant said softly. His dad grunted, yawning and rolling over.

“Okay. Cool. I approve of your new boyfriend.” Grant's dad muttered tiredly, burying his face into the couch and waving Grant away.

What.

“Why, father, why must you do this to me.” Grant whined in mortification. His dad snorted, murmuring incoherently in a way that made Grant relatively certain that the man’s main goal in life was to emotionally torture his son. It was to a point where Grant was sure he would be doomed to end up as the creepy old guy at the end of the block with forty cats and a collection of wind-chimes in his yard.

Sighing dramatically, Grant slipped out of the house and clambered into Clayton’s truck. Clayton didn’t even bother to greet him, shifting out of park and instead grunting, “we need to stop and do a lockout on the way in.”

A perfect opportunity to sit in the truck and lech on Clayton, Grant decided. “Okie dokie.”

It was, in fact, a perfect opportunity. Grant got to hunch down in the passenger seat and watch Clayton’s utterly delectable bum shift back and forth while fighting with the window to get to the lock.

Clayton dropped him off at the office after he was with the lockout, leaving right after to do another run that had come in during the trip to the office. Grant got himself settled in for the day, humming under his breath because today was completely awesome and there was nothing that could make him think otherwise.

Of course, that confidence must have been the exact reason that everything went to shit just a few hours later.

              Chapter 4

The second that Elliot pulled into the garage, Grant hopped onto the intercom to ask him to come into the office. Clayton was in there, working on Grant's jeep and most likely talking to Elliot’s father, Mike, who a raging back of dicks. The guy was a decent driver, but he was an awful father that harassed Elliot constantly when he made mistakes, so Grant went out of his way to try and contact Elliot properly whenever there was any miscommunication.

It was partially because Grant didn’t want to hear Mike’s snide commentary, lest he go on a baby-punching rampage, and partially because his words were often cruel and biting. No child should hear that from their father; especially in front of coworkers. It made Grant appreciate his own dad, because his dad was fucking awesome, okay.

When the door opened and Elliot came in with his father hot on his trail, Grant held back the burning desire to just grab the phone and chuck it at the man’s head. Instead, he gave Elliot a placating grin and snagged his pen. Elliot was a nice guy; just a couple years older than Grant, with a little pudge to him and a perpetual sunburn that made his brown eyes seem even darker. He had short, unkempt hair that was bleached into a light brown from hours in the sun, and broad hands that shook too much when he got overwhelmed.

“Hey, dude, what were your miles on that tire change? I think you were mumbling ‘cause it was hard to hear you.”

Elliot opened his mouth to list the miles, but Mike was already jumping on the opportunity, coming up behind his son and slapping him on the back. It didn’t sound affectionate, it actually sounded pretty painful. Mike shot Grant a grin, roughly holding Elliot’s shoulder and shaking him.

“Aw, don’t blame him. I bet his mouth’s sore from sucking too much dick. Boy needs to learn to speak up, huh?” Mike laughed, and Elliot’s expression took on a look of miserable humiliation.

Grant's had never been so infuriated in his entire life. Seriously, what the hell. How was that even work-appropriate. Actually, how was that appropriate in any context to talk about your son like that? Did this guy take his cues from Rush Limbaugh or something?

It wasn’t really Grant's fault that his brain-to-mouth filter completely malfunctioned.

“I’m sorry, I don’t think I heard you correctly. Did you just make a derogatory comment about your son in reference to a sexual situation that should not be implicated as insulting?” he threw his arms out, gesturing to Elliot and watching Mike start to tense in preparation for an argument. “You didn’t? Because what I heard was you talking some bad mojo about your kid and about what he does with his life.”

Elliot’s eyes went wider than Mike’s--which was a feat on it’s own.

“Excuse me, son?” Mike breathed incredulously, his hand falling from Elliot’s shoulder. It would have been intimidating, but Grant was a) on a roll and b) in an office with cameras, which meant that only an idiot would actually go Tarzan apeshit on someone.

Grant shrugged flippantly, bouncing his pen between his fingers. “I’m sorry, maybe you couldn’t hear me over the sound of your own ignorance.”

Jesus Christ, he was going to get his own ass fired for this.

Mike shoved Elliot out of the way, advancing for the desk so quickly that Grant jumped to his feet and knocked his chair over. Elliot lurched forward, grabbing his father’s arm to try and pull him back. It had the opposite effect when Mike whirled around and snapped his fist right into Elliot’s cheek, knocking him to the ground.

Holy mother of Mary. He actually
was
an idiot.

“Woah!” Grant cried, lunging past Mike to get to Elliot. “What the fuck is wrong with you, man? Are you a Neanderthal? You don’t.
Hit
. Your son!” 

Advancing on the two younger men, Mike’s finger came out to jab into Grant's chest.  “You don’t tell me what to do with my kid,” his finger was actually more like a javelin of fury, hitting Grant right in the sternum and making him want to uppercut the guy.

Grant stiffened, positioning his body completely in front of Elliot’s fallen one and trying to make himself look like he wasn’t utterly petrified and running on adrenaline. “You know what? Get the fuck out of this office. You don’t work here anymore, and don’t think --”

He cut himself off with a startled yelp when Mike grabbed on to the front of his shirt, whirling the both of them around and slamming Grant up against the vending machine--which was an old ass piece of shit made of nothing but metal and some plexiglass windows.

His head now knew this from personal experience.

Grant struggled, shoving at Mike when he was shaken and bashed into the machine a second time.

“You’re just some punkass kid who works weekends here!” Mike snarled, pushing and pushing until Grant was terrified that his chest was going to cave in from the sheer pressure. “You don’t know shit about how to raise a kid!”

It was like he was channeling his father in that moment, anger increased tenfold at the idea that someone would ever hurt their child. “I know you don’t hurt them and humiliate them!” Grant cried, gasping for air and flailing his legs out. No matter how hard he fought back, thought, Grant couldn’t get free. The man was like a fucking juggernaut, shoving forward and never moving back no matter how much Grant pushed and kicked at him. Mike may have been thin, but he was nothing but wiry muscle from years of hauling cars for a living.

“Dad!” Elliot screamed, face blotching around the welt blossoming on his cheek. He looked completely terrified, tears filling his eyes with each passing second. Grant felt kind of bad, in a way, because Elliot didn‘t deserve to see any of this happening. Elliot didn‘t deserve any of this, period. Not when he was crying, “dad, let him go!” as if frightened that Grant's life might actually be in danger.

“You shut the fuck up!” Mike roared, not even looking away from where he was staring into Grant's face as if he could murder him by sheer will alone. Grant choked, hands coming to try and pry Mike’s fingers from his shirt when he saw the front door fling open in the corner of his eye.

Grant had never been happier to see Clayton in his entire life, even if Clayton looked utterly livid. The only thing that could have made this better was if he was wearing less clothes and his entrance had been introduced with a vicious rock ballad. He was up behind Mike in a heartbeat, hand snagging the back of the other driver’s collar and wrenching him off of Grant. Mike didn’t let go of Grant right away, dragging him forward until Clayton could get between them and shove them apart.

“Get the fuck out,” Clayton barked, positioning himself between Grant and Mike. Elliot’s father looked thrown for a moment, pointing at Grant and opening his mouth to protest when Clayton’s minimal patience snapped. “I said get the FUCK out!” Clayton grabbed the front of Mike’s uniform, bodily hauling the man towards the door, jerking it open and shoving him outside.

“Go stick your head in the sink and cool off before you start looking for a new job!” Clayton snarled, shutting the door as quickly as he could and snapping the deadbolt lock on it.

Grant couldn’t seem to find the energy in himself to stand up from where he’d been tossed to the ground, because seriously--what the hell just happened? Was he high? Was he on acid? If he was on acid, he was tripping
balls
.

Grant wasn’t really sure when Clayton had crouched in front of him, it probably didn’t help that his head was ringing so loud that it was deafening, and his chest was aching like a bitch.