Like He Never Left

Chapter 3: Consider Me a Dumbass

Working at a car garage in my younger years meant that I knew a thing or two about cars. Getting this truck from Josie's father as a sixteenth birthday present meant I knew a thing or two about this particular truck. (The truck was just sitting in his garage, and he saw how much I loved it. He gave it to me with the condition that I would fix it up. Which I did.)

So why in the hell did it take me four hours to spot the problem and fix it? This is not including the extra hour I spent on a lunch break at Clint's when I got hangry.

I roll out from under the hood, once again, sure that I found the problem and fixed it and look at Jake.

"If this doesn't work, Jake, consider me a dumbass and take away my Harvard degree." He only lifts his head off the dirt driveway in acknowledgement.

Five hours ago, I left Tommy's house with the intent of fixing Josie's truck quickly and quietly, meaning she would never know that I did it. I don't know what made me do so, but I felt like I just needed to.

She left the door unlocked, probably thinking that my father would be the one to look at her truck. Not her ex-husband. There was also a sticky note on the screen door telling me where the keys were in the house.

But I totally checked to see where the spare house key was anyway. Under the porch table, just where it's always been.

After I spotted the keys on the kitchen counter, it took all that I had not to snoop upstairs, and my "snoop-drive," as Brooke likes to call it, is high.

I did see that she kept the southern charm theme on the first floor and that she turned our old bedroom into a workspace and added to the kitchen. It looks amazing—much better than anything we could have done with the place.

And I let Jake come out with me to keep me company. He's no Johnny, but he's a cool dog. Not like he'd shut up with me out here and him in there, anyway.

I turn the key in the ignition, and it rumbles to life. I punch the air in triumph and let out an excited holler. I may as well have just won the hardest case with how proud I felt.

I look to Jake to gloat to see him looking at something down the driveway.

"Jake, whatcha looking at?" I ask him. He barks and scurries off the ground to whatever is in the driveway. I look in the left-side mirror to see what he's doing behind me and find my father's truck pulled in behind this one.

And he's not alone.

Oh boy.

I check my watch. It's hardly past three. Granted I don't know exactly what she does, but aren't most jobs at least till five? And nurses, for the most part, work 12 hours, not eight.

I let out a breath and turn the engine off. I step out of the car, meeting my dad's eyes in the driver's seat. Josie May is also looking at me despite Jake barking up a storm outside her door.

I walk to my father's side of the truck and lean my elbows against it.

"It took me four hours, but I fixed it," I smile cheekily. Dad chuckles incredulously.

"You look like you spent most of it under the hood." I glance down at myself. I'm covered in spots of grease and must smell like gasoline.

"Cause I did," I tell him with an easy smile, trying to ignore the obvious.

"Is that what you've been doing all day?" he asks me, going with it. I shake my head.

"Nah. Around nine-ish I visited Tommy and SueEllen. They have a kid, Alan. A kid! And I guess they're expecting a second one."