*sigh* I wasn't going to post this here but I made a deal with Megan that if she put her new story up I'd put mine. I have a compulsion, it cannot be
helped.
One
There's blood everywhere. On her hands, her clothes...some of it hers, most of it not. She leans against the brick wall of the alley, thinking somehow if she could just manage to crawl inside it that the whole night could be negated. All sins awash, color the night clean but anymore, some part of her knows this is a lost cause.
"Rowan--hey, hey hey, look at me--fuckin' look at me!" He grabs her face in his hands, forcing her attention away from the body. Ice blue eyes focus in on his, pooling with tears and confusion. She's shaking, the flimsy ball gown shredded in places, shallow cuts lining her ribcage.
And in this moment, he doesn't know what's going on anymore than she does.
SIX WEEKS EARLIER
"How long is this going to take?" Rowan Harper raises a perfectly arched eyebrow, digging impatiently through her purse.
A head pokes out from underneath the hood of an oversized SUV and features muddied with dirt and oil from the car glare back at her, barely bothering to mask his evident disdain. "Not any fuckin' quicker with you hovering over me."
He wipes his hands on a ragged cloth, tossing it over his shoulder. She grimaces at the sight of his hands, blackened from years doing this kind of labor, dirt and grime a permanent fixation beneath his fingernails. She eyes her own, perfectly manicured, as she reaches for her cell phone. "Well I need to be at a DAR luncheon in like, half an hour..." trailing off, she realizes she didn't bother to catch his name. A fleeting moment of guilt passes through her conscience before his laughter, loud and uncivilized, interrupts her thoughts.
"Justin," he supplies, extending a hand for her to shake. "Been in the same homeroom as you since seventh grade, 'case you forgot."
Right. Justin Timberlake, riding his dirt bike around town from the time he could fit on it. All while she flitted from one Cotillion to another, never running in the same circles, never giving him a second thought.
She looks down at his hand, hesitant, before her manners kick in and she forces herself to take it, all but ripping it back when he squeezes hers. "I'll pay you double what you charge if you can get this done before then."
"Sweetheart, your transmission's shot. Don't matter how much you wanna pay, it's gonna take a couple days."
"I don't know what the means."
"It means..." Justin says, his voice low and deliberate, as if he were explaining to an idiot, "that it's gonna take a couple days to fix. You need a new transmission. You're gonna have to call for a ride or one of us can take you--"
"I'll call for a ride."
"I figured as much."
"Excuse me?"
"Nothin'. I suggest you call your ride and quit buggin' me. You can come pick it up Thursday." He turns the corner, heading inside the shop, craning his neck to find her following him.
"Thursday? And I'm supposed to do what until then, use the Batmobile?" She knows it isn't his fault entirely, or at all, but she doesn't have the time to function without a car for three days.
There isn't an ounce of sympathy in his gaze as he washes his hands in the garage sink, gray liquid draining to the bottom but not removing any of the grime stuck to his skin. He turns around to face her, arms folded across his chest. His eyes travel over the length of her, a flicker of appreciation in his features but mostly just amused.
Rowan shifts uncomfortably, tucking a strand of perfectly curled hair behind her ear.
"You're a Harper. Have Mommy and Daddy call you a driver or some shit, you'll manage."
"So what, because I don't subscribe to the greasy boys' club of not bothering to shower I'm not entitled to getting my car back?" Which isn't entirely the truth, because he smells like a nice mix of sweat and soap, though she wouldn't dream of admitting it. But something in his tone strikes a bitter chord in her, and she speaks without thinking, a rare occurrence for her.
"Aren't you making yourself late tryin' to insult me, Princess?" he grins smugly, pulling his lower lip between his teeth.
"Damnit!" Rowan pulls the phone to her ear, dialing frantically, all the while silently cursing him for the distraction. "Ash...can you come get me? I'm on McComb and Waters, the mechanics'...yeah well I wasn't planning on stopping here, my car broke down...something about the transmission...can you just...oh...yeah okay, no it's fine, I'll see you there." She hangs up, slipping the phone back in her purse.
Fighting the urge to chew on her fingernail, she musters up a polite smile, fighting back the panic rising in her throat. "Justin...would you maybe mind--if you have a minute...it's not far from here..."
Justin wipes down a wrench absently, trying not to laugh as she struggles to get the words out. "Yeah, gimme a minute. Trace!" he hollers towards the back.
"The fuck you want? I'm busy!" A male voice hollers back, clearly joking.
"Be back in ten, droppin' a customer off."
><><
Justin looks over at Rowan from the driver's side, zipping through traffic without a second thought. She, on the other hand, is struggling to keep her hair, her dress, whatever other parts of her she's hellbent on keeping in place, still. The wind throws her hair back, blowing the curls straight, and he almost laughs at how miserable she looks.
He tugs his hat off, throwing it in the backseat, rubbing a free hand over his buzzed hair. "Don't like the wind, huh?" he hollers over the radio.
"The DAR doesn't like the wind," she snaps, yanking her dress down as it flies up past her thigh, her cheeks reddening. "Is there any way we could maybe raise the windows?"
"You'll be sweatin' balls if we do."
Rowan cringes at the reference. "Just turn the AC on."
"Sweetheart, it's a '67 'Vette, there is no AC."
"Stop calling me sweetheart."
"Whatever you say, sweetheart." He swerves into the parking lot of the country club, the car screeching to a halt. Her fingers dig into the leather, knuckles turning white as she tries to maintain some sort of balance. "Here ya go."
She yanks her purse out from underneath the seat, paling when she looks up to see a pristinely dressed middle-aged woman barreling towards them. "Shit," she mutters.
"Friend of yours?"
"My mother." Fishing through to find her wallet, she pulls two crisp twenty dollar bills out and hands them to him. "Here."
"What is this?" Justin asks warily.
"For driving me."
"I'm not a fuckin' taxi service, I did you a solid. Are you kidding me with this shit?"
"I was just trying to be--"
"Just get the fuck outta the car, Harper. I'll let you know when yours is done."
Rowan lets herself out of the car, legs a little shaky. She doesn't even have the chance to turn before she hears the squeal of tires peeling out of the lot. She smoothes the wrinkles out of her dress as her mother approaches, tight-lipped. "Do you have any idea what you look like right now?" Caroline Harper growls, snatching a barrette from her purse. "Come here." She roughly brushes her fingers through Rowan's hair, pulling it back into a neat ponytail as she clips the barrette on. "What were you thinking? The luncheon starts in five minutes."
"Ow," Rowan winces, touching her head, now a little sore. "I'm sorry, the car broke down--"
"We JUST bought that for you, Rowan."
"It's not my fault, Mom! Something happened with the transmission."
"Now you're just making parts up," Caroline admonishes, pushing at her arms in order to make her stand up straight. "And the hoodlum?"
"He's just a mechanic. Ashley was already here, I didn't have a choice."
"You could have called for the car."
"By the time the car got from the house to the garage to here I would have been late," Rowan protests, trying in vain to make her mother see some kind of logic.
"Late would have been better than showing up looking like you just spent the last three days in a brothel. Turn around." Caroline frowns, tugging at the hem of the dress, trying to smooth down a few stray wrinkles. "Well, this is the best I can do with you for now. If you need anything, Elliot Lampert is your date for the afternoon, have him get it for you because I don't want anybody seeing the back of this dress. There's a reason you don't take rides from the local watering hole, darling. It doesn't look right and ruins your clothes."
"Yes, Mother."
"Okay let's go get you seated. Walk in front of me."
><><
"Yo, I can't believe she tried to fuckin' pay you," Trace clutches his stomach, doubled over laughing.
Justin shakes his head, parked underneath the hood of her car, his fingers working meticulously to remove a part. "Girl's nuts, all I know."
"You talking about me behind my back again?" He lifts his head, turning as a girl strolls up, dropping her backpack on the ground, leaping into Justin's arms, legs wrapped around his waist as she bends down to kiss him.
He smiles against her mouth, slapping her ass playfully before setting her back down on the ground. "Woman, you're late."
"Baby, I'm on time. I'm not the one who skipped out on eighth period, today, remember?" she sets a hand on her hip, blonde hair swishing in a loose ponytail as she laughs.
"Megs, I had to fuckin' work," he gestures at the car.
"Hey that's Rowan Harper's car," Megan muses, her nose wrinkling in confusion. "She brought it to you?"
"It broke down about a block from here," Trace says. "And much as we love your crazy ass, she's the nuts one."
"What'd she do?"
"Bitch tried to pay me for droppin' her off at some DMV bullshit."
Megan laughs, rubbing his back sympathetically. "DAR you mean?"
"Whatever."
"Cut the girl a break."
"For what? Seems that's all she gets all the damn time anyway," He tries to keep the bitterness from his voice, not quite getting there. Maybe it's unwarranted or unfair but as far as he's concerned the girl has never had to work a day in her life and that's a situation he cannot even begin to understand or feel badly for.
"She spent the night at my house once in like, sixth grade and her mom gave a list of food she wasn't allowed to eat to my Ma."
"Shut up," Trace's eyes go wide.
A nagging feeling lingers in Justin's stomach at Rowan's reaction to seeing her mother, but he brushes it aside, getting back to the car. "Boo fuckin' who, poor little rich girl. Heard that song before."
"You're just a cranky old man is all," Megan pokes him in the side. "Be nice to her when she comes in next time."
"I ain't bein' nice to her if she's gonna come up all high and mighty and shit, Megs. Not doin' it. I don't wanna talk about this anymore."
"Fine, fine," Megan throws her hands up, admitting defeat because as stubborn as he is she knows it's no point in arguing with him when he gets all riled up like this. "We going to Shelly's bonfire tonight?"
"I'm going," Trace pipes up, gunning the engine of an old pick-up truck. "Almost done with this."
"Can't, Momma's working a double at the diner, I promised her I'd come help out when I was done here," Justin sighs.
"Cool. You need some help over there?"
"Nah, I got it. Go to Shelley's," He assures her, setting the wrench down on the hood and giving her a quick kiss. "I can take a break though if you uh, wanna hang out a minute in the back?"
"Real slick, J," Trace laughs as Megan punches him in the arm. "Damn, girl, where'd you learn to hit all of a sudden? Fuck."
"You got twenty minutes," Megan says, lacing her fingers through his and pulling him towards the back office.
"Shit, I only need fifteen..." Justin follows her eagerly.
"Wouldn't go advertising that, you sorry sonofabitch!" Trace calls out, rolling his eyes as they disappear from sight.
><><
PRESENT DAY
"Are you okay...?" Justin asks un-surely, kneeling in front of Rowan, a bottle of peroxide and a bag of cottonballs in his hands. She's sitting on a shoddy looking couch, worn with age, stains and small tears lining the fabric. Her eyes travel absently over the room. All the furniture looks cheap or already use; the kind of environment she's never seen and yet it feels more like a home than her own does. There's a certain warmth that emanates from it, a kind she keeps looking for but cannot seem to find from the mansion she lives in.
She moves to stand, all of a sudden needing to get out of the place but her legs give out and she falls back against the couch, looking down dumbly at her still shaking hands. "I don't...I can't..."
"Shh, I know. I need to clean these up and make sure they don't get infected. That okay?"
Rowan nods, wincing in silence as he wipes the dried blood from her skin, careful not to touch her. Once finished, he eases the oversized t-shirt back over her stomach. "Thank you," she murmurs softly, always Miss Manners even in the state of shock she's in.
"You can sleep in my bed, I'll take you home in the morning."
"Just take me to school, my parents won't notice. I have a change of clothes in my purse." Her voice is completely flat, and if he knew her better he'd reach out and hug her. But she isn't a friend, not even remotely close to one, and he doesn't know her.
But at the same time, now he does, in ways he didn't expect to. They've been thrust into a situation he cannot comprehend the ramifications of, and the only person who can sympathize is Rowan.
As if she senses his thoughts, she reaches out, taking his hand in hers. "I don't know what...or how--"
"Hey, listen, listen it's okay. You're here, you're safe...I ain't gonna let anything happen to you, okay? I got you." Justin rubs his thumb across her cheek.
"Justin...what did we do? Seriously this is...what did we do?" she asks.
He shakes his head, looking down at the floor to avoid her face. "It was an accident. It wasn't your fault, you had to do something--"
"Don't tell me what I want to hear. Please."
"I don't know, Rowan. But it's done, and we're in this together now, and we can't take it back. So just get some sleep, okay? You'll feel better in the mornin'."
Rowan nods, quiet, letting him lead her into his bedroom.
One
There's blood everywhere. On her hands, her clothes...some of it hers, most of it not. She leans against the brick wall of the alley, thinking somehow if she could just manage to crawl inside it that the whole night could be negated. All sins awash, color the night clean but anymore, some part of her knows this is a lost cause.
"Rowan--hey, hey hey, look at me--fuckin' look at me!" He grabs her face in his hands, forcing her attention away from the body. Ice blue eyes focus in on his, pooling with tears and confusion. She's shaking, the flimsy ball gown shredded in places, shallow cuts lining her ribcage.
And in this moment, he doesn't know what's going on anymore than she does.
SIX WEEKS EARLIER
"How long is this going to take?" Rowan Harper raises a perfectly arched eyebrow, digging impatiently through her purse.
A head pokes out from underneath the hood of an oversized SUV and features muddied with dirt and oil from the car glare back at her, barely bothering to mask his evident disdain. "Not any fuckin' quicker with you hovering over me."
He wipes his hands on a ragged cloth, tossing it over his shoulder. She grimaces at the sight of his hands, blackened from years doing this kind of labor, dirt and grime a permanent fixation beneath his fingernails. She eyes her own, perfectly manicured, as she reaches for her cell phone. "Well I need to be at a DAR luncheon in like, half an hour..." trailing off, she realizes she didn't bother to catch his name. A fleeting moment of guilt passes through her conscience before his laughter, loud and uncivilized, interrupts her thoughts.
"Justin," he supplies, extending a hand for her to shake. "Been in the same homeroom as you since seventh grade, 'case you forgot."
Right. Justin Timberlake, riding his dirt bike around town from the time he could fit on it. All while she flitted from one Cotillion to another, never running in the same circles, never giving him a second thought.
She looks down at his hand, hesitant, before her manners kick in and she forces herself to take it, all but ripping it back when he squeezes hers. "I'll pay you double what you charge if you can get this done before then."
"Sweetheart, your transmission's shot. Don't matter how much you wanna pay, it's gonna take a couple days."
"I don't know what the means."
"It means..." Justin says, his voice low and deliberate, as if he were explaining to an idiot, "that it's gonna take a couple days to fix. You need a new transmission. You're gonna have to call for a ride or one of us can take you--"
"I'll call for a ride."
"I figured as much."
"Excuse me?"
"Nothin'. I suggest you call your ride and quit buggin' me. You can come pick it up Thursday." He turns the corner, heading inside the shop, craning his neck to find her following him.
"Thursday? And I'm supposed to do what until then, use the Batmobile?" She knows it isn't his fault entirely, or at all, but she doesn't have the time to function without a car for three days.
There isn't an ounce of sympathy in his gaze as he washes his hands in the garage sink, gray liquid draining to the bottom but not removing any of the grime stuck to his skin. He turns around to face her, arms folded across his chest. His eyes travel over the length of her, a flicker of appreciation in his features but mostly just amused.
Rowan shifts uncomfortably, tucking a strand of perfectly curled hair behind her ear.
"You're a Harper. Have Mommy and Daddy call you a driver or some shit, you'll manage."
"So what, because I don't subscribe to the greasy boys' club of not bothering to shower I'm not entitled to getting my car back?" Which isn't entirely the truth, because he smells like a nice mix of sweat and soap, though she wouldn't dream of admitting it. But something in his tone strikes a bitter chord in her, and she speaks without thinking, a rare occurrence for her.
"Aren't you making yourself late tryin' to insult me, Princess?" he grins smugly, pulling his lower lip between his teeth.
"Damnit!" Rowan pulls the phone to her ear, dialing frantically, all the while silently cursing him for the distraction. "Ash...can you come get me? I'm on McComb and Waters, the mechanics'...yeah well I wasn't planning on stopping here, my car broke down...something about the transmission...can you just...oh...yeah okay, no it's fine, I'll see you there." She hangs up, slipping the phone back in her purse.
Fighting the urge to chew on her fingernail, she musters up a polite smile, fighting back the panic rising in her throat. "Justin...would you maybe mind--if you have a minute...it's not far from here..."
Justin wipes down a wrench absently, trying not to laugh as she struggles to get the words out. "Yeah, gimme a minute. Trace!" he hollers towards the back.
"The fuck you want? I'm busy!" A male voice hollers back, clearly joking.
"Be back in ten, droppin' a customer off."
><><
Justin looks over at Rowan from the driver's side, zipping through traffic without a second thought. She, on the other hand, is struggling to keep her hair, her dress, whatever other parts of her she's hellbent on keeping in place, still. The wind throws her hair back, blowing the curls straight, and he almost laughs at how miserable she looks.
He tugs his hat off, throwing it in the backseat, rubbing a free hand over his buzzed hair. "Don't like the wind, huh?" he hollers over the radio.
"The DAR doesn't like the wind," she snaps, yanking her dress down as it flies up past her thigh, her cheeks reddening. "Is there any way we could maybe raise the windows?"
"You'll be sweatin' balls if we do."
Rowan cringes at the reference. "Just turn the AC on."
"Sweetheart, it's a '67 'Vette, there is no AC."
"Stop calling me sweetheart."
"Whatever you say, sweetheart." He swerves into the parking lot of the country club, the car screeching to a halt. Her fingers dig into the leather, knuckles turning white as she tries to maintain some sort of balance. "Here ya go."
She yanks her purse out from underneath the seat, paling when she looks up to see a pristinely dressed middle-aged woman barreling towards them. "Shit," she mutters.
"Friend of yours?"
"My mother." Fishing through to find her wallet, she pulls two crisp twenty dollar bills out and hands them to him. "Here."
"What is this?" Justin asks warily.
"For driving me."
"I'm not a fuckin' taxi service, I did you a solid. Are you kidding me with this shit?"
"I was just trying to be--"
"Just get the fuck outta the car, Harper. I'll let you know when yours is done."
Rowan lets herself out of the car, legs a little shaky. She doesn't even have the chance to turn before she hears the squeal of tires peeling out of the lot. She smoothes the wrinkles out of her dress as her mother approaches, tight-lipped. "Do you have any idea what you look like right now?" Caroline Harper growls, snatching a barrette from her purse. "Come here." She roughly brushes her fingers through Rowan's hair, pulling it back into a neat ponytail as she clips the barrette on. "What were you thinking? The luncheon starts in five minutes."
"Ow," Rowan winces, touching her head, now a little sore. "I'm sorry, the car broke down--"
"We JUST bought that for you, Rowan."
"It's not my fault, Mom! Something happened with the transmission."
"Now you're just making parts up," Caroline admonishes, pushing at her arms in order to make her stand up straight. "And the hoodlum?"
"He's just a mechanic. Ashley was already here, I didn't have a choice."
"You could have called for the car."
"By the time the car got from the house to the garage to here I would have been late," Rowan protests, trying in vain to make her mother see some kind of logic.
"Late would have been better than showing up looking like you just spent the last three days in a brothel. Turn around." Caroline frowns, tugging at the hem of the dress, trying to smooth down a few stray wrinkles. "Well, this is the best I can do with you for now. If you need anything, Elliot Lampert is your date for the afternoon, have him get it for you because I don't want anybody seeing the back of this dress. There's a reason you don't take rides from the local watering hole, darling. It doesn't look right and ruins your clothes."
"Yes, Mother."
"Okay let's go get you seated. Walk in front of me."
><><
"Yo, I can't believe she tried to fuckin' pay you," Trace clutches his stomach, doubled over laughing.
Justin shakes his head, parked underneath the hood of her car, his fingers working meticulously to remove a part. "Girl's nuts, all I know."
"You talking about me behind my back again?" He lifts his head, turning as a girl strolls up, dropping her backpack on the ground, leaping into Justin's arms, legs wrapped around his waist as she bends down to kiss him.
He smiles against her mouth, slapping her ass playfully before setting her back down on the ground. "Woman, you're late."
"Baby, I'm on time. I'm not the one who skipped out on eighth period, today, remember?" she sets a hand on her hip, blonde hair swishing in a loose ponytail as she laughs.
"Megs, I had to fuckin' work," he gestures at the car.
"Hey that's Rowan Harper's car," Megan muses, her nose wrinkling in confusion. "She brought it to you?"
"It broke down about a block from here," Trace says. "And much as we love your crazy ass, she's the nuts one."
"What'd she do?"
"Bitch tried to pay me for droppin' her off at some DMV bullshit."
Megan laughs, rubbing his back sympathetically. "DAR you mean?"
"Whatever."
"Cut the girl a break."
"For what? Seems that's all she gets all the damn time anyway," He tries to keep the bitterness from his voice, not quite getting there. Maybe it's unwarranted or unfair but as far as he's concerned the girl has never had to work a day in her life and that's a situation he cannot even begin to understand or feel badly for.
"She spent the night at my house once in like, sixth grade and her mom gave a list of food she wasn't allowed to eat to my Ma."
"Shut up," Trace's eyes go wide.
A nagging feeling lingers in Justin's stomach at Rowan's reaction to seeing her mother, but he brushes it aside, getting back to the car. "Boo fuckin' who, poor little rich girl. Heard that song before."
"You're just a cranky old man is all," Megan pokes him in the side. "Be nice to her when she comes in next time."
"I ain't bein' nice to her if she's gonna come up all high and mighty and shit, Megs. Not doin' it. I don't wanna talk about this anymore."
"Fine, fine," Megan throws her hands up, admitting defeat because as stubborn as he is she knows it's no point in arguing with him when he gets all riled up like this. "We going to Shelly's bonfire tonight?"
"I'm going," Trace pipes up, gunning the engine of an old pick-up truck. "Almost done with this."
"Can't, Momma's working a double at the diner, I promised her I'd come help out when I was done here," Justin sighs.
"Cool. You need some help over there?"
"Nah, I got it. Go to Shelley's," He assures her, setting the wrench down on the hood and giving her a quick kiss. "I can take a break though if you uh, wanna hang out a minute in the back?"
"Real slick, J," Trace laughs as Megan punches him in the arm. "Damn, girl, where'd you learn to hit all of a sudden? Fuck."
"You got twenty minutes," Megan says, lacing her fingers through his and pulling him towards the back office.
"Shit, I only need fifteen..." Justin follows her eagerly.
"Wouldn't go advertising that, you sorry sonofabitch!" Trace calls out, rolling his eyes as they disappear from sight.
><><
PRESENT DAY
"Are you okay...?" Justin asks un-surely, kneeling in front of Rowan, a bottle of peroxide and a bag of cottonballs in his hands. She's sitting on a shoddy looking couch, worn with age, stains and small tears lining the fabric. Her eyes travel absently over the room. All the furniture looks cheap or already use; the kind of environment she's never seen and yet it feels more like a home than her own does. There's a certain warmth that emanates from it, a kind she keeps looking for but cannot seem to find from the mansion she lives in.
She moves to stand, all of a sudden needing to get out of the place but her legs give out and she falls back against the couch, looking down dumbly at her still shaking hands. "I don't...I can't..."
"Shh, I know. I need to clean these up and make sure they don't get infected. That okay?"
Rowan nods, wincing in silence as he wipes the dried blood from her skin, careful not to touch her. Once finished, he eases the oversized t-shirt back over her stomach. "Thank you," she murmurs softly, always Miss Manners even in the state of shock she's in.
"You can sleep in my bed, I'll take you home in the morning."
"Just take me to school, my parents won't notice. I have a change of clothes in my purse." Her voice is completely flat, and if he knew her better he'd reach out and hug her. But she isn't a friend, not even remotely close to one, and he doesn't know her.
But at the same time, now he does, in ways he didn't expect to. They've been thrust into a situation he cannot comprehend the ramifications of, and the only person who can sympathize is Rowan.
As if she senses his thoughts, she reaches out, taking his hand in hers. "I don't know what...or how--"
"Hey, listen, listen it's okay. You're here, you're safe...I ain't gonna let anything happen to you, okay? I got you." Justin rubs his thumb across her cheek.
"Justin...what did we do? Seriously this is...what did we do?" she asks.
He shakes his head, looking down at the floor to avoid her face. "It was an accident. It wasn't your fault, you had to do something--"
"Don't tell me what I want to hear. Please."
"I don't know, Rowan. But it's done, and we're in this together now, and we can't take it back. So just get some sleep, okay? You'll feel better in the mornin'."
Rowan nods, quiet, letting him lead her into his bedroom.
I don't know if we get cookies for this necessarily, but oh well. In due time.
. Post more sonn, please =)
I heart you. 
