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But I couldn’t just go into business with nothing backing me up. I’d fail for sure. But if I could find a partner or a backer, someone to help me out…
“I couldn’t do it on my own,” I admitted. “Maybe if I had someone else… I’ll have to look into this and think about it.”
“You could go down to the bank and talk to an advisor, find out what you’d need to make a go of it,” Jones suggested. “That’s what I did when I was in your position. I know things were different then, money-wise. But it can’t hurt.”
“I’ll do that,” I agreed. Jones clapped me on the shoulder, smiling, and then went to finish closing up the shop for the night.
I waved goodbye to Jones after we had finished and went upstairs to my apartment. Did he really think that I was good enough to run a business? Any business but especially his, this business that he’d cared about for so long? Jones was a staple of the community. Open every day except Sunday, and available to tow cars or help people out, anytime, just give him a call. Surely there were other mechanics at this shop that could run the place better than I could, mechanics who hadn’t been gone for four years.
Fuck. I paced up and down, feeling suddenly like the apartment was too small, feeling claustrophobic. This was a huge decision and not one that I’d expected to make so soon.
Truth was, okay, if I was honest with myself—the idea of owning a car garage was perfect. It would be enough money to support myself and the family I hoped to someday have, and it was doing what I loved. And taking over Jones’ garage? Yeah, I liked that. No, okay, I loved that. Jones had looked out for me when almost everyone else wrote me off as an asshole and a delinquent. Only Morgan and his parents had been the other ones to see past the trouble I was causing to the lost kid underneath. This garage had been home to me in a way that few other places had been.
But owning a business was a huge responsibility. I hadn’t thought I’d take one over so soon, that I could work my way up somewhere. Jones retiring—it felt like the world was now spinning in the opposite direction. What the fuck was I supposed to do with this? How was I supposed to handle this?
Shit. I couldn’t be in this apartment a minute longer. Both because it felt too small, confining, but also because it was right above the garage that Jones wanted me to buy. He wanted me to buy it, how did I earn that kind of faith? Where did that confidence in me come from? I wanted to demand to know what I’d done to earn him being so confident in me, choosing me over all the other people who might have been chosen, people who probably would be better at it than I was.
Fuck it. I changed out of my mechanic overalls, into jeans and a shirt, grabbed my black leather jacket, and strode out the door. I was going to the tavern again.
It was a stupid idea, yeah, I was telling myself that even as I revved up the engine of my baby and headed out there. But I wanted to see Billie. It was Friday, so she worked there, and I could—yeah she didn’t want to talk to me but at least I could see her. It might help, just to see her and know she was there. It would help soothe something in me, it felt like. Just to see her in her element, having fun, taking care of customers. Happy.
When I got to the bar, I felt my nerves fluttering in my stomach like butterflies. What if she was angry that I showed up? What if she felt I was stalking her? Shit, was I stalking her?
That quickly became a moot point as I walked into the bar and saw that Billie wasn’t there.
There was the same guy behind the bar that had been working with Billie last week, but the other person was another woman, redheaded, serving up the customers like there was nothing the matter.
Was something wrong? Was Billie sick or something?
I shouldered my way to the bar so that I could get a seat and then waited until the bartender saw me and walked over to take my order. I didn’t want to be too pushy, otherwise I’d look like a creep and the person wouldn’t tell me anything about Billie, and I wouldn’t blame them. Coworkers had to stick up for each other. If I was in this guy’s shoes and someone shoved their way to the front demanding to know where my coworker was I wouldn’t tell him either.
