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Adam had known that moving in with his college friend group was a bad idea, but he’d gone and done it anyway. Now he only had himself to blame for his current predicament: pulled over in an empty McDonald’s parking lot at 2AM, holding back the urge to smack his head off the wheel.
It hadn’t been his week. Finals stress, work stress, everyday life stress. The usual, really. He’d been playing this game a long time and these latest setbacks were nothing he couldn’t handle. He knew how it went, knew that suffering was part and parcel of building a better life, knew how to manage his expectations most days. But he hadn’t anticipated just how much some new roommates could complicate the dynamic.
They were loud, was the problem. Persistent. Present. They asked questions and demanded attention. They brought in boyfriends and girlfriends and hook-ups who treated the apartment like a video game save point rather than a space to evacuate as soon as possible. It’d been less than a month and already Adam could feel himself readying to snap, like an elastic band stretched too far.
Was it so much to ask for some privacy? Was it selfish to demand some room to think things through? How could he go about fixing all the problems in his life if he had no space to sit still and breathe?
Adam practiced breathing now. Long, drawn out breaths, until his dark mood faded. What did it matter that his boss was an asshole and his bank balance was in double figures and the logical reasoning final he felt woefully unprepared for was in three days’ time and the guy he’d gone on a date with last weekend hadn’t texted him back? What did it matter that he resented his roommates for their uncomplicated happiness even though they were good people, because maybe deep down he wasn’t a good person? What did any of it matter? He didn’t have time for an existential crisis.
Adam ran his hands over his face, contemplated covering his mouth to muffle one good scream—
Something crashed against the front of his car.
The vehicle shuddered, rocking back and forth before steadying. Adam’s head shot up. No, that couldn’t be…Honest to god—
“You’re shitting me,” Adam said, and threw the door open. “How do you crash into me in an empty parking lot?”
The idiot in question — a BMW driver, because of course he was — jumped out of his car. He was wearing shades, never mind that it was December and the sun had gone down almost twelve hours ago. Point one against him.
“The fuck were you doing in an empty parking lot, anyway?” he said as he pulled off the sunglasses. And there was point two against him. Was this asshole for real?
“It’s a twenty-four-hour restaurant,” Adam said.
“So? Drive-thru’s that way, man. I don’t see you eating anything.”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you when you just crashed into me. What were you doing in an empty parking lot?”
“I was parking,” he said, and shot Adam a no, duh look. So much for shelving the existential crisis. Adam was going to murder this man, and then he’d have nothing but free time and excess privacy to ruminate over his life choices in prison.
He sighed and strode towards the front of the vehicle, where Douchebag Personified was already surveying the damage with his arms crossed. Very nice arms, said the lizard part of Adam’s brain. Not the time, argued the sensible part of Adam’s brain.
His front bumper was mangled but it wasn’t hanging off, so at least there was that. The headlight was smashed. Paint-job destroyed. Adam had seen way worse — he was a mechanic, of course he’d seen worse — but that didn’t keep his anger from simmering.
It didn’t help that Douchebag Personified’s retro M3 had survived the collision mostly unscathed, with nothing but one measly scratch on the hood. He’d hit Adam with the rear end of his car, which raised various questions Adam wasn’t sure he wanted the answers to, like, how did you pass your test when you can’t do a basic reverse manoeuvre? and why pick the parking spot beside me when the whole lot is empty? and do I look like a dealer to you? Is that what this is about? and why the hell are you doing your dodgy dealings in a McDonald’s parking lot? You know there’s CCTV cameras here, right?
Adam pulled out his phone, turned the flash on and started taking photos.
“Hey, what’s all that about?”
“Have you never been in a crash before? We need to document the damage. For the insurance companies.”
“Can’t you just take it to a mechanic’s?”
Adam scoffed. “What, and pay for it myself?”
“I’ll split you the cost.”
“Wow, you’re a dick.”
“What? We’ll go fifty-fifty. That’s a better deal than you’re gonna get anywhere else.”
“No, a better deal would be you taking responsibility and paying for all of it. Or you could do the smart thing and let your insurance handle it.”
“Have you got a hard-on for law and order? Fuck the insurance.”
Adam double checked his photos. They weren’t the cleanest, given how dark it was, but the damage and registration plates were all recorded. That was good enough, surely. He switched over to his contacts page and asked, “What’s your phone number?”
“You’re screwing with me.”
Adam didn’t respond; he trusted his face to get his lack of patience across.
“You want my number? For real?” Douchebag Personified looked Adam up and down, brows furrowing. Adam’s traitorous stomach swooped under that gaze. Embarrassing. This guy was a grade-A jerk. Who cared if he looked like he could bench press Adam’s body weight without breaking a sweat, or if his whole severe exterior was the exact brand of scary hot that Adam knew to be his type? The only person allowed to give Adam shit was himself.
“For the insurance,” Adam clarified. “I need your name and address while we’re at it.”
“Jesus weeps. You want my social security number too?”
“Hey, you wanna keep your identity a secret so bad, learn to drive like it.”
Douchebag Personified grumbled to himself before finally rhyming off his details. Ronan Lynch, that was his name. Adam called his number just to be sure he hadn’t lied.
“Oh, come on.” Ronan sneered at his ringing phone. “Is that necessary?”
“I don’t know you. It could’ve been.”
“Well I don’t know you either, man. You’re just the creepy fuck that was sitting by himself in an empty parking lot, and now you’ve got my address.”
“How does it feel to be the biggest hypocrite in Boston?”
“That’s unlikely,” Ronan said. “My brother lives here too.”
Adam rolled his eyes before giving Ronan his own details. The sooner they got this sorted, the better.
Except Ronan had different ideas. “What if I found a mechanic to deal with it? You don’t need to get the insurance pricks involved.”
The pieces clicked in Adam’s mind. “That car’s not really yours, is it?”
“It’s not not mine.”
“Oh my god. Did you steal your brother’s car?”
Ronan’s answering grin was savage, which was not the reassuring response Adam was hoping for. He barely had the energy to deal with insurance claims, never mind a grand theft auto case. But then Ronan said, “As if I’d go to all that effort. He drives a Volvo, the boring bastard.”
“So whose car did you steal, then?”
“Who says I stole it?”
“Everything about your face says you stole it.”
“What are you, a goddamn criminal psych major?”
“Classics, actually. You’re just easy to read.”
“Yeah?” Ronan’s grin widened into something shark-like. “Ascendo tuum.”
Adam shook his head. Who was this guy? He’d crashed into Adam’s car, acted like it was Adam’s fault, and now he was insulting Adam in Latin? And who did that anyway, just sprinkled Latin into everyday conversation like it was all casual, like it was nothing? Was he fluent in the language or had he merely learned a handful of offensive phrases to maximize his douchebag potential?
“Look, if you stole that car, you better tell me now,” Adam said, “because first thing tomorrow I’m calling my insurance company. And if you’re not insured—”
“Alright, alright, fucking hell,” Ronan said. “It’s my dad’s car.”
“And you’re not insured to drive it?”
Ronan shrugged. He didn’t look at all ashamed. Point, point, point against him.
Adam considered his options. He didn’t have time to deal with this. He absolutely did not have time to deal with cops. Not to mention, he couldn’t afford to wait months on a claim going through, if it even went through at all. He wasn’t sure his third-party contract would cover this.
But what was the alternative, settle this one on one? Trust Ronan not to screw him over? Insanity — Adam didn’t know him, and what he’d seen so far didn’t paint a flattering picture.
He could fix it himself, but he had finals to worry about. Not to mention, he didn’t have the money for new headlights.
“Don’t tell me you’re freaking out now,” Ronan said.
“Of course I’m freaking out,” Adam snapped. “You trashed my car and you don’t even have insurance!”
“I told you I’ll find a mechanic.”
“I’m not splitting you fifty-fifty.”
“Fine, I’ll pay for the whole thing. Your car’s a shitbox anyway, it’ll be dirt cheap. I’ll even rent out a tow truck for you too.”
You can’t kill this man, Adam thought, because there’s CCTV cameras everywhere. You can’t kill this man no matter how tempting it might be, because you’ve worked too hard just to throw it all away in a fit of passion.
“You really expect me to take you at your word?” Adam said.
“I’m not a liar,” Ronan said, sounding more offended by this implication than he had by anything else.
“No, you just steal people’s cars for the hell of it. Great moral distinction.”
The scowl Ronan shot him was so fierce that Adam almost laughed. There was untold joy to be found in out-annoying an annoyance, and years of customer service work had allowed Adam to perfect the skill.
Ronan flipped the car keys in his hand before saying, “So you’ll let me pay for it?”
“If I don’t hear from you by 10 tomorrow, I’m making a claim,” Adam warned. Ronan just scoffed. He already looked bored with the conversation, which was fine. On his head so be it.
Adam climbed back into the driver’s seat of his rundown Toyota and ran his hands over his face. It was very possible he was making a huge mistake, leaving Ronan to run wild on the road, but Adam had enough to deal with; he didn’t have room for a guilty conscience too.
“Hey, Parrish?”
Adam sighed and rolled his window down. “What?”
Ronan just smiled, gleefully smug. “Perfer et obdura, dolor hic tibi proderit olim.”
Fuck, was that Ovid?
Sarcastic Ovid?
Adam rolled his eyes. “You are not as funny as you think you are,” he said — although, in better circumstances, he might’ve laughed — and then he started the engine and pulled away.
Silver linings: at least Adam’s breakdown had been averted. Ronan Lynch had given him little room to think of much else.
*
Adam’s phone rang at 9:42 the following morning, right when he’d gotten into study flow mode. He swiped it off the library table and made a beeline for the doors, shooting his study buddy Henry a warning look on the way that said, don’t let anyone steal my spot.
“Parrish,” greeted the voice on the line when Adam picked up. Ronan Lynch, finally making good on his promise right when Adam had dubbed him a lost cause.
“Eighteen minutes is cutting it quick, don’t you think?”
“You wanna hear about the Shitbox savior I found or not?”
Adam wanted to get his car fixed before the cops fined him for his busted headlight. He said, “I’m listening.”
Fifty minutes later, Adam pulled up outside the autobody shop Ronan had listed on the phone. Ronan’s father’s BMW was already parked across the street. Adam waved him over.
He figured Ronan would want to talk money — Adam knew for a fact that replacing headlights was never cheap — but the first thing he said was, “Who goes to college to get a classics degree?”
“Thousands of people every year,” Adam said. “Are you really going to keep driving that car around?”
“That’s bullshit.”
“How is it bullshit?”
“You don’t need a fancy piece of paper to talk a dead language. I do it just fine and I dropped out of high school.”
“Well, that explains a lot.” Okay, that was elitist of Adam, but who could blame him? How could anyone have a conversation with Ronan Lynch and stay civil? “You know there’s a lot more to a classics degree than learning Latin, right?”
“Like what, jacking off to Roman sculptures?”
“That’s more of an after-school special.”
Ronan grinned. He looked twice as hot in the daylight, or maybe it was just that Adam could catalogue the full picture now that he wasn’t sleep deprived. He was all sharp edges, eyes more gray than blue, every aspect of his exterior cultivated to give a threatening allure. Still didn’t make him less of an asshole, but hell. It’d been a while for Adam. Why shouldn’t he get to fantasize, reality be damned?
Ronan wandered into the garage and reappeared moments later with a middle-aged mechanic in tow. The man, who went by Jerry and was very round and very red-faced, laughed uproariously as Adam retold the story of how the smashed Toyota came to be. He whistled to himself as he surveyed the car, before finally remarking that, “With a junker like this, you might wanna consider trading in.”
“That’s not an option,” Adam said, and ignored the smug smile Ronan shot his way.
“Well, it’s not gonna be cheap, I can tell you boys that.”
“Money’s not a problem,” Ronan said, and ignored the flat look Adam shot his way.
Adam weighed up the estimation Jerry gave them. He was sure they could’ve gotten a better deal elsewhere — his own garage could’ve knocked at least thirty dollars off — but Ronan did say money wasn’t a problem. Call it karmic revenge.
Afterwards, deposit settled and car left behind, Adam hovered on the sidewalk. Calling Henry or Blue to come pick him up wasn’t ideal. They’d have too many questions. He’d just have to look up what public transport—
“You getting in?”
Or he could risk death with Ronan Lynch.
Adam peered at Ronan through the rolled down driver’s window of his father’s car. “You’re kidding, right?”
“You can get an Uber all you want, but you’re gonna be paying out your ass.”
Well, he had a point. Still. “As opposed to what, letting you send me to the ICU?”
“Last night was a fucking fluke, okay? I know how to drive.”
“I’d have an easier time believing that if you had insurance.”
The look on Ronan’s face said, dear god, this again? Because Adam was the one being irrational here, sure. If anyone had space to look put-upon right now, it was him.
“I’ve got insurance,” Ronan said.
“It doesn’t count if it’s for a different car.”
“Semantics.”
“Yeah, surprisingly the law deals in those.”
“What would you know about the law? You spend your time studying dead war generals.”
“Did you know classics majors score the best averages on the LSAT?”
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph. So that’s why you’re a pedantic bastard.”
Adam climbed into the passenger seat. He couldn’t explain why. He simply made the decision and then chose not to dwell on it; he’d have enough time for regrets later. “I’m the pedantic bastard that’s saving your ass from a license suspension. You could at least try being a little grateful.”
“What do you think I’m doing right now?”
Okay, point.
The drive back to the library continued in much the same pattern, both of them sniping back and forth. The words flowed. The conversation didn’t stall. Ronan might be a dick but Adam could give as good as he got. He’d been on the Harvard Debating Union for two and a half years running.
By the time they pulled up at the college gates, Adam’s blood was pumping. He felt energized by the interaction rather than drained, and how often could he say that? Even last weekend’s date had left Adam sapped out by the end, and he’d considered that one a rare success story. Well, until he got ghosted.
Probably he had some sort of previously unseen psychological disorder. Area Man Thrives Under Hostile Company. He could live with that.
“So, same time Friday?” Ronan said. Friday was when Jerry had promised the car would be ready.
“Are you playing a long-con game here?” Adam said. “You bribe me now so you’ve got a lawyer on call years down the line?”
“Fuck, you’re a piece of work.” But Ronan looked more impressed than put off, so Adam figured it wasn’t an insult.
He smirked and climbed out the car. “I’ll call you when Jerry calls me.”
*
On Wednesday, Adam switched his phone back on after completing his logical reasoning final and found three new texts from Ronan Lynch.
The first one was a photograph of a letter. When Adam zoomed in on the text, the words ‘insurance premium’ jumped out. At least Ronan had had the sense to blot out the important details.
The second one was another photo, this time of a raised middle finger.
The third one was just a text: ascendo tuum.
Adam replied, I see you got over your fear of identity theft.
Ronan’s response came thirty seconds later: you’re a sucker for rules and shit, you dont have it in you
Well now that sounds like a challenge.
But you’re right, I wouldn’t steal your identity. I’m still not convinced you’re a real person.
Ronan sent another picture, this time of a…crow? A raven? What the hell? It was perched on someone’s — Ronan’s — arm, a towering black-feathered creature with glowering eyes.
A text came in two seconds later: could a not real person do this
Do what, exactly? Shapeshift?
Is that your brother?
bozo
Familiar?
its my bird
You have a pet bird?
Ronan replied with another picture, this one a close-up of the raven-crow’s squinting face.
say hi to chainsaw
You have a pet bird named after a power tool and you expect me to believe you’re real?
Now I’m even more convinced you’re a hallucinatory nightmare, congrats.
Adam frowned the minute he sent that text. Maybe that was pushing it a little, but then again, Ronan had crashed his car into Adam’s. You couldn’t leave a worse impression than that.
Sure enough, Ronan’s reply swept away all of Adam’s concerns: so your saying im in your dreams then
Adam drew to a standstill in the center of Harvard Square and burst out laughing. Ronan Lynch was an asshole, but he was also a conundrum. A contradiction. A —
“Is that a smile I detect on your face?” Henry said, suddenly right there at Adam’s side. Adam jumped out his skin. “God, it is! What’s got into you, Parrishman?”
Nothing yet, said the lizard part of Adam’s brain. “I think I aced that final,” said Adam out loud, because he could at least be counted on to act sensible in public.
*
On Thursday, Ronan put the effort in to call.
“Don’t tell me,” Adam said before Ronan could get a word in. “You need free legal advice.”
“You’re still on that? You’ve seen me driving.”
“You expect me to believe the rules of the road are the only ones you don’t follow?”
When Ronan spoke again, Adam got the sense he was absurdly pleased. “You’re not in law school yet, you bastard.”
“That’s why it’s free. Get in now before I bump up the premium.”
“I can afford it.”
“You sure about that? You don’t know what I’m charging.”
The line went quiet, long enough for Adam to question what the hell he was doing. Then Ronan said, “What’s it cost for you to stop harassing me?”
“You’re the one who called me.”
“Not for legal advice.”
“For what, then?”
“I got you a trashy bumper sticker for your trashy car. It says ‘Law Student: Because I Hate Mankind and I Love Being Right.”
Adam laughed. This was absurd. Everything about this conversation, this entire situation, was absurd.
He kind of liked that, though.
“Is that all you wanted to tell me?”
“If I think of something else I’ll call back,” Ronan said, “you know, just to push you over the edge.”
“You do that, Lynch.”
“I will.”
Adam smiled to himself for seconds, minutes after the call had ended. He smiled even wider when his phone lit up with a new text from his new favorite number: a video of Chainsaw the terror regurgitating her food. He kept smiling all the way from the kitchen back to his room.
“Is he feeling okay?” he heard one of his roommates say as he shut the door.
*
On Friday, Adam called Ronan after Jerry called him.
“He said to come over any time this afternoon,” Adam explained.
Ronan picked him up in his stolen (borrowed?) Beemer and immediately bombarded him with more pictures of Chainsaw the raven-crow.
“Why does she always look one step away from pecking your eyes out?”
“Don’t be fucking insensitive. She’s teething.”
Adam laughed all the way to the garage.
Jerry greeted them both with an easy smile and small talk as he took them round to the back office. The Toyota looked good as new, possibly better than it had before Ronan arrived on scene. The new LED headlights were an upgrade, that was for sure.
Ronan handed over his bank card, his face betraying no shock or annoyance at the final bill. However rich he was, Adam didn’t want to know.
“Thanks for all your help,” Adam said as they backtracked out the shop.
“Anytime, boys,” Jerry said in his usual affable tone. “I’d say be careful out there, but hell. That’d run me outta business.”
He really was a whole lot nicer than Adam’s boss. Would it be weird to ask if he was hiring?
Adam climbed into his car, reversed it out the garage and pulled up beside Ronan’s. Then he hesitated, watching as Ronan crossed the street. What now? He’d never been in a situation as bizarre as this before. He didn’t know the protocol.
He rolled the window down as Ronan approached. “So. Thanks for being a halfway decent person, I guess.”
“Man,” Ronan said, “that’s the worst thing you’ve said to me all week.”
He shoved his hand in his pocket, pulled out something crinkly, then tossed it through the window. Adam picked it off the passenger seat where it had landed, brows furrowing.
“Is this—?”
“For your trash heap car. I told you I don’t lie.”
Adam turned the wrapper over in his hand. Because I Hate Mankind and I Love Being Right. It shouldn’t have blindsided him, but it did. It shouldn’t have charmed him, but it really, really did. It was sweet in an absurd never-learned-how-to-socialize-with-peers kind of way. If Adam were more put together, he might’ve swooned.
But he wasn’t, so instead he deadpanned, “I’ll treasure it forever” and hoped that got the message across.
Ronan smiled — fondly? Who could say? — and shook his head. “You do that, Parrish.” He shoved his hands back in his pockets as he stepped back from the window.
Wait. Stepped back?
“Lynch?”
But Ronan was already returning to his car. Of course he was. Why would he stick around? He’d kept up his end of the bargain, and now Adam had a shiny new bumper and matching headlights and a heart that hadn’t stopped hammering since he’d climbed into Ronan’s car.
In other words, transaction complete.
Adam waited to see if Ronan would turn back. When he didn’t, Adam ran his hands over his face and started up the Toyota. It was fine. Adam was fine. What had he been hoping for here, anyway?
He drove home in a daze, ignored his roommates when they tried corralling him into being the DD for their post-finals celebratory night out. There was something else for the agenda: find a new place to stay for next semester.
Adam poured his attention into looking up room shares in the Boston area, resisting the urge to check his phone. When he did give in, he found just what he’d been expecting: no new messages, no missed calls. And that was fine, not a problem. He’d get over this embarrassment sooner or later.
On Sunday, Adam clocked in for his standard nine hour shift at the garage in Waltham. He kept to himself and kept busy, working away on an old Jeep with a faulty transmission, and he didn’t think about his phone with no new messages or calls since Friday morning, or about the disappointment that threatened to eat him alive.
At least, not until Ronan’s stolen-borrowed BMW pulled up outside.
“You’re a mechanic?”
“You crashed your car again?”
“Fuck,” Ronan said. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”
The words stung more than any of Ronan’s worst insults, maybe because Adam knew he actually meant them this time. He hadn’t wanted to run into Adam, because unlike Adam he wasn’t—
“I’m not a goddamn stalker, okay? I was trying to find a garage that looked sketchy, and this one fit the bill.”
“We don’t do anything by the book here,” Adam confirmed. “My boss is an asshole.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Adam took in the car. The bender was hanging off, practically scraping the ground at one end; it was a wonder Ronan had managed to drive it out here at all. “Am I allowed to ask who you hit this time?”
“My brother’s fence.”
“On purpose?”
“You think I’d trash my car on purpose?”
“No, but I wouldn’t put intentional property damage past you.”
Ronan grinned but it was all teeth, nothing real about it. Understandable; Adam would feel that way too if his car looked like that.
“It’s fixable,” Adam said, “but it’ll take days.”
“Whatever, I’ll manage.”
“Won’t your dad be pissed?”
“My dad’s dead.” Ronan let that hang over them for seconds, then added, “It happened years ago. Don’t make it a thing. But he left the car to Mom in the will, and she’s not…She doesn’t drive anymore. It was just sitting in the driveway collecting dust, so I took it. I told you I didn’t steal it.”
Adam stepped over to the desk and wiped his hands off on a rag. “You know you could get yourself put on the insurance, right? It’d save you searching out sketchy auto shops that might pull a scam on you.”
“Yeah, well. Worked out all right this time, didn’t it?”
Warmth crept into Adam’s stomach. He bit his lip before the smile could break through, then turned back around. Ronan had his arms crossed as his eyes took in the rest of the shop. Adam tried not to stare too hard, tried to play it cool. He hadn’t called, after all.
When Ronan finally spoke again, it was to ask, “Why didn’t you just bring your car over here in the first place?”
“Because,” Adam said, “my boss is an asshole.”
Ronan burst out laughing, for real this time. He had such a lovely smile when he wasn’t posturing, so bright and brazen that Adam could feel its influence infecting him too.
“How are you real?” he said.
Adam shrugged. “Maybe you dreamt me too.”
Ronan’s gaze finally met Adam’s, lingering too long to be casual. That warmth in his chest spread all over, flooding Adam from head to toe. He didn’t think he was imagining the measured intent behind Ronan’s stare. He hoped he wasn’t, at least.
“Do you want to…?”
Keep calm, play it cool. “Want to what?”
“You know.” Ronan scuffed his boot off the floor. “Go out with me tonight. Or, I don’t know, some other night. When you’re free.”
“Oh?”
“You can say no. I mean, it’s whatever. Forget I asked.”
“I’m not saying no. I just. You didn’t call.” Adam’s face flushed once the words were out. They reeked of insecurity. “I figured you weren’t interested.”
“I didn’t want to make an ass of myself.”
“You trashed my car the first time we met. Trust me, you don’t have to worry about that.”
Ronan’s face brightened. “So is that a yes?”
Adam didn’t answer, simply bridged the gap until they were face to face, close enough for the smell of Ronan’s aftershave to overwhelm him.
“I get off at six tonight,” he said, fingers skating up Ronan’s arm, “if you want to get dinner.” And then he leaned in — or maybe Ronan leaned in — and kissed him.
It was feather-light and over too soon, more a promise than a consummation, but it felt wondrously right. Adam’s body ached with the need for more, more, more.
Still. “We really shouldn’t be doing this here.”
“Why not? Have you got a no kissing til the first date policy?”
“I’ve got a no kissing customers at work policy.”
“Your boss is an asshole,” Ronan reminded him. “We should make out on his desk.”
Adam dropped his head against Ronan’s shoulder to muffle his laugh. How was any of this real? Ronan was absurd and impossible and absolutely terrible. In other words, he was everything Adam hadn’t known he wanted, so much more than Adam ever would’ve thought to ask for.
But he didn’t need to ask. Ronan had crashed into Adam’s life, and if Adam played his cards right then he might even stick around.
Well, so long as he didn’t crash his way into a prison cell first.