Work Text:
Louise waited for the elevator patiently. Sure, she could take the stairs—she wasn’t scared of the ghost everyone else in her apartment complex was convinced haunted the area—but she decided to treat herself with minimal effort and a morning donut on her Do Nothing Day. Or, wait, donut-ing day. Heh.
Between helping her dad at the restaurant and her freelance work, Louise hardly took any vacation, and certainly never on a weekday when everything was still open. Every once in a while though, Louise allowed herself a day for her philosophy of accomplishing the most while doing the least.
As a ding announced the elevator’s arrival, Louise moseyed in, not even bothering to hit the door close button.
A mistake, she realized, when a well-dressed but disheveled-haired blond barreled into the shaft with her.
“Did I leave it in here?!” Logan yelled at the space, his head swiveling as he searched the small area.
“Leave what?!” Louise yelled back. Do Nothing Days were not supposed to include any form of stress, and her menace was ruining that.
She hit the floor for the lobby with a little more gusto and then the door close button, glaring at it for not pressing itself earlier.
“My laptop! I can’t find it and I’m going to be late for work and-” Logan stopped suddenly, slapping a hand to his forehead and moaned. “It’s at work! I left my laptop at work.”
“That’s a good thing, right?” Louise eyed the descending numbers. “That means you didn’t lose it in the elevator.”
“But that also means I’ve wasted the past twenty minutes looking for the stupid thing, and now it’s,” he checked his watch, “SHIT!”
“Language,” she chided with a slight smile.
Usually, Louise wouldn’t have borne witness to her neighbor’s panic, with his corporate job and her restaurant schedule never lining up. Inwardly, she delighted in seeing him stress even a little, because his usual air of nonchalance annoyed her to no end after a rough day.
“Do you have everything you need to leave now, or are you taking a pointless elevator trip down?” Louise asked, rubbing salt in his wound.
Wild eyes shot to the doors as though just putting together that they were moving. Logan’s hands hit at his pockets, front and back and front again, then his shoulders relaxed.
“I have everything,” he sighed. “Not that it does me any good. There’s going to be traffic, and I have to find a parking space at the office, which ha! At this hour? I’m not going to make it by nine. And it’s on the day I have to give a damn presentation…”
Louise rolled her eyes. “Calm down. It’s one presentation. How bad could that actually hurt you.”
“Of course you don’t get it,” Logan scoffed as the elevator dinged and let them into the hall for the lobby. “My annual review is coming up, and I was in the running for a promotion. This was supposed to be MY moment.”
They made their way through the lobby, offering half-hearted waves to Annie, the manager and self-ordained social event coordinator, at the front desk.
“Oh, hey you two!” Annie called out after them. “Remember, there’s a mixer coming up and-”
“No,” they responded in unison, continuing the journey out of the complex.
Dragging his feet and accepting fate, Logan turned right for the parking garage. Louise prepared to break off in the opposite direction, mouth falling open to tell him to build a bridge or something of the sort as a parting message, but then it hit her.
“A promotion? That comes with a raise?”
“A fat one, yeah.”
“And that means more money?”
“Uhh, yeah, a raise would mean more money.” Logan squinted at her. “Where’s your head at today? We usually have wittier banter than this.”
“Which means,” Louise continued, ignoring his snark, “if you got to work on time and got the promotion, you could afford to live somewhere nicer? You could move away?”
“... yes?”
Helmet hair was a small price to pay for punctuality.
His button-down was fairly dark and could hypothetically hide wrinkles.
Plus, he looked so pathetic, moping around like that. Who would take her seriously if she told them this sad sack was her nemesis?
Recovering from her odd line of questioning, Logan rolled his shoulders and sighed. He took another look at his watch and immediately deflated again but still stepped towards the garage.
“Well, wish me luck. Or don’t. Maybe if I’m in a car accident they’ll postpone the ‘path to advancement’ talk.”
He started to trudge to his car, but Louise grabbed his hand and yanked him in the opposite direction on the sidewalk.
“What are you-”
“Helping,” she said simply.
He didn’t put up a fight as she dragged him off course. Their destination was only a little way up the road, a huge perk for Louise.
“And what am I supposed to say when I’m really late instead of just late?”
“You can tell them you got caught up with a beautiful girl.”
“That’s all fine and dandy,” Logan said while dodging someone coming up on the opposite side of the walkway. “But where am I going to find a beautiful girl to hold up the story?”
That remark earned him a slug in the arm.
“Kidding, kidding!” He rubbed at his bicep, smiling. “You’re beautiful, don’t hit me again.”
Continuing their journey, Louise chuckled as she made it to the crosswalk and hit the pedestrian button.
“I know how I look, and I don’t care.” She threw a smirk over her shoulder. “But I like having an excuse to hit you, so keep at it.”
With a tsk and a lean against the light pole, Logan waited with her for the time to cross safely.
“I thought you were above petty violence these days.”
“That’s right. Graphic violence from here on out.”
“Well then Joe Louis-e, are you going to tell me where we’re going?” Logan choked suddenly. “I’m being led to an unknown second location. This is just like they talked about on Dateline.”
“Yeah, actually,” Louise said, wagging her finger at him. “We’re gonna have to have a talk about your survival skills because this is just sad. Poking bears and following them with no prior knowledge?”
Snickering, Logan nudged her shoulder when they got the okay to cross from the little man in the box.
“I’ve given up anyway, why not let a bear eat me?” He sized her up. “Actually, that might not be so bad.”
She held up her fist again, but he didn’t flinch, merely presenting his arm for her. Shaking her head, she patted his bicep in place of a punch.
At the second stoplight, she turned left into If Two of Them Are Shed, a storage facility residing on the corner mildly famous for holding onto people’s secrets.
“We’re here,” she said, waving at the security guard, who knew her face and buzzed the gate open.
Unit in sight, she only stopped walking when she noticed a lack of footsteps next to her. Glancing back, she saw Logan still on the sidewalk.
“Wait, are you actually going to kill me?” Logan asked, half joking. “I thought we were having fun.”
“Why would I kill you in broad daylight? That’s ridiculous. I would get caught.”
“Which is exactly why you would lure me into a tiny room covered in plastic.”
Lips sucked in between her teeth to keep from laughing, Louise went back to grab his hand and tug him along until they reached her unit.
Forfeiting her hold on him, she unlocked and yanked open her storage unit, the metallic rolling noise unfitting for a dramatic reveal of her bike.
“I’m not desperate enough to steal someone’s motorcycle.” He didn’t move from his spot even as she went inside. “I don’t know how to drive it.”
“No, dingleberry,” Louise said, waiting until he inched further into the unit to keep talking. “You’re riding passenger. No way I’m letting you drive my baby.”
“This is yours?!”
He stared on in astonishment, hand coming up as though to touch it then falling back down.
Louise was used to staring. The sport bike didn’t match the rider, with an almost too tall seat and fancy body not suited for her budget, but she fell in love the moment she laid eyes on the sleek black frame. Learning to ride the thing was a trip, having only practiced on standards and a few cruisers. When Louise’s driving mentor—or whatever Nat’s wife wanted her title to be—first showed off the speed of her future baby on the track, Louise knew she was a goner.
“I take it out every Sunday.” She shrugged, unlocking the chain. “I’m surprised you didn’t know.”
“Sunday is Lo-” Logan cut himself off. Whatever he was about to say was lost as he changed topics. “Did the uh, who is it... the gang?”
“The One Eyed Snakes?”
“Yeah them. Did they help you pick this out?”
“Oh nah, they’d ream me for getting a sport bike.” She lowered her voice in a goofy imitation. “Uh hah hah, you sit like a shrimp, shrimpy shrimp.”
“Do you sit like a shrimp?”
“Well yeah,” Louise admitted. “But I could also outrun a cop much easier.”
After another look of awe, Logan turned back to her. “Do you really think this could get us there in time?”
“Where’s your building?”
“Corner of Jolly and Harbor. With the big fountain out front.”
Louise knew the spot and mapped it in her head while pushing the chain lock off to the side with her foot. He would never make it by nine in a car. But cars couldn’t filter like she could.
Most drivers also feared God more than her.
“Easy.” She grabbed her helmets and motioned for him to come closer. “You can put this on after I’m done here. We’re both getting torn up in these clothes if we crash, but at least you won’t be able to sue me for head injuries.”
She charged the intercom headsets after her last ride before accidentally forgetting to bring them into her apartment, so she assumed they would survive the short trip into town. Logan inspected the helmets while she turned them over.
“Awww they’ve got little pink bunny ear stickers, how cute,” Logan teased. He ignored her when she grumbled shut up. “What are you doing?”
Louise pressed two buttons simultaneously and waited for the robotic chime of a woman’s voice.
“I’m pairing the headsets so I can hear your last words in case you fall off. Do. Not. Distract. Me.”
“Oh sick, I didn’t know helmets let you talk to each other.”
“These do because Tina’s an excellent gift giver.” Louise thought about Tina, and the looks her older sister shot Louise every time Logan was caught anywhere near the apartment. “And you do not tell her you borrowed one. She’s... very protective about who wears these helmets.”
Not necessarily a lie, Tina did send an updated list every so often about who she “allowed” to wear the helmets. The emailed list served a dual purpose, also acting as a not-so-subtle hint of people Tina thought Louise might find suitable companions. Her older sister still fancied herself a matchmaker after all these years.
After handing the paired helmet off to her nemesis, Louise stepped away and removed her beanie, which caught Logan’s eye.
“Huh,” he said, unable or unwilling to look away. “It’s been a long while since I’ve seen you without a hat of some kind.”
Running a hand through her uncovered hair, Louise huffed in amusement. Though it still felt foreign to expose her head, the action failed to make her uncomfortable like it once did.
“Yeah, about... twenty years almost?”
Logan whistled. “We’re getting old.”
“Not me. I’ll be young well into my seventies.”
Louise asked Logan if he had ever ridden a motorcycle before, which he denied. Though she was confident in her abilities to ride with a passenger—she forced her family to ride occasionally, much to the dismay of everyone save for Linda—she still needed to give him the breakdown. After a short spiel on the basics, Louise broached the elephant in the room.
“If this was a cruiser, you’d have a little more room, but it’s not so...” Louise mumbled then internally groaned. “Are you afraid of holding me?”
Logan, who had been fidgeting with the helmet’s visor, stopped suddenly to blink at her.
“Wow, uh, okay,” he said, eyebrows furrowing. “That poses a lot of follow-up questions about our relationship that I’m not confident either of us are equipped to answer at this point in time. I mean, we don’t try to kill each other anymore, sure, but our level of intimacy has always been, sort of, an unspoken thing that-”
“Do you want to be a smart ass, or do you want to get to work on time?”
“... I have to choose?”
“Welp, hope you had a fun field trip,” Louise said, snatching the helmet back from him. “Enjoy being even later than you were originally going to be.”
“No, wait, come on, I’m sorry,” Logan whined, even as he fought to keep a smile down. She let him take his helmet back slowly. “I’ll be good, I promise.”
She glared at him but resumed getting ready, slipping into her riding jacket and moving her phone and wallet to the zippered pockets. He handed his own effects over silently, and she threw them into her jacket as well.
“On a bike like this,” she said, warning in her tone, “you don’t have the option to not hang on. If you’re not holding me, you’re flying off. Get comfortable with it.”
If anything, he was basically being rewarded for dumbassery. Who wouldn’t want to be snug up next to her? Shaking the thought from her head, she continued.
“When I lean, you lean. I might do something dangerous, but I’m not doing it to purposefully scare you. We’re racing against time. Are you going to freak out, or are you going to stay collected?”
“I can handle it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Are you going to waste more time by asking the same question?”
Rolling her eyes, Louise donned her helmet. “If it means not risking a lawsuit? Yeah.”
“I’ll do my best to remain calm.” He seemed genuine enough as he saluted. “Scout’s honor.”
“Alright then,” she said, grabbing and rolling her bike out of the storage unit. She paused, instructing Logan to lock up while she walked the motorcycle the short distance to the road.
Catching up with her, Logan slipped into his borrowed helmet and stood on the sidelines.
She swung herself onto her bike, started it, and waited.
“You getting on or what?”
He didn’t try to say anything back through the intercom, instead steeling his nerves. With an immense caution, he settled in behind her. His arms encircled her waist, and she revved the engine. His hold tightened.
Louise turned her attention to the road, watching the corner and waiting to time the lights she knew well. Her chance came, and with no cars approaching, she prepared to speed off.
“Hang on.”
Accelerating, Louise pulled out into the road and adjusted to the extra weight of her passenger. He was somewhere in between a Bob and a Tina, and she could work with that.
The first part of their journey was mostly a straight shot, so she had a bit of time to check in with him.
“You doing okay back there?”
“Yeah...”
“You sure? Because if you squeeze any tighter I’m gonna pee myself, and that’ll be awkward for both of us.”
The joke worked, and his grip marginally loosened.
“Is it always like this?” Logan asked, somehow pressing himself further into her back.
She assumed he meant the adrenaline that hit after the first spike in speed.
“Pretty much. There’s also a… meditative element to it. Not the relaxing kind. It’s just a- a different type of mental clarity.”
“I don’t think I’m at that stage. I just keep replaying a loop of accidentally letting go and dying.”
“You’re doing better than Gene,” she said, throwing him a bone.
“Really?”
“Yeah. About thirty feet into the ride, and they wanted off.” Louise remembered the joke they used. “They said if God intended for them to risk their life on a motorcycle, then She wouldn’t have made their body so perfect for stage work, gender, and snacks.”
“Which gender?” Logan asked through his fear.
“All and none of them.” Gene identified as an enigma most days.
After a fond smile, she remembered the passenger still clinging to her like a frightened kitten.
“You can ask me to pull over,” Louise corrected. “I will.”
“... um.” He let out a big puff of air, and she winced as it transmitted to her headset. “I think I’m alright. Thanks, softie.”
“I’m just making sure you don’t puke in the helmet, dork.”
Oddly, their conversation felt natural even as she focused on the road. While she needed to tune out Linda’s excited jabbering or the strained jokes Bob made to pretend he enjoyed the ride, falling into conversation with Logan felt so second nature that Louise was confident that she could keep them safe through the banter.
Realistically confident. If any driver was too confident, bad things happened.
Spying the first light that would turn red before she got there, Louise prepared her passenger, all the while remembering to slow down sooner than if she rode solo.
“We’re coming up on a stop. You want to fix your pretty boy hair? Tuck your fancy shirt back in?” She mocked. “Too bad. No adjusting. You’ll want to but don’t. I’m not completely used to your weight, and that might make things complicated.”
“Pretty boy, huh?”
“Did you hear a single thing I just said?”
“That you think I’m pretty and have fancy clothes.”
“Yeah,” Louise scoffed. “And I feel the same way about Rapunzel. Did you hear my warning?”
“Uh huh, no moving. Got it.” Logan paused for a second. “I can’t help but notice your example was another blond. Do you have a type?”
Thoughts of Boo Boo flashed through her mind, and she pushed them away just as fast.
Her usual style of response, a slap on the wrist with snarky admonition, fell through as Louise concentrated on the road. The stop came, and she decelerated with ease. He was in between a Bob and a Tina. She patted herself on the back for an accurate assessment.
Filtering to the front of the line, likely to the dismay of some cars around her, she stopped and let her bike idle.
Logan must have taken the pause in speed as a moment to collect his bearings. One of his fingers poked at Louise from his hold on her waist.
“Have you named it?”
“What?”
“Your motorcycle. Did you name it?”
She thought about pretending not to hear but relented.
“Barra-Gouda.”
Even though she failed to mention the cheese sticker she hid on the bike, she picked up on Logan’s snort through the headset.
“You take after your dad, huh?”
Louise didn’t dignify that with a response, answering instead by revving her engine as the light turned green. His grip tightened, and the smart-ass comments ceased when the scenery started to blur around them.
The absence of his voice led her to notice that something was… off. Not in a threatening way, but Louise still tried to pinpoint the irregularity just in case. The only real change was her passenger, so she assessed the differences there.
He was taller than her other riders, that one she already knew, but height never played as much of a factor as weight. For a moment she considered his anxiety but tossed that out because he wasn’t any more nervous than Tina on her first trip. So why did this feel different?
Logan readjusted his hold, one of his hands sliding just a hair lower on her waist, and a jolt shot through her. She stilled, the bike stayed steady.
She hardly considered riding with someone that intimate, but it seemed somewhere in her nervous system it clicked that this was neither friend nor family with her. Gathering those thoughts to lock away, Louise slipped back into instructor mode.
Ahead, she saw their next obstacle.
“We’re coming up on a turn,” she warned. “Lean with me, okay?”
“Okay.”
He did as was told and without freaking out, so Louise gave him her version of a gold star.
“Good. You’re doing good.”
His grip was still tight but did... soften? at the praise. She filed away that tidbit for later use.
As they trekked deeper into the city, Louise noticed the volume of cars start to increase. With clear skies and little wind, it seemed the other drivers had calmed. Sometimes, it felt like she had a sixth sense for who would be the aggressive driver, just by looking at the back of their car. No death auras lurked in their future.
“Oh my god, what the hell is that??”
Chuckling as she too got a whiff of the city around them, Louise answered him. “Yeah, they don’t warn you about how you can smell literally everything when you ride.”
“Holy... it smells like- like rotten mung beans and burnt hair.”
“It disturbs me that you could place either of those smells.”
“Oh, Miss Perfect Chef over here. Never let a vegetable go bad.”
Louise snorted, saving her crack about his take-out habits for later.
One of his many pranks had been to put her apartment number on to-go orders, so the delivery driver would show up at her door demanding she pay for his food. Logan would come out, pretend to apologize, then pay. His final move was to open whatever he ordered in front of her and rub it in. It only worked as a prank because he, unfortunately, had immaculate taste in take-out.
Never one to accept defeat, Louise started carrying cash to the door. He quit soon after, and she still ordered from that Caribbean fusion place, Insane in the Plantain.
Her subsequent prank—a complicated little number involving two nickels, a car battery, and a guitar—had been the stuff of legends.
After a few more twists and turns, Louise’s adrenaline spiked, seeing a straight path that she would have to do a bit of weaving through or risk getting stuck behind a line of cars.
“We got this, baby. Mama’s got you.”
“Uhhh...”
“The bike, idiot.”
Most cars knew better than to challenge her as she weaved through them. Maybe they were more considerate, maybe they could tell she was on a mission, or maybe they rolled their eyes and assumed an ass was driving. No matter any guess they made, she accepted the good fortune.
She spotted the exception, a Camry driver, ahead. It was always obvious, the way their car would suddenly sway closer one way to keep her from passing.
Too bad for them, because Louise was going to be that bitch today.
Pulling up as though she were going to pass, she waited until the car swerved left to lean her bike and accelerate on the right. A successful move, Louise was too close for the Camry to block her, so they rode past and ignored the honk.
“That lady is mad at you.”
“Don’t look!”
She sped through a yellow light that she definitely didn’t make just in case the woman caught up to her somehow. Her maneuvering didn’t allow her much wiggle room, as she still caught a light a few blocks down.
Filtering to the front again, Louise stared ahead and waited.
“So,” Logan spoke up. “You know how I’m not supposed to tell Tina I wore the helmet?”
“Yes?”
“What happens if she sees it for herself?”
“What?!”
Louise’s head snapped to the side where, sure enough, a wide-eyed Tina stared from the driver’s seat in the car next to her. Louise cursed herself for forgetting this road led to the daycare where Tina dropped her kids off.
The bunny ear stickers gave away her identity, but Louise reasoned that Tina would have no way of guessing her rider. Sure, Louise kind of had a rule about not hanging out with tall people, but maybe she just met a random, well-dressed person on her ride. Named... Marcus. And, even though he was tall, he really needed help to get to this interview because it was his big shot to-
Nope, her half-concocted lie fell through as Logan flipped up his visor to smile and wave at the kids in the backseat, one of whom waved back at him frantically. Tina rolled the children’s window down, and Louise could almost make out their delighted squeals over the engines. Whether they remembered him from their sporadic trips to Louise’s apartment or whether they just liked seeing the motorcycle, Louise couldn’t tell.
Averting her attention from Tina’s intense stare, Louise spotted the pedestrian crosswalk countdown. She nudged Logan to lower his visor, and he did then resumed his position of gripping her waist.
“Oh good god,” she whispered to herself as she somehow felt the daggers of Tina’s stare dig deeper into her.
“What?” Logan asked, and Louise was surprised the headset picked up anything. Damn Tina and her quality, thoughtful presents.
“Nothing,” she replied, careful not to jerk the throttle as they took off at the green light without another look at her sister.
Checking the cheap plastic watch she clipped on one of the bike handles, Louise resisted gasping at the time. They should be fine, but she definitely thought they would be closer to his office by now.
Any other quips from Logan were ignored as she sped through the city.
Not much further, she swore when she noticed a stall ahead due to construction. She didn’t have the minutes for that, thinking she gets him to his presentation, he gets a promotion, and they both get to be free of each other when he moves away.
Just ahead of the construction, the lights—one left turn go arrow and two straight lanes—turned yellow. Louise realized that, though she didn’t have room to get into the turning lane, the car already there had begun slowing down.
She exhaled slowly even as her heart pounded, making up her mind to do something ballsy.
“Sorry.”
“Wha-”
Though she wasn’t in the turn lane, Louise threw on her blinker and hard cut left, Logan blessedly leaning with her.
A stupid risky move that only paid off when no one honked or killed them, Louise sighed her relief. From the way Logan‘s nails dug in, she could tell he might have other feelings about the maneuver.
Changing the route last minute only stalled them a moment, a faster moment than if they had sat in construction she would argue. In fact, Louise noted, they still pulled up to the front of his building in record time.
Louise cut the engine, but Logan didn’t move. Poor thing was frozen.
“We’re here,” she said while disconnecting her Bluetooth to preserve battery. When he still didn’t move, she elbowed him.
He startled, realizing where they were. His adrenaline must have kicked back in, as he jumped off the bike and immediately made towards the entrance.
“Helmet!” Louise called after him, yanking off her own helmet and setting it on the handlebars to ensure he heard her.
Logan patted his head, confirmed there was indeed a helmet there, and turned back. Watching him remove the headgear, Louise snorted both at how his hair immediately messed up and his bewildered expression.
“You drive like a maniac,” he said, handing the helmet back to her. She took it and traded him his stuff from her jacket pockets, which were promptly shoved into his own slacks.
“Thanks,” she said, readjusting and motioning him to her with an open palm. “Come here. Your hair is messed up.”
“I don’t have time for-”
“You have fourteen minutes. Bend over.”
He jolted at the information and checked his watch, confirming her estimate. Logan blinked at her in surprise then did as he was told, bending over so she could fix his mussed hair.
Focused on her task of straightening and fluffing, it hit her suddenly just how close he was and how intimate the gesture might seem to the casual onlooker. She pushed him away, deciding she was done regardless of the finished product.
“Go,” Louise said, facing forward without deciphering his look. “Thirteen minutes.”
He nodded and rushed off.
Louise scoffed, shuffling in her seat. “Some thanks.”
By the time she noticed the approaching footsteps, her head had already been caught between two hands, one at the base of her skull and the other under her chin.
Had the Camry lady come to snap her neck?
Before reaching for the knife in her boot, she felt a pair of lips descend on her cheek as Logan crushed her to him.
“Mmmmwaahh!” Logan kissed the side of her face in exaggerated passion, almost enough to rival her mother’s shower of kisses except this was a single drawn-out bolt of lightning instead of Linda’s storms. “Thank youuuu!”
He ran off again, leaving Louise stunned on her bike. Blinking, she regained her senses enough to yell after him.
“I meant like a gift card or something; that doesn’t count for jack, dingleberry!” She cupped her hands over her mouth. “Cash rewards only! AND you have to move out if you get promoted! You hear me?!”
Disappearing into the manicured commercial building, Logan didn’t acknowledge her, and she cursed under her breath.
What a weird Do Nothing Day.
-
When she finally arrived home, donut in hand, Louise found an email waiting for her. The subject line stopped her cold.
Re: Updated List of Approved Helmet Wearers
“Motherf-”