Tag Archives: character: carson koslow

Author’s Note: Everyone has doubts sometimes. Carson might have more than most.

About Trust

“You all right?”

“Not really. I don’t know how to sleep after what my brain warped this thing into earlier, and even after all this time, I can’t rid myself of it. I don’t want to close my eyes,” Carson said, letting out a breath and staring at his hands. He shook his head. “I don’t think I should go with you tomorrow.”

Mackenna stared at him. No. Impossible. He didn’t get to back out now. They’d been planning this for a while—all right, it was only about a week, but that didn’t mean that she was giving up and quitting. She wouldn’t. He wasn’t allowed to, either. “What?”

He pulled his legs up against his chest. “I just… I know it’s supposed to help, that we’re chasing down what leads we have, but I don’t think it’s a good idea at all. We’re just… I think what I need to do is what I’ve been avoiding since I got the news about Grandpa. I need to find a new shrink and get on medication. I don’t like the idea, and I hate the meds, but this isn’t working.”

“How can you say that? You’ve gotten more back in the last week than you did in the past twenty years. You are doing just fine, Carson, and you’re going to keep doing that.”

He lowered his head. “I don’t feel fine. I feel like I’m coming apart, and as we were driving back, all I could think about was who might have been lying. Like I can’t trust anyone. I didn’t want to believe that the one man didn’t know if his father had sold someone in my family Phantom. I didn’t believe they’d never met my father. I don’t like what I’m becoming, Mackenna. I need to stop it somehow, and if that’s getting back on anxiety medication, then… I have to do it.”

She let out a breath. She didn’t like the idea of putting him on medication—she’d had her moments thinking that her uncle had committed suicide not in spite of the drugs but because of them—and she really didn’t like the way he was talking right now.

“You still trust people.”

“What? My brothers? You know I don’t. I could, maybe, almost, because they wouldn’t have been that old if Dad did die when I was eight, but I don’t know that for sure, and I still don’t trust them. I don’t trust my former coworkers or my boss, don’t trust the old guys at the Legion, don’t trust my uncle or anyone I knew—”

“What about me?”

His eyes jerked up to hers, and she frowned, afraid he was going to say he didn’t trust her, either, after all she’d done for him and seen him through, and when he did, not only would she be pissed, but she knew it would hurt. It would sting in a way she hadn’t felt in a long time. She’d been so careful about not letting anyone in, and now that she had, he’d hurt her all over again.

“No, I trust you,” he said, his voice so quiet that he should have been talking to his knees and not to her. “You’re all I’ve got, and that scares me.”

She bit her lip. She knew that feeling all too well, and having Carson be a part of her life was only possible because she’d healed after years with Mac, because he was so damaged himself, and if he didn’t need her, she wouldn’t have started down this path with him. The way they’d bonded scared her. She didn’t want to be this close to anyone, either.

“I want to say you’ve got Mac, too, but you don’t, not in the same way.”

Carson nodded. He knew what she meant. “He’s nice enough, and he tolerates me, but I made everyone mad tonight, talking about giving you the car. I thought… I thought you’d want it, and after all that work, you’d deserve it.”

“I thought we agreed on some kind of shared custody,” she said, swallowing. She tried to force herself to be calm. “As long as you’re still going to be my friend when it’s over, it doesn’t matter which of us owns the car, does it? As long as you’re not abandoning me the minute the car is finished—”

“I couldn’t do that.”

“Could you do it if you had your memories back?”

He shook his head. “No. I’ll need you just as much then—how am I going to cope with them without you?”

She shrugged. “Not by going to a shrink and getting back on drugs. That might be something you do as a temporary fix, but it’s not like you have a disease that needs long term care. You just need to cope with the reality of what happened. You can’t, not until your memories are back, but when they are, when you’re free of all you’ve got locked away, you’ll be able to start dealing with it and start healing.”

“I wish I could heal you the way you’re healing me.”

She snorted. “I’m fine. You’re the mess. Oh, I have my moments, I guess, but on the whole, I’m fine. I’ve had a long time to process what happened with my uncle, and while I’ll never forgive my aunt for her poor choices, that time is behind me, too.”

“I don’t think it is,” he told her. “If it was, you’d let someone in besides Mac, someone who isn’t like me and isn’t a wreck. You don’t have anyone that didn’t come into your life because of Mac, and if you’re honest, you’d call them his friends, not yours.”

She closed her eyes, hating him for being right. “Carson…”

“It’s weird and awkward, but I want to hug you again.”

She almost smiled. “That’s funny. For some reason, I want to hug you, too, and I’m not much of a hugger. Why don’t you put your knees down and sit next to me instead? We can kind of… lean against each other, and that’s not so awkward.”

He did, scooting across the couch until he was next to her. “This is better.”

“I still want you to come with us. Will you?”

He let his head rest against hers. “A part of me is convinced I shouldn’t. Still… I seem to have no willpower when it comes to you, so yeah, I’m going with you.”

Author’s Note: Okay, so there’s a bit more with the cameo part, and another one later in the story, but it’s okay. It’s for a good cause. 🙂

Incidentally, friends of Grandpa’s, ones in his car club, have a Schact. I thought it was “shot” at first, too. 😛

On the Subject of Projects

“You’ve got your work cut out for you.”

“It’s a project, but it’s one that’s worth doing,” Mackenna said, and Carson tried to smile. He didn’t know how to feel anything less than awkward among the others, people who had apparently known each other for years and could finish each other’s stories and sentences. Their meeting was kind of all over the place, interrupted by pizza and only kept in line by Mary. Otherwise, they might have talked about restoring some car ten years ago instead of what they were there to do—start organizing their next swap meet.

The conversation found its way back to the car in the barn, though, after everyone had seen the pictures. He didn’t know when Mackenna had gotten them developed, but the stack had made the rounds at the table, with some commentary along the way that was as meaningless to him as a foreign language might have been. He didn’t understand any of it.

He didn’t know that a Shacht was a car, either. He’d almost thought they were talking about the murder for a minute with the whole “shot” thing, and he felt like an idiot when he realized it was a car brand, another one he’d never heard of.

Bob was watching him, and Carson didn’t know how long that had been going on. He didn’t know if that qualified as spacing out or not this time. “You don’t think it is?”

Carson frowned. “I wouldn’t know. I don’t know much of anything about cars. It used to be a gag, giving me cars as toys because of my name, and maybe that led to me running in the opposite direction, but I’ve never been a mechanic. You should see my other car.”

“That’s not your fault, though. You didn’t ask for a drunk to hit it.”

He shrugged. He still had a wreck that he couldn’t fix—two of them, actually. “I know, but there’s still nothing that I can do about it.”

“I could, but I think that Phantom’s worth it and that one isn’t.”

Bob nodded, and he wasn’t the only one who did. None of them seemed to argue with Mackenna’s decision about his car—and none of them had seen it. He had to assume that was the bias they all had toward their classics and antiques.

“You might ask in New London. I know there’s a man who brings a Maxwell Messenger to the run, one almost exactly like yours. Even has the wooden spokes on the wheels.”

“That’s great,” Mackenna said, grinning. “You’ll get to see what yours can look like when we’re done with it.”

Simon smiled. “Should we give you a registration form, Carson? I have a feeling you’ll be joining us soon. There’s really no stopping Mackenna when she gets started, and she’s been looking for a project like this for a long time.”

“I should hit you for that.”

Carson shook his head. “I don’t know that I need a membership just yet. I kind of figure the car will end up with the person who put the work into it, not me. I’m in transition at the moment, with a lot to figure out—new job, new place to live, new memories to uncover… I’ve got too much to do, and as I said before—I’m not a mechanic.”

“You don’t have to drive the cars or fix them to join.”

“You’d really just let go of Phantom like that?” Mackenna asked, staring at him. “I don’t understand. How can you do that?”

“She belongs to you more than me, Mackenna. I think that’s been clear from the beginning.”

“Yeah, sure,” she muttered, getting out of her seat, and Carson winced as she walked away from the table. He hadn’t meant to upset her—shouldn’t she be happy to get the car? That was her dream, wasn’t it? She’d loved it from the first time she saw it, and she should get to keep it if she was going to do the work on it.

“Oh, boy,” Simon said, shaking his head. Carson reached for his water, trying to find a way to make this whole thing less awkward.

Mac grunted. “You have no idea what you just did, do you?”

“No, I don’t. I thought she’d want the car.”

“There’s something else she wants a whole lot more than the car.”

Author’s Note: So normally I don’t do things like this, but I thought I had to, under the circumstances. Most of the time when I think of dedicating a story to someone because they inspired it or helped with it, I just find something to say at the beginning, but since everything I know about Maxwells and antique cars is from my grandfather and I borrowed his cars for Mac’s but Mac is not my grandpa, I figured that Grandpa had better cameo in the story.

So he did. Love you, Grandper. 🙂 And, yes, Grammer, you’re in there, too. 😛

A Special Cameo

“First of all, if you don’t meet everyone, that’s fine. One person you have to meet is Bob Long. He has got two Maxwells, just like Mac, and he’s also one of only two people who has done the New London New Brighton run every year. He’s a bit like Mac—not that much—and his wife Mary should be along. She’s always with him,” Mackenna told Carson as they walked to the back of the restaurant, a bit worried about how quiet he’d been all the way into the city. He didn’t seem to be much better than when she’d found him staring off into space in his room at the farm.

The idea of his grandfather betraying him like that had screwed him up good, and she wished they had some concrete way of disproving it. She didn’t really believe it, and she didn’t think Carson did, either, but that nagging doubt would continue to bother him until he had all of his memories back.

She reached out to touch his arm. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah, I am. I’m just… me.”

She shook her head, nudging him over to the table. “Mac’ll be along in a minute. He’s being overly cautious with the Airstream again. I told him we should have brought the Woodsman, but he didn’t want to hear it. So, this is Carson. He’s probably going to end up joining the club because he just inherited a 1912 Maxwell Messenger, and you’ll love this—no one in his family knows where it came from.”

“Welcome,” one of the younger members said, rising. “I’m Simon. My wife is usually here with me, but one of the kids is sick tonight, so she stayed home with them. Rick there is the club president, and that’s his wife Patrice. Mary’s the secretary, she always does the minutes, and that’s her husband, Bob. Bob’s a Maxwell man, and you might just want to ask him about yours because his father used to own a dealership. In fact, I believe he sold at least one of Mac’s Maxwells to the family.”

“He did. The 1908. The 1911 came from a drifter in the thirties. Not as cool a story as the one about getting Bob’s Maxwell back for the price of a case of beer.”

Carson frowned. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No,” Bob said, shaking his head. He quirked a small smile, one of his signature ones, and Mackenna pushed Carson into the chair across from him. This would help, a lot, maybe. Bob was too young to have seen the car the day it was sold or anything, but he might know of old records or have his father’s tales to help with their search.

“Here,” Mackenna said, taking out the photographs she’d done of every inch of the car. “We figure the car’s been in Carson’s grandfather’s barn for about thirty years, maybe a bit less than that.”

“Well, at least twenty-two years, yeah,” Carson said, fidgeting. “That’s as much as my memories can narrow it down, if it is connected to something else, which we think it is.”

Simon frowned. “Something else?”

Carson coughed. “Um… My father may have been murdered, and um, the car might have been around when that happened.”

“And no one in your family knows where it came from?”

“Supposedly not.”

“Well, now, that’s no good,” Mary said, and Carson nodded. He reached for the water glass, and Mackenna almost regretted bringing him here. Maybe there were answers here, but maybe not, and he was so uncomfortable he looked ready to run. “Don’t you have any way of knowing for sure?”

“Well, we think I was there, since I have… nightmares and a few flashbacks, but I was eight, and I must have been so scared I blocked it away. Later, some of them came back, and they searched the farm for a body, but they didn’t find anything. I didn’t even know the car was there until Grandpa left me the contents of the barn in his will. Mostly it was scrap metal, but then it was… that.”

“Phantom.” Mackenna smiled at the looks she got. “I’m the only one who names the cars around here. Well, and I think Bob’s granddaughter named one of his, but he doesn’t use it.”

“Oh, so you’re the oddball in among all the car nuts?”

She laughed. “Yeah.”

Carson smiled, looking a bit more at ease now that they were teasing each other again. She nudged him with her shoulder, and he pushed her back. “Why didn’t you name the Airstream, then?”

“I did.”

“And?”

“I’m not allowed to use it.”

“You’re not?”

“Nope.”

“So you won’t even tell me what it is.”

She looked up as her grandfather walked into the room. She shook her head. She couldn’t tell Carson the name, not now. Maybe later, when Mac wasn’t around. He hated it, and if she’d known how much it would bother him, she’d never have started using it. As it was, she’d been forced to go back to Airstream just to keep the peace.

“I see she got you looking at the pictures already.”

“Boy’s got quite a story.”

Mac grunted. She knew he was still bothered by her connection to Carson, but she wasn’t going to stop helping him just because her grandfather had the wrong idea about them or even just about why she was doing it. “Have we already ordered?”

“Should be coming soon.”

“Good.”

Author’s Note: I had to have them meet with the car club. So this is just set up, but it’s there for a reason.

Simple Necessities

“So, you feeling like being social? Need anything from your apartment?”

Carson lifted his head from his knees and frowned at Mackenna. She’d left him alone after he came inside, and he didn’t know how long he’d been here, on this borrowed bed, trying to sort himself out and convince himself that he was wrong. He didn’t want to do this anymore. He needed answers. He couldn’t handle the dark turn his thoughts kept taking. He needed to know the truth before this drove him completely insane. “Why?”

“Well, I’d forgotten that the monthly meeting of our local car club is tonight. They try and do it before the run just in case anyone needs anything. So… I should have remembered, but there’s been a lot going on lately. Either way, we still have to drive into the city, but we can leave you here or at your apartment if you want.”

He shrugged. He didn’t need anything from his place, and he didn’t know that he’d do anything there but stare at the walls, letting them close in on him. “I’m not real sure what would be best. I don’t know. After earlier, I’m just—I’d be lousy company, but at the same time…”

“You shouldn’t be alone. Nah, come with. You can have pizza, meet a few other car nuts, enjoy something that has nothing to do with the crap that’s screwing you up right now.”

He nodded. “That might be nice.”

“You will be okay, Carson. You will get through this, and you will get your memories back. Once you know, it won’t be like now. You’ll know, and all the unanswered questions won’t hurt as much. You’ll know. You can deal with what you know.”

He let out a breath, trying to keep himself calm. He didn’t want to react like he had earlier. “I wish I was as confident as you are. Not that I don’t want to believe you, but I’ve been here before. It didn’t go so well.”

“We already discussed how this time is different.”

“I have you.”

She smiled. The look was a bit grim, but it was still a smile. “Exactly.”

He needed her, and that wasn’t going to stop. He’d been alone in here for long enough. The time hadn’t made any difference. He still felt the same. She was right. He would be better off with her and Mac. He shouldn’t be alone. “Okay. Let me change.”

“Change?”

“Can’t go to your car club meeting like this,” he said, rising. She got a good look at his clothes and snorted. He rolled his eyes.

“Oh. Right. Yeah, sweatpants are not very flattering, not on anyone.”

“Thanks a lot.”

She shrugged. “I can’t help it if your wardrobe sucks—other than your socks, that is.”

He stuck his tongue out at her. He’d picked this outfit because it was comfortable, not for fashion. After that horrible thought about his grandfather, all he’d wanted to do was hide. He’d thought about drowning himself in the shower, but that wasn’t going to happen. He was stronger than whatever memory was buried in his head, and he would be okay. He just had to remember that. Still, it was easier to try and get back to normal in comfortable clothes instead of jeans or a suit or anything else he might have put on.

“And, of course, added bonus—the car club might have some answers about your car, too. We’ll have to see.”

Carson frowned. He stopped in the middle of reaching for his jeans. “Oh. I hadn’t even thought of that. You’re right. Why didn’t you just say that in the beginning?”

“Well… The last attempt at that didn’t go as planned, and I was trying to encourage you to think of it as a distraction.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s something else, isn’t there?”

He hesitated. “I don’t know. It used to be a joke in my family—Carson gets all the cars. That was the main toy people bought me as a kid.”

“Oh. That must have been fun.”

“I’d kind of forgotten about it. It stopped happening… around the time I was eight.”

“So… something about your father?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. It’s hard to say. Everything seems to be about him, but it can’t be.”

“You need pizza.”

He laughed. “Sure. That’s it. All right. I’m going to change now, so if you don’t want to see more than my socks, you might want to leave.”

She leaned over to get a better look at the ones he was wearing, and she grinned. “Nice. Love the smiley face.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll let Mac know you’re coming. Meet us at the car.”

“Okay.”

Author’s Notes: Carson’s theories are probably worse than his reality.

Another Terrible Theory

“You’re still feeling last night, aren’t you?” Mackenna asked, watching Carson as he made slow progress up the path to the car shed. He’d been quiet all morning, drank down a bunch of water and ate without a word, the hangover making him more of a mute than Mac was half the time. She’d figured he’d come out of it after breakfast, but he’d managed to spend the whole meal that way.

“I don’t know that I’m still hungover. I’m just… I think I remembered something more last night, and I’m not sure what it means. I have been trying to figure it out, but I don’t know. It’s not bad, not necessarily, and so I shouldn’t be so worried, but I can’t help obsessing over it, either. I don’t know what to do.”

“What was it?”

“Dad gave me a toy car—oh, wait, I guess the important thing is I know for sure when that happened. Well, almost for sure. It was after Chambers and his friends decided to shave my head, and my hair was short. Dad noticed, and I pulled away from him when he touched it. So… That means I was definitely eight at the time. It’s something, right?”

Mackenna nodded. “Yes, of course. Now you’ve got it narrowed down to a specific time, and that is important. Why are you so upset by that?”

“I don’t know. I thought that we moved back before school, that her breakdown might have been because of Dad’s death, but isn’t necessarily true. I don’t know. Maybe it was after. Maybe… Maybe she decided we had to move back because he wouldn’t find us otherwise.”

“Maybe. It does seem like he found you after that, so… yeah, it could fit.” She studied Carson’s face for a moment, trying to decide if he needed to keep pushing or to let that go for now. She glanced toward Mac, who pointed to the car. She let out a breath. “So, today we get to finish prepping Shadow for the run. You up for that, Carson?”

“Um, I do not recommend me as a mechanic, not at all.”

“You can use a rag, can’t you?” Mac asked, and Carson turned to him with a frown. “Car needs to be cleaned. Get all the grease off of it. You can do that, can’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

Mackenna smiled, stopping at the door and pushing it open. She looked in at Shadow and started around to the back to push it out.

“Get over there and help her.”

“Yes, sir.”

Mac gave him a look. “Don’t remember you doing that last night. Not to me or any of the others. You don’t have to say ‘sir’ all the time. That because you drank too much last night?”

“Uh… No, it’s I… I used to do it with my grandfather. I think. Wait, I…”

“Carson?” Mackenna asked, moving closer to him, even though she thought that maybe she might get puked on. His skin had washed out, and either the hangover was back or he’d gotten sick real fast. “You okay?”

“I just had probably the worst thought of my life.”

She frowned, and he shuddered, wrapping his arms around himself. Mac frowned, and Carson lowered his head as he tried to calm down.

“That sounds strange, doesn’t it? I mean, I’ve got the whole thing with thinking my father’s dead and all, and he might have tried to hurt me. I was wondering if the toys were a bribe or something, if he was just working up to…” Carson shook his head. “Then I heard myself doing the ‘sir’ thing, and Mac called me on it, and for no good reason that I can see, I started wondering if it was my grandfather. If he killed my father because… he was the one that molested me. I don’t understand that. I know I’ve thought my grandfather was a killer before, but never because of that. It can’t be possible. I was never scared of him. Of the farm. I went back there on weekends to see him and help out until more recently. I loved being there, loved spending time with him. How could I do that if—No, it’s not right. It’s not possible. I’m just being… ridiculous.”

She swallowed. It made her feel sick, every turn in their theories making things worse, but it didn’t have to be that. She didn’t want it to be that, and maybe they’d find it wasn’t. She had to hope that was the case. “It’s a possibility, I guess, so it’s not ridiculous, but you can calm down and look at it the way it really is. You just listed off why it’s unlikely, so maybe if you went through and accounted for the time or made sure there were no gaps in your memory for visits with him—”

“I just need a shower. I can’t believe I had that thought. Look at what I’m doing. I can’t let myself trust anyone or anything. I’m determined to ruin it all.” He started walking away, and when she grabbed for his arm, he yanked it free.

“Carson—”

“Let him go, Mackenna,” Mac advised, putting a hand on her shoulder. She frowned as Carson went back toward the house, hating this. “He needs time.”

“You were friends with Henry. Tell him he’s wrong. Tell him that it wasn’t what he thought. Make it so that he’s not… tormenting himself with that. If what he said was true, if he was that close to his grandfather, came here often, he’ll start thinking he… encouraged it or something stupid like that.”

Mac grunted. “Henry didn’t tell me about the car. If he was doing things to his grandson, he sure wasn’t going to say anything to me. He talked the most about that one, worried about him, but never gave me any sign to think his interest was wrong in any way. That’s the best I can do.”

She sighed. “I just… I wish we could get his memories back so he didn’t have to keep wondering, to doubt everyone he cares about.”

“You’re trying to fix him.”

“So?” She couldn’t deny it anymore, much as she might want to. She was caught up in Carson’s problems and was going to do her best to help him.

“It won’t fix you.”

Author’s Note: Time for Carson to get another part of the puzzle.

Memories and Mascots

“I’m sorry we didn’t learn anything new at the Legion,” Mackenna said, sitting down on the couch. Carson had kind of fallen into the other seat, not sure what made him think that joining them in as many rounds as he had was a good idea. No, he knew it was a bad one, but he wasn’t good at saying no to the old guys.
“It’s fine. I wasn’t expecting any kind of breakthrough. It’s all good.”

“You are so drunk.”

“I told you—lightweight.”

“Yeah, you did.” She closed her eyes. “The guys are fun, though. Even Granger. He can be grumpy, but they’re all a lot of fun over there. Were you there when he said we could use his trailer? I think you were, but I don’t remember, and I’m saying it now just in case.”

“I don’t remember, either,” Carson said. He might just fall asleep right here, not that he minded all that much. He didn’t. This was fine. He didn’t want to think about it or admit it, but he slept better when Mackenna was nearby. He let his eyes shut, curling up in the chair. “That’s good, though, right?”

“Assuming the truck can pull it, we’ll be able to take both cars, like we wanted to, and we won’t have to get another rig to do it. We’ll just use Granger’s trailer because it’s a lot bigger.”

“Okay.”

“We should probably get up and go into the bedrooms before we fall asleep.”

“Nah.”

She laughed. “Fine, but no blaming me tomorrow when your neck is all sore.”

“I won’t.”

“You doing okay over there? Maybe you need to go puke.”

Carson shook his head. “I don’t. Just trying not to think about Chambers. Running into him… That brings up all those old memories, and if he’d actually had a chance to tell you about the school mascot thing… Well, it wasn’t pretty.”

“I don’t remember what the mascot was.”

“Bald eagle.”

“Ouch. Did you lose your hair?”

“Part of it before I got away. Then they had to shave it to make it even.” Carson had been keeping it on the longer side ever since. He didn’t like when it was short. It bothered him. He always went back to bad times in his childhood when he had it too short.

“What happened to your hair? Last time I saw you, it was long, almost shaggy.”

“Nothing.” Carson wasn’t going to tell his dad about the shaving thing. He didn’t want to think about it. He just wanted to forget, though it was impossible—every time he touched his head, looked in a mirror, or caught his mom looking at him, he remembered. She was so upset.

He just wanted to forget that, too. He hated how unhappy she always seemed to be.

“Okay, then. So, what has my little boy been up to lately? You’re in school now, aren’t you? What’s that like? You get good grades?”

“I guess. I hate it. I’d rather be here at the farm,” Carson said, putting his hands in his pockets and kicking the ground. He didn’t want to think about school. That meant thinking about the bullies, and he didn’t like the bullies. Larry and Nick could deal with them if it was after school, if they came to walk him home, but during the rest of the time, he was alone with Chambers and the others, and they kept saying they’d make the school mascot out of him. They’d already started.

He didn’t want to be a bald eagle, and he was afraid of what they’d do if they tried to make him fly.

“Yeah, this is a great place,” his father said. Carson shrugged. His father seemed to be worse at talking than he was. Maybe he should just go away. “Hey, you like cars?”

“I have a set. I want to build them a track, but Larry won’t let me use any of his even though he doesn’t play with it anymore.”

“Here, I’ve got something for you.”

Carson smiled, but when his father tried to hand him the toy, he had to frown. He took it, forcing a smile. “Thanks.”

“What’s wrong with it? You don’t like it?”

“I do, it’s just… They’ve had this toy in the meal for months now. They’re supposed to change, but they never do. I’ve already got three of them.”

“Oh.” His father put a hand on his shoulder. “I didn’t have enough time to get anything real special, but I promise, next time I’ll bring you something that you’ve never seen before.”

Carson snorted. He didn’t think so. It was a big joke for people to give him cars because of his name—he got one from the guy at the gas station every time he and Grandpa went to town. His mom gave him them as presents. His older brothers dumped their old ones on him. He found them at school. It was like he couldn’t get away from them.

“Like what? I’ve got all kinds of cars. Fords, Chevys, Dodges, even foreign ones—race ones and not race ones, just about any model you can think of.”

“I’ll find one you don’t have. Just wait.”

“Okay.”

“That’s my boy,” his father said, ruffling his hair. Carson frowned, pulling away from him. He didn’t like that when he did have hair, and without it, he hated it. “Are you ever going to trust me?”
“Why should I? You’re just going to leave again.”

Author’s Note: Just a few old timers gathered around a table swapping stories… Well, and a bit more.

Sunday Night at the Legion

“Thought you were some big shot with a degree now, Koslow. What you doing back here? You were always too good for the rest of us so—”

“So I don’t get the drinks that Mac’s friends ordered? Because I think even you should know better than to piss off your regulars,” Carson said, trying to keep his temper in check. He should have known that a loser and bully like Chambers would end up stuck in town, sponging off his former glory days, and what surprised him was not that the guy had a job as a bartender, but that he had a job at all.

If not for Larry and Nick, that kid would have beat the hell out of Carson every day.

He’d do it now if there weren’t so many witnesses, and Carson didn’t have his brothers to bail him out this time. Maybe if Mackenna got involved… He figured she had a mean right hook, she could do some damage—all that work fixing cars made her a lot stronger than Chambers would think.

“You know, if you’re hanging out with the geezer patrol to get with the girl, I should warn you—she plays for the other side.”

“I am going to hit you if you don’t shut up.”

“Gonna start saying I’m dead like you did your daddy?”

Carson smiled, a grim thing that had no kindness behind it. “You know, in recent years, I’ve come to suspect that I killed my father, and you might remember that they never did find his body, so… The drinks, now, and if you so much as look at one of the glasses funny…”

“You don’t scare me. You were never a threat. Only your brothers were.”

That was true, but Carson wasn’t about to back down. He heard something smack the table and looked over at Mackenna’s hand. “I think you lost out on any tip you might have gotten already, but what the hell? All the guys want is beer, and it’s not that hard to open them. You could have sent them to the table with the caps still on, and they’d deal with them. It shouldn’t take ten minutes to get the drinks.”

“Just discussing old times with your boy Koslow here. He ever tell you about that time we decided to make him the school mascot?”

“Did I ever tell you about the time I broke a guy’s arm for refusing to pay me for the work I did on his truck?” Mackenna asked, pointing to the bill on the bar. “That’s for the night, and you know it. We’ve already paid for several rounds. Just give us the drinks.”

Chambers muttered under his breath as he turned away. Carson gave her a slight smile. He’d been rescued, again, from the bully. “Larry and Nick used to hurt him on a daily basis.”

“Oh.”

“He picked on me.”

“Brotherly code. I understand. They were looking out for you.”

“I told him about my dad, about our latest theory, and the guy still thinks I’m the little kid I was when he bullied me.”

“Did you tell him we think you were probably eight when you dad died?”

“I forgot. I should have.”

She laughed, shaking her head. “I’m not sure that we should be joking about it, though I have to say, it’s been harder and harder to get our drinks around here since someone started working. It’s always a fight if anyone besides old Granger comes up to get them, and that’s because Granger’s a nasty old marine.”

“Gathered that much already.” Carson shrugged, reaching for the beers that Chambers had started to stack on the bar. Mackenna grabbed the rest of the other bottles, loading up both hands as she walked back to the table. He followed her, distributing the ones he’d picked up and finding that they had one more than necessary.

Mackenna took it from him, opening it. “I wouldn’t hate Chambers so much if he didn’t hit on me every time I was in here.”

“Oh. That explains it.”

“What?”

“He told me I didn’t have a chance with you because you’re a lesbian.”

She rolled her eyes. “Cute. Just because someone’s not attracted to him, they’re automatically gay. He is an idiot. I’m sure that he won’t last much longer here. He never seems to work anywhere for more than a month or two. I preferred him as a bartender over the guy at the gas station, though. Saw him way too much there because I have so many cars to deal with.”

Carson nodded. “I don’t blame you for that.”

“Should kick his ass for saying that, though.”

“You could, or you could grab one of these gentlemen here who would gladly help you prove otherwise. Think about it—he’s not your type, but they are, and wow, what an insult that would be, right?”

She giggled. “You’re devious. I like it. Only I can’t take advantage of the guys like that.”

“Take advantage! Take all the advantage you want,” the man beside her said, leaning over and puckering his lips as she laughed. That was Brady, Carson thought, but he’d lost track of all the names over the course of the night. He hadn’t had much to drink, a lot less than the rest of them, but they were all old friends, and their conversation was hard to follow for an outsider. “Please?”

“I volunteer, too,” George said, lifting his beer. “Been a long time since I’ve had a kiss from a pretty lady.”

“Not true. She gave us all kisses last week when she said goodbye.”

Mackenna grinned. “I did. You behave, and you might get another one tonight.”

“There something wrong with you that you didn’t volunteer yourself?” Granger asked, and Carson looked at him. “You’re her friend, right? Why not you? Why us old guys?”

“I suppose that came out wrong, the part about the old guys…”

“Lay off him, Granger,” Mac said, reaching for his beer. “The boy’s trying to sort out his issues with that missing father of his. You remember that, don’t you?”

“Damn shame, that. He had a beautiful wife and three fine boys. No reason to walk away from that. No good one, anyway. You know my boy Tom was in love with her, but she only had eyes for that one. Then he left her. Never came back. Never so much as a word.”

Fidgeting, Carson gave the old man a look. He wasn’t sure his father was a great man or anything, but he knew he hadn’t abandoned them completely. He’d come back. “I’m pretty sure he’s dead.”

“Nightmares again, kid?”

Carson took a sip, closing his eyes for a moment. “Memories. I don’t remember it all yet, but I know I talked to him at least once before he died.”

Brady shook his head. “Henry swore he never saw him again. None of them did.”

“Dad made me promise not to tell. I was a kid. I guess I didn’t.”

“Did he hurt you?”

Carson shrugged, feeling helpless again. “I don’t know. I don’t remember anything, but there was one dream where I saw blood on my arm, so he could have or he could just have been dead… The one clear part I have doesn’t deal with him hurting me, but I can’t help worrying that he did.”

“Sounds a lot like James.”

“James?”

Mackenna winced. “Don’t go into that. Not now. Not here.”

“Oh,” Carson said, understanding what she was trying to avoid. She’d told him before, but he hadn’t connected that to this. “Your uncle?”

“Yeah. He—his unit was under review—someone had accused them of hurting civilians. I’m not sure if it was a war crime sort of thing or just an accident or what, but he couldn’t remember the incident well enough, and the idea that he’d been a part of that… It destroyed him.”

“He wasn’t,” Mac said, his voice cold. “Investigation cleared the whole unit. Too little, too late, though. My boy was already gone.”

“We need another round. Need to get those dark looks off some faces and get that one tipsy enough to kiss all the old men again.”

Mackenna forced a smile. “I don’t have to drink to do that, Brady.”

She leaned over to kiss his forehead, and then rose, doing a sort of duck, duck, goose thing as she circled the table. Carson smiled as she did, knowing that they all needed the distraction. He didn’t know that they’d learned anything here they hadn’t known before, but both Mac and Mackenna needed the old men—their friends—to keep going. This was a part of who they were, not just a casual outing. Their friends mattered to them.

Carson jerked when he felt her lips on his forehead, not expecting that, and the whole table burst out laughing. She grinned at him, sitting down and looking smug. “Gotcha.”

“Yeah, you did.”

George snorted. “That was nothing. Should have seen my Rosie back in the day. Now, she was quite a lady, but boy, she could kiss…”

Author’s Note: Mostly just a fun moment. Everyone deserves them.

Suggestions, Jokes, and Unwanted Advice

“Truck working?”

“I think so, but the real test will be driving it around with a car in the trailer. It needs a stress test,” Mackenna told her grandfather, looking up to the mirror as she tried to get the grease off her hands. She wished that it was easier to get that stuff off, since most of the cleaners that claimed to do it made her nauseous by smell alone, sometimes giving her bad reactions if she tried to use them. She was stuck with plain soap, and she just never seemed to get clean.

“No joyride?”

She laughed. “I let Carson drive it around some of the roads he knows. He took me out by his family’s farm and showed me a few things, and we took it down to the interstate and pushed the speed a bit, but no, I didn’t load up any of the cars, and I didn’t take the trailer out. The Woodsman is running again—that’s the important thing.”

Mac nodded. “It is. You put those tires on the one that belongs to him?”

“Yeah, Phantom has tires, just for the sake of moving her around. Why?”

“Load her up. We’ll go down to the Legion. Maybe someone will recognize it. Might know about Henry and the past. Might not.”

“Good idea. You want to back the truck into place while I find Carson? I think he disappeared somewhere when his brother called. I don’t know that he wants me to hear any part of that since they keep teasing him about me.”

Mac grunted. “You’re not doing much to discourage those kind of rumors.”

She sighed. “You know me better than that. I’m not dating him. I just… He’s a friend. He’s like a brother to me, too, and I always wanted someone like that. So sue me. I’m weak. I needed someone other than you to talk to, someone my age—I think he’s a bit older—someone who needs me back.”

“You think I don’t need you?”

That made her laugh. “The Great Mac Gilreath doesn’t need anyone, remember?”

Her grandfather shook his head as he walked away, and she let out a breath as she leaned over the sink. She hadn’t meant that, but then again… She had. She didn’t want to fight with him, but she also didn’t need anyone giving her crap about her friendship with Carson. What they had helped both of them, and it wasn’t for anyone else to judge. Why was it that everyone had to be obsessed with the idea that since she was female and he was male they were attracted to each other? It wasn’t about that with them, and it wouldn’t be.

She shook her head as she grabbed a towel, drying off her hands before she left the room. She walked over to the other doorway, leaning in. “Carson? Mac wants to go to the Legion. You okay with coming with? He thought that maybe someone down there would recognize the car or know your grandfather. Might help. Might be nothing.”

Carson nodded, grabbing a shirt off his bed. She didn’t know that he’d need it—looked like a warm night—but it couldn’t hurt to have an extra layer just in case. “The Legion has a bar, yes?”

“I thought you were a lightweight and avoided drinking.”

“I do, usually. It’s just… Nick said something that pissed me off, and I hung up on him, so then Larry called me, and he ticked me off, too. I want a drink. Just a let off steam type deal. I’m stopping at one. You should, too.”

“Oh, you be careful. They’ll buy you rounds faster than you know what to do with down there. If they like you, that is.”

“Hmm. Maybe I should make it so they don’t like me.”

“That’s not funny.”

“It isn’t? I thought that was pretty good.”

“You need better jokes.”

He rolled his eyes. She grinned, and he reached over to tug on her bandana. “You need better clothes. You’re not planning on going in your dirty overalls, are you?”

“What, don’t you think this look is sexy? I mean, it’s the height of fashion because filth is free, stains are sensual, and crud is chic.”

He shook his head. “That time you should have stopped when you were ahead. It’s a shame your one shirt never got washed. That would be a perfect choice, since you’re about to see all your guy friends at the Legion.”

“They’ve seen it. I think they’ve seen them all. I’ve got some you haven’t seen, though, so I suppose I could change…”

“Surprise me.”

She grinned. “Don’t worry. I will.”

Author’s Note: So, for a very, very brief time, my dad owned a truck like the one Mac and Mackenna have, but we never gave it a nickname since we only had it for the briefest of times. Kept its camper for a lot longer, though…

Nicknames and Repairs

“Is there any hope?” Carson asked, peering under the hood, not sure what he was seeing, since he knew so little about engines. He tried to pick out what he did know—there was the battery, the radiator, the fan, maybe, the windshield wiper thing—and that just left him feeling more pathetic than before. He didn’t know anything about cars.

She’d probably just laugh and tell him that was what he had her for, and she was right, but he didn’t think he wanted to be dependent on her forever. Bad enough he couldn’t seem to cope with his own mind without her, but he could at least learn basic maintenance for a car, couldn’t he?

“Maybe,” she said, crawling out from underneath the truck. “Go ahead and start it for me, would you? Or try to start it? We’ll see if that did anything, or if I should stop calling myself a mechanic.”

“Because one truck won’t start, you’re going to give up your right to your profession?”

She laughed. “This isn’t a profession. I’m a girl. This is a lark, a hobby, a joke—”

“No, it’s not, and you’ve never talked like that before. Even when you thought I was a chauvinist, you never made it seem like you thought—like everyone treated you like you couldn’t fix a car because you’re a woman. Do they? Is that how all these guys at the Legion and people on the run are? Really? Because if it is—”

“Wow, you are so protective. Larry and Nick taught you well,” she said, reaching over to touch his cheek. He felt something on his skin, rough and gritty, and he figured she’d gotten grease on him now. She pulled her hand down and grimaced. “Sorry. I was just teasing. I forgot how dirty my hands get, especially with this monster. He leaks.”

“He? I thought the cars were all female.”

“That would be sexist.”

Carson laughed. “I see. So the ones you like are female and the ones you don’t are male? Now who is being—”

“Shh. Don’t say I don’t like him. He’s the only man in my life besides Mac. Well, and you,” Mackenna said, giving the truck a pat. Carson shook his head. Unbelievable. She could be so… He didn’t want to say frustrating, but she was always pushing some kind of button, wasn’t she? Either she was pushing him or teasing him, and he knew he needed the one and could put up with the other, but still… He kept finding himself in moments like this where he didn’t know if he should laugh or walk away.

No, that wasn’t right, either. He knew enough to know that he couldn’t walk away. He needed her, and he couldn’t ignore that. He didn’t know why they’d ended up so tangled in each other’s lives, but they were. No going back now. Unless they had some kind of huge fight, they’d be friends for the rest of their lives.

“Oh, I know what it is,” he said, almost gleeful when he realized he might be able to tease her for a change. “The truck is a he because it’s all manly, does the work, hauls the trailer, is considered a symbol of masculinity—”

“Guzzles everything it can, chain smokes, and has gas problems? That the kind of manly you mean?”

“You really do hate men, don’t you?”

“Can’t hate you. You’re too much fun to tease,” Mackenna told him with a grin. He rolled his eyes. “No, actually, I thought Shadow was a ‘guy’ first, but I ended up using the feminine form since Mac called her ‘she’ and the last thing a car needs is gender confusion.”

“Right.”

“Besides, with a name like ‘the Woodsman,’ you can’t call the truck a ‘she.’”

“The Woodsman?”

“Yep,” she said, waving him over to the side of the truck where a plate with the words Custom Camper was, opening the compartment next to it. Carson frowned when he saw the firewood stored there, hidden away in a little spot almost under the cab. He’d never seen that feature before. “I guess my dad named it that years and years ago. So, anyway, I just can’t bring myself to call The Woodsman a ‘she,’ even if the rest of the cars are ‘girls.’ Well, ‘ladies’ is a more fitting description.”

“Why? Because they’re a hundred years old? That’s young yet.”

She laughed. “True. They’ve got a long life ahead of them.”

“Is it hard to work on the truck, knowing its connection to your dad?”

She shook her head. “No. I never knew him, don’t have anything to associate with him. It’s not the same for me. If it was my uncle, maybe, but not my dad. My dad’s just… He was a genetic donor, and I know it shouldn’t be that way because they did love me and all, but my uncle raised me, not them. Those are the people that matter—my uncle and Mac. That’s it. Even when Mac tells me about my parents, I don’t feel any different, don’t really seem to care. That’s wrong, isn’t it?”

He shook his head. “I think it’s understandable. It’s like… if you were adopted, the ones that raised you are your parents, right? Just because someone caused your birth doesn’t necessarily give them any rights. I mean—no one would think a rapist had a right to his kid, would they?”

“Depends on the circumstances and if he was married or dating the woman at the time or if he’s just a good liar, but yeah, I get your point.”

Carson grimaced. “Okay, subject change. Let’s try a song about… um…”

“Camping? Hello, Muddah, hello, Faddah, here I am in Camp Grenada…”

Perfect. She’d picked one that he knew. “Camp is very entertaining, and they say we’ll have fun when it stops raining.”

She giggled, reaching into the cab of the truck and turning over the key. The truck gurgled, sputtering some, but it came to life, and she grinned. “Ah, now I know the secret. I’ll have to make you sing to him from now on. I think he likes you.”

“Oh?” Carson asked. “I’m not so sure I like you.”

Author’s Note: Plans change so often, but it’s important to have them, right?

The Day’s Plans

Mackenna cleared away the dishes from breakfast with Carson’s help. He passed them to her so that she could load the dishwasher as she went along. She didn’t say anything, but she couldn’t help thinking that they made a pretty good team and had already settled into a routine, here and at his apartment. They’d make decent roommates.

He could stay here if he broke his lease. Well, Mac would have to agree to that, but she’d be okay with it. She would like it a lot, if she was honest. They had similar patterns of behavior—both insomniacs—and she enjoyed having someone to pass those long hours with for a change.

“I’m heading into town.”

“Okay, Mac,” she said, aware of the lingering, always unspoken question that went with those words. She didn’t do what he did on Sundays, and she didn’t know that she ever would. Maybe if she ever felt healed enough, if she didn’t find it hard to reconcile faith with all the bad she’d seen, but she just couldn’t bring herself to go there now. “We’ll see you when you get back.”

“You’ve got plans?”

“Well, we can either prep Shadow or go over Phantom some or take a nap because neither of us slept last night, but we’ll have to play it by ear. Did you want to wait on getting Shadow ready? I can save that for when you’re back.”

Mac nodded, pointing behind her, and she turned to the sink. She grimaced as she looked at the dishes that needed to be washed by hand. She should deal with them now—had to do them before Tuesday—but she didn’t want to do it. She never did. Still, this was her week for dishes, and she was getting off easy since they’d be gone for most of the week.

“All right. I’ll get them done before you get back. Carson can help.”

He frowned at her, and she elbowed him, so he rolled his eyes. “Yeah, sure. I’ll help dry them. That’s it.”

“Behave,” Mac said, heading out of the kitchen. Mackenna almost laughed, but then again, she wasn’t sure she liked what might have been implied by his warning. She wasn’t a troublemaker, and she took care of all of her responsibilities around here.

“So, out of curiosity, why didn’t you say you were going to fix the truck? I mean, that’s what you need to haul the cars to your run, right? So if you need the truck, you should work on it, shouldn’t you?”

She winced. “Oh, there is that. I don’t know that it’s salvageable, to be honest, but it’s hard to be a mechanic and admit that I can’t fix something. It’s so demoralizing. I mean, if you think about it, what mechanic can’t fix her own car?”

“If the car’s had enough, it’s had enough. You can’t do anything about it. I mean, mine’s totaled, right? That is what we’re saying about it.”

“You’re not a mechanic.”

“True, but the same principle applies. No amount of new parts would be worth it. You know… Larry really liked you, and he inherited Grandpa’s truck, the one I drove Phantom over here in, so if you wanted to ask him to borrow that one…”

“I don’t think encouraging your brother is a good idea. I’m not interested in him, and from what I gathered, his ex-wife did a number on him when she left.”

“Nick’ll tell you that’s what he deserved for marrying a lawyer in the first place, but I’m not so sure I agree. I didn’t ever like the woman, I admit that, but Larry did. He loved her. She even seemed to love him. It was just that they were from two different worlds. Her career was more important to her, and he wasn’t ambitious, and so they drifted. She climbed the ladder, slept with a few people along the way, and they split. She blamed the glass ceiling. He told her would have shot through it for her. I think a part of him still loves her. Yeah, don’t mess with Larry’s heart. It’s not fair.”

“I won’t. I promise.” Mackenna shook her head. “I don’t know. I’m not the marrying kind, but I just don’t know how a career could be more important. Of course, when you grow up a bit starved for companionship, you value it more than some people do. My aunt was such a mess, and I probably could have used some therapy after my uncle died—I was a bit traumatized and not easy to know—so I was alone a lot.”

“You really did need a brother or sister.”

“It might have helped, yeah.”

“Well, you have three now, so that’s something, right?”

She nodded. “It is. I’m glad you came here with Phantom. Even if we don’t ever get you all your memories back—and I still think we will—you coming here was important. For both of us. We needed to meet. We need each other.”

“We do. More than we knew.”

“Oh, hey, I should dig out that song. More than You Know. I think I have a version of Ella Fitzgerald doing it,” Mackenna said, thinking that washing the dishes deserved a soundtrack anyway. She could think of several songs that suggested that singing made things better, and she agreed with them. “Just a second. I’ll find it.”

Carson smiled. “No worries. I’m not going anywhere.”