“I’ve never even heard of this place,” I said, groaning as we exited his car the following morning. We’d waited until late morning, when there would be few people to run into. I found it hard to believe that X was a man who would run in very many social circles, especially given his proclivity to stay locked up in his house like it was some fortress, protecting him from the evils of socializing.
“Yeah, and that’s a good thing,” he replied, coming around to my side of the car. “Less security. Grainy video surveillance. On the opposite side of town.” He wrapped an arm around my shoulders and I struggled not to duck away from it.
The problem wasn’t that I didn’t want X touching me—the problem was that I did. Very, very much.
“And besides, this place has jackhammers in stock. The other places had to ship to store, and we can’t let Ron literally waste away in my freezer.”
“Fine,” I muttered, taking his hand when his arm dropped from my shoulder. “But I want to pick it out.”
The hardware store was clean enough, and the stockers were plentiful, which was a good thing. We’d need advice on the project we were about to take on. I could tell X wasn’t someone who frequented hardware stores, judging by the way he picked up a few things and studied them, trying to decipher their purpose. “That’s a nail gun,” I told him, and put the chamber up against my palm. “Just hook up the compressor, pull the trigger and boom! New piercing.”
“In your hand, though?”
“We could try it out on your nipples, if that’d be a better place?” I raised an eyebrow at him, watching as he swallowed hard.
“I like my nipples intact, thanks.”
“Good, I like them too.” I dragged my hand over a hammer. “Too bad you didn’t have one of these when,” I looked around, to see if we were alone, “you know.” I simulated smacking upside my head, the way X had hauled that cast iron pan atop of Ron’s head.
“Wouldn’t that have been messier?”
“Maybe. But it wouldn’t have sullied my favorite pan with a horrible memory.” I closed my hand over a box of nails. “You know, that pan is the most expensive thing I’ve purchased with my own money?”
“Yeah, right. What about your car?”
“That was given to me in payment for one of my drops. And that debt I owed Ron was part of the reason I got thrown in jail. Great waste of potential income too, considering that the hunk of duct tape and metal is still parked in your neighborhood.” I only knew that because we’d driven past it on our way to the hardware store. It’d already collected a couple tickets.
“But anyway. The most expensive thing I’ve purchased with my own, hard-earned money.”
“You have a job?” he asked as I slipped the box of nails into the pocket of my yoga pants.
“Yeah, I work at a diner. Shifts haven’t been great lately and my boss needs to get bent, so I haven’t been working as much as I’d like.” Which reminded me that my rent would be due in a few days, and there was not enough money in my bank account to pay half.
X came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. “You, serving people? It’s a hard thing to imagine.”
“I know. Imagine how I feel.”
His hand patted the box in my pants and without saying anything, he fished the nails out and gave me a mild look.
“I wanted them,” I told him simply, staring at them as he placed them back on the shelf.
“If you really want them, I can pay for them.”
“Yeah, but it’s not about the money.” And then I zipped my lips shut. I would never be able to explain to X the reasons I stole things. I didn’t claim I had honorable, Robin Hood-style intentions. I wanted things—I collected things. Impractical things, like the encyclopedias in my apartment. That kind of shit looked passed down, from one generation to the next. They made me feel like I belonged to someone. The people who had thrown them in the dumpster without a second thought made me sick.
“What is it then?”
“Nope,” I told him simply, quickening my pace only slightly as I turned down the next aisle. “Now this is what I’m talking about,” I said with my arms wide as I took in every yellow, orange, green, blue, and black tool that decorated the counter.
“What could we possibly need in this aisle?”
“Uh, tools. That’s kiiiind of the reason we’re here, X.” I rolled my eyes at him and then held my hands out like a game show model showing off a prize. “Look. A reciprocating saw!”
“What the hell is a reciprocating saw?”
It wasn’t powered, so I picked it up and held it like it was an automatic weapon. “Check it,” I said excitedly. This was different than holding Ron’s gun—this felt like I was seriously in charge of some shit. “I feel like I’m a character in Scarface.”
X shook his head, but didn’t look entirely comfortable with the idea of me holding something as intimidating as a recip saw. “What would we need something like this for?”
Before I could answer that we needed it because it looked damned cool, an employee in a bland, oatmeal-colored uniform stepped forward. Sweat stippled his thinning hairline and he had a genuine smile. “Anything I could help you with?”
“No,” X said as I exclaimed, “Yes!” Because I was louder, I won.
“So,” I began, running my tongue over my teeth. “My boyfriend and I have a little project we’re working on. Trying to fix a problem, you know? And I’m trying to sell him on this.” I thrust the saw up and even the employee backed away for a second.
“Okay, well maybe tell me a little about your project, and I’ll see if I can help outfit you both for it.”
“It’s silly; it’s really a fix because he,” I hooked a thumb at X, “has such shallow pockets, so we’ve gotta do it ourselves.” I looked over my shoulder at him and tsked. “The floor drain in his garage needs to be fixed. Busted pipe.”
“Oh.” The worker turned to X. “A drain in your garage? Must be pretty fancy.”
X began to stutter a reply before I interrupted. “He’s got a car collection, and because he’s so anal about cleaning them, he has a wash bay in the garage. Anyway, we need to replace the pipe under the drain, but there’s all that concrete.”
“Right.” The worker—whose nametag read James, took the saw from my hands. “This wouldn’t be that much use for getting through concrete—”
“See?” X said.
“But the concrete probably has rebar, and you’d need something to get through all that.”
“Oh my God, rebar, babe,” I said dramatically, my hands clutched to my chest.
“You’re going to want a good blade for that. Rebar’s tough on reciprocating saws.”
“For sure,” I agreed, nodding.
James slipped a saw off the rack and handed it to me. “And if you’re going to use this, you’ll need eye equipment.” He looked at X. “Do you have eye protection?”
“Nope, we don’t,” I replied, steering James’ attention to me. X wouldn’t know what to say, and one of us was trained in improv—even though it was prison-level improv. “Gotta get them goggles,” I said, tossing one James handed me to X. I slipped mine over my face, testing them out. “These are comfy.”
James looked at me like I was a little deranged, which I didn’t doubt I looked. “Okay, so do you have a jackhammer?” James asked.
“No.” It was a reverent whisper. All my heavy machinery dreams coming true. “We need one of those.”
X sighed from behind me, and I turned around to loop my arm in his. “What’s wrong?” I asked, as we followed James a few aisles down.
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“I’d offer to split the bill with you, but unless you want to dive in the cushions of my couch, you’re S.O.L. for getting any money from me. Besides, I think you’re good for it.”
“I’m not worried about the money. I’m worried about this…” He ran his hand through his hair and then down his face. “Project. This is already sounding like it’s going to be a rough time.”
“I mean, in all fairness, did you think getting rid of a body would be like tossing out an old sock?” I whispered.
He pursed his lips. “Of course not. But dumping him in Lake Michigan is looking better and better right now.”
“Oh,” I said, patting his chest, “don’t be a baby. Rebar and concrete—that’s what’s working you up? That’s nothing.”
“Here’s what we have in stock for jackhammers,” James said, gesturing a limp hand at the selection of four on display.
“Can I hold them?” I asked, practically rubbing my hands together in glee.
“Uh, sure,” he said, lifting them over the bars that kept them from falling off the display and handing me one. I gripped the handles and held it over the concrete floor, trying to imagine drilling this into X’s garage floor.
“Can it go deep? Like, real deep?”
X coughed behind me and James face resembled a tomato in color. “I mean, sure. How deep do you need to go?”
“Just the garage floor. So,” I tried to think about how tall Ronald was. “Six feet-ish?”
“Well, it could do that, but you don’t need a jackhammer to go six feet deep in a garage.”
When X and I looked at him quizzically, he said, “Garages are usually only about six inches of concrete.”
“Only six inches?” I asked, feigned shock in my voice. James turned redder and X coughed again. “Well, that’s disappointing.”
“Um, yeah, so underneath that concrete and rebar is usually gravel, compacted. And then dirt. You don’t need a jackhammer to go through dirt.”
“Oh, that makes sense. But I’m guessing all that dirt is going to be really hard to get through?”
“I recommend a pickaxe.” He stepped around the aisle and grabbed something off the endcap, holding it up for me to look at. “You can use this to break up the gravel and dirt, and then you’ll be good to go.
“But then where’s the dirt and gravel and concrete going to go?” X asked.
“Wheelbarrows?” James asked as if this was obvious. I didn’t know how he hadn’t picked up on the fact that we were complete novices at this.
“Okay, I’d suggest getting three wheelbarrows—one for the concrete, which you’ll dispose of. One for the gravel, and then one for the dirt.”
“Guess we’ll need shovels too, huh?”
X sighed beside me.
“You don’t have shovels?”
“We’re not exactly handy people, if you couldn’t tell.”
“I couldn’t tell,” James said, that terrible liar. “But then when you fix the pipe and start to put it all back, you’ll need a compactor. We rent those here. And you’ll want a concrete mixer.”
“Christ sakes. The lake is sounding much better by the second,” X said and I elbowed him in the gut.
“We’ll take it. All the shit you talked about.”
James looked hesitantly between the two of us. “Well, what about the pipe?”
I blinked blankly for a moment, before remembering the story I’d concocted. “Oh, duh. Yeah, we’re gonna need that pipe.” I wrapped my arm around X’s waist and leaned against him. “That area’s more this guy’s domain though. He loves laying pipe. Practically his hobby. Does it all day, every day. Night, too.” X tugged on my hair hard enough to stop me from talking, but not hard enough to actually hurt.
James’ face was brighter than a red traffic light. “Okay. This way.”
We passed a tile display and I grabbed a square and tried to shove it discreetly into my purse before X, just as discreetly, pulled it out and set it back. And then he gave me a look—not like he was disappointed in me, but more like he was trying to figure me out. I shook my head no, hoping he’d realize that this wasn’t something I was willing to talk about with him. Stealing things wasn’t about the things themselves, usually. It was about needing to have something—to know I could take it and sneak out with it. Something that was mine, even if it was mine under less than honorable circumstances.
Which was why I needed to keep an emotional distance from X. Because I knew that facing that kind of temptation for an extended period of time might make me needy and dependent. And because he was miles out of my league, anything I’d have with him would be an act of thievery.
I could steal him for myself, just to prove I could, but there’d be nothing honorable about that—and there was nothing safe in knowing that I’d be the one hurting when he finally left me.