6 weeks later

Blackwell, Middle of nowhere, USA

September arrives, and the leaves start to show the slightest sign of red and orange. Classes are back in session at Blackwell University, and the college kids fill out the town.

And the auto shop.

We hired a kid to help us with the extra business we’ve been getting.

“Ralph. Wrench.” I say from under the car. I’m rolled underneath and working on a woman’s brake pads, de-torquing some screws.

Well, not her brake pads. Her car’s brake pads. You know what I mean.

“Anyways,” the kid continues his story. “I had a big crush on this girl named Rose, but turns out she was hooking up with a professor all along. I didn’t stand a chance.”

“That’s rough.” I say, wiping the sweat from my brow.

September in Blackwell is still steamy. I don’t have the heart to tell the kid I know exactly who Rose was hooking up with, since I’m buddies with the professor in question. He’s young. He’ll recover.

“What about you, Liam? You got a girlfriend?”

I sigh.

“Nah.” I answer simply. “Switch me out for the breaker bar.” I say, handing him the wrench.

Since the shitstorm I endured with Haley and my breakup, I’ve had exactly zero motivation to “get back out there” as the dating gurus like to say.

I’ve put all my mental energy into working and staying busy at the shop.

I fix the rotor in place and twist it in with a grunt, but something’s not right.

“So you just...don’t want a girlfriend?”

I try to re-center the rotor on the screw holes, then push it back in. I can’t quite fit them, though.

“You don’t have to talk about it if you’re busy.” Ralph says. Jesus Christ, you’da thought I put ‘personal conversationalist’ on the damn application.

“Fucking screws don’t fit.” I growl through my teeth, and roll out from under the car.

“Do you have the three eighths or the one quarter screws?” He asks.

I sit up, and try to towel some of the grease off my body, but the dirty towel doesn’t seem to do much. “Three eighths.”

“Well, this is a Mini Cooper, so shouldn’t you be using a quarter?”

I look at Ralph, the skinny, gangly college junior.

I clench my jaw. I don’t like being told the right answer about something, especially in my own shop. “How’d you know that?” I ask.

He shrugs. “I checked the specs on my phone while you were down there.”

“Good job,” I say, though inside, I’m fuming. “Give me the other screws. Actually, you want to get under there and have at it?”

His eyes light up. For this entire week, he’s basically just been learning the ropes. He hasn’t even touched a car yet.

I switch places with him, and hand him the screwdriver, and he slides underneath.

“I had a girl,” I tell him. “The thing about women, is that when you meet one who gets you, it goes great. Until it doesn’t. And then, it all falls to shit. Just like a car, my man. You can have a great engine in theory, but all it takes is one of a million possible problems, and bam--your car is done for.”

“So how are you supposed to keep it from falling apart?” He asks, sticking out a hand from under the car. I put four more screws in his palm.

“Maintenance, my man. You’ve got to make sure you’re taking her in all the time, keeping her well lubricated, making that baby purr like she did the very first time.” I sort of drift off into my own analogy, getting carried away, but I think it works.

Ralph pops out from under the car. “Done.” He says, sitting up. “Hey, you doing alright?”

“Alright? Why wouldn’t I be.”

He stands up and shrugs. “You just seem tense. You got a vein popping out of your neck.”

I touch my neck, and realize the kid’s right. My fist is also clenched. I’m basically a ball of tension waiting to explode.

“Not tense at all.” I lie. “Must just be the heat.”

“Hey y’all.” I hear a woman’s voice call from behind us, outside the garage doors.

I spin around, a little too fast, and for a moment all I see is the blur of long red hair, sunglasses, and a white and blue dress.

My heart starts thumping. I walk toward the woman with a smile. I can’t quite make her face out, but this has to be her.

Haley’s been thinking about me just as much as I’ve been obsessing over her these last weeks. All the times I’ve called and texted her, she’s been saving those to surprise me.

My grin dissipates when I get closer to her, and realize this is most definitely not Haley Rosebaum. Whoever it is, they have the same shade of her red hair, and it’s playing tricks on my mind.

“Hi. You must be Liam. I’m here to pick up my brother, Ralph. I’m Delilah.” She pauses. “Are you okay, Sir? You look a little tense.”

My lack of Haley Rosebaum has me dying of thirst, like I’m in the desert. I might as well be, I’m over here seeing fucking mirages.

I clear my throat. “I’m fine, thanks. Nice to meet you.” I stick out my hand for a shake.

“You too. Thanks for having Ralph. I know he’s a little awkward, but he’s a good kid.”

“So you go to Blackwell University, too?”

“Yeah. I’m a senior.”

I nod. “Well congrats.”

She swallows and gives me an up-and-down. Fuck. I realize I don’t have a shirt on, and when I thought she was Haley, I was giving this girl the straight up “I’m going to fuck the shit out of you” eyes as I walked toward her.

I might as well be full on flirting with this broad. She licks her lips, takes off her sunglasses, and shakes her hair out a little.

“So you’re the boss around here, eh?” She asks. I turn my head and see Ralph grabbing his things.

“You could say that.”

“That’s...very cool.” The corners of her lips curve upward in a flirty smile. “Look. I know this might be a little forward. But here’s my number...if you ever want to grab a drink or something.” She says. “I could help you relieve some of that tension you are experiencing.”

She jots her number on the back of a scrap of paper, then hands it to me right before Ralph gets to us.

“See you later, Liam!” He says cheerily. They walk together to her car, and she turns and winks at me over her shoulder.

“Later.” I croak.

They pull away. I look at the number in my hand, crumple it and toss it into the the trash.

As I hear her car pull away, I realize there is one thing she’s right about. I am very tense these days, much more so than I used to be.

I thought an adventure with Haley away from Blackwell would be the antidote to the stress I’ve been feeling.

Instead, almost two months later, I’m dreaming up ways in my head that I could possibly get Haley Rosebaum back.

I take a deep breath as I turn off the lights to the shop, and my phone lights up with a text from my buddy Cole, who is also going through a rough time right now, given his employment situation.

Cole: Drinks at The Watering Hole tonight?

Liam: You bet your ass

I haven’t been drinking in almost a month. And you know what, it’s time to relieve some of that tension everyone keeps telling me I have.

* * *

It’s a typical Friday night at The Watering Hole. My boy Mason is behind the bar, hooking me up with free drinks, and my buddy Cole sits with me as we proceed to get shitfaced. It’s guys night. Except, of course, for the girl who has inserted herself right next to me, between mine and Cole’s barstools.

“So like, if you’re not doing anything later, I’m trying to get some perspectives on a photo shoot I did for my secret tumblr blog.” The pretty brunette says next to me. I’ve known Francine for some time. She’s always been a good girl, and I’m surprised that she’s propositioning me like this.

“Look, no offense, but I’m just not interested.” I reiterate.

“Why?” She scoffs.

“Leave the lovesick man alone!” Cole barks from behind in a sarcastic tone.

“Liam, I don’t see what the big deal is. I’m not even looking for anything serious.”

She sways a little, clearly buzzed.

“Well maybe I am,” I growl.

Her eyes bulge a little bit and she scoffs. “Asshole.” She mutters under her breath as she walks away.

Mason shakes his head as he fills a pitcher of beer behind the bar. “Dude what has gotten into you lately? She’s hot. I don’t understand what your big deal is. You’re Liam fucking Blackwell. You crush puss. It’s kind of your thing.”

“So? I’m not in the mood for a one night stand tonight. What’s the big deal?” I shrug.

Mason chuckles. “Dude you haven’t been ‘in the mood’ for a one night stand since you got back from that crazy road trip or whatever you did with that girl. What’s her name? Haley? Dude she’s not coming back. You just need to get over yourself. And Francine’s a nice girl. She’s very experienced. You just have to get over this girl, man. And the best way to get over her is standing in the corner. Ironically, I bet she wants you more now that you turned her down.” Mason finishes filling the pitcher and turns to Cole. “Can you explain that one, Mr. Harvard Professor of attraction? Why do girls want guys they can’t have?”

“Ex-Professor,” I correct with a smirk.

“Dude, fuck you. Too soon, man.” Cole shakes his head, still a little salty about his current work situation. “And now I’m not even going to explain the theory of attraction, and thus the reason for that.”

“Aww, come on,” Mason chides. “It’s not Liam’s fault you decided to sleep with a student.”

Cole rolls his eyes, then shrugs. “Worth it, asshole.”

“Oh, is that because you are in looove?” Mason draws out the L-word, and Cole’s jaw clenches up a little bit.

“What, you’ve never been in love, Mason?”

Mason’s a smooth operator, but when Cole says that, he gets a little flushed.

I know why, too. Mason has been in love. Once.

Just it’s been with Cole’s little sister, who is incidentally back in Blackwell now.

And incidentally just got hired as a hostess at this very bar.

And incidentally, I’m the only who knows this.

“I fall in love with every girl I see at the bar.” Mason says, deflecting. “How about you, Liam? Mr. Heart of Stone.”

I smirk. “I don’t know man. I thought I was in love when I was nineteen, but I don’t think I even knew what love was, back then. The girl fucked me up pretty bad though.”

“So you’ve never been in love with anyone since then?”

I bite my lower lip. I honestly thought what Haley and I had was love. But if she wasn’t willing to give me a shot because of something in my past—something I had no control over—was it real love in the end?

“I don’t know.” I say, a little hoarsely, and take another sip of my whisky straight.

“Whoa, getting all serious on us.” Mason quips, then heads to the other end of the bar to attend to a customer.

“So you were in love with this broad? Dude, you fall so quickly. It’s really quite an accomplishment, if you ask me,” Cole comments.

“Nah,” I say, swallowing. “I wasn’t in love with the girl. I just wasn’t.”

When I say the words, I’m trying more to convince myself than just trying to state a fact. Just thinking about Haley’s deep red hair, those blue eyes, the way she looked in the dress on her sister’s wedding day, damn near activates me between my legs.

“So you weren’t in love with her, yet you won’t go and hang out with Francine, and, in fact, you just told her off.”

“Yeah, that’s right.” I argue.

“Okay, man. Well, it doesn’t take a Two-hundred thousand dollar degree to figure out what’s going on with you. I don’t know what this girl—what was her name? Haley?—did to you. But she fucked you up as bad as that girl from back when.”

I nod. “This was her sister.”

Cole damn near spits out his drink. “Her sister was the one you ran into late in the mechanic’s shop? So you’ve hooked up with two sisters.”

I nod. Cole scratches his head.

“Shit. I thought I did some shit, hooking up with the daughter of the Dean of Blackwell University. You, Sir, just might have outdone me.”

“Hey.” I shrug. “At least I got to keep my job.”

Cole clenches his jaw. “Dude. Too soon. Much too soon.”

“You know, you can always come work at the mechanic shop if you want. We could use a Harvard grad.” I wink.

“I just can’t believe it’s come to this. But I might take you up on that. I’ve been picking up some MMA classes at the gym that they let me teach, but I’ll take what I can get at this point.”

“I hear that man. Well, I saw they are hiring down the street at Nancy’s diner. I’m sure they could use a bus boy.”

Cole chuckles, ever the good natured guy. “Dude, if I didn’t know you so well, I’d be punching you in the face right about now.”

“Well you do.” I say with a chuckle, smirking.

Mason finds his way back to us. “Alright well, you guys want to head out? I trained the little hostess to pour drinks for the rest of the night.”

“By ‘little hostess,’ do you mean ‘my sister?’

Mason rubs his cheek with his thumb.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Hm. Okay. You don’t know her name?”

Shit is getting awkward between the two of them. And I’m the only one who knows why.

I’m ninety percent sure Mason is hooking up with Cole’s little sister.

I interject, breaking the tension. “It’s midnight, so we are past peak time here. And I’m starved. You want to hit up Nancy’s diner?”

“Yes, definitely!” Mason gratefully says. “I love Nancy’s.”

“And that’s perfect, because ol’ Harvard here is going to pick up an application.”

Cole punches me in the arm. “I swear to God, Liam. You’re gonna get it one of these days.”

“Oww.” I mouth, rubbing my arm and feigning like he hurt me. “Who is the new bartender by the way, Mason? She’s cute.”

“Dude,” Cole says, grabbing my shirt. “That’s my fucking sister. Were you not paying attention?”

“Oh.” I wink, and put my hands up. “Too far. My bad.” Right as I speak, Clarissa files into the bar behind Mason. “Hi Clarissa.”

“Hi Liam,” she drawls.

“Thanks for taking over for the big guy here so we grab some food,” I say, nodding toward Mason.

“Oh, it’s alright.” She says, rubbing Mason’s back. “I know how our star mixologist gets when he is on his feet all day.”

Cole glares at Mason, and then at Clarissa. I would do the same if I had a sister who were rubbing my good buddy’s back like that. I might have to raise the odds of them hooking up to one hundred percent.

But I’ve pushed Cole far enough tonight. As much of an asshole as I am, I know when to keep my damn mouth shut.

And when you suspect your buddy may be hooking up with your other buddy’s little sister, that is just one of the times you bite your tongue.

“Let me close out my tabs and I’ll be ready.” Mason says. Clarissa gets busy at the bar, and damn, she is going to get some tips tonight. Her flirting game is strong.

Cole whips out his phone, probably texting his girlfriend. I think about taking mine out, but who would I text?

Instead, I fist my drink and gaze into the numerous bottles of alcohol behind it.

The past few weeks have been monotonous, but worse than that, just about everything that happens sets me off. At work, I’m a cannon waiting to be unleashed.

Asshole Liam is back in full force.

I guess I’ve always been an asshole. After I had some time to process the whole ‘Haley and me’ thing, I found it ironic that she’s softened me by loving how much of a dick I was. Anytime I went too far—in the bedroom, or in general, she’d say ‘yes, and I can one up you.’

I can be dirtier than you are, she’d say. And damn, did she live up to it. I smile a little, thinking of the nickname I gave her from day one.

Dagny—the dirty ass girl from New York—was as accurate a name as I’ve ever given someone. I wonder what she’s doing now? I hope she’s happy, whatever it is.

A baseball game flashes on TV, and my eyes move up to the big screen. The Chicago Jaguars are playing in New York tonight, and of course that cocky bastard Jake Napleton is on the mound for the Jags.

I wonder if Haley has ever been to a Yankee’s game. I’d love to take her to one if she hasn’t. What if I just drive to New York and pop in? She can’t say no to me once I’m there, right?

My heart starts racing, even just at the thought of heading to New York. It’s crazy, but shit, who in this damn town is crazier than me?

Finally Mason closes out his tabs, and we head out of the bar to Nancy’s Diner, just down the street. Mason and Cole are saying some things as they walk slightly ahead, but I’m too far in my own head to hear them, already planning my trip to New York.

Sure, I may be crazy. But it wouldn’t be the first time someone called me out on having an insane plan. And it wouldn’t be so hard. What the hell do I have to lose?

Why didn’t I think of this earlier?

We file into Nancy’s diner, get a booth with a table for three.

A smile spreads across my face from ear to ear.

“What the hell’s gotten into you?” Mason asks, furrowing his brow from across the table. “You look like you either just won the lottery, or maybe just got out of jail. I’m guessing it’s the first, so you know I want a few hundred bones.”

“Just a few hundred?” I wink.

“Seriously. What are you thinking about?”

There comes a time in every man’s life when he has his Good Will Hunting moment: Where you stop whatever you’re doing, and you just know, you ‘gotta go see about a girl.’

I get up from the table, still with that same shit-eating grin on my face.

“What are you doing man? You alright?” Cole asks. “I mean I know sausage and pancakes for dinner is your favorite, and it’s even better at midnight, but usually you don’t get this excited.”

I take a deep breath and get ready to unleash something on these guys. Cole risked his career to be with his love. He’ll understand.

“I’m going to fucking New York!!” I boom, full confidence in my voice.

Mason’s jaw drops. Cole just nods and bites his lip a little. “It’s that girl, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” I admit. “It’s the girl.”

“Ha! I knew it!” Cole gloats, slamming his hand on the table.

“Well, are you going to leave right fucking now? Or are you going to have some pancakes and finally tell us about this broad?” Mason asks. “You’ve barely said shit about her since you’ve been back.”

I nod whimsically. I don’t know where to start about Haley. How I like her soft voice, her pretty eyes, or maybe just keep it classy and talk about how great we are at fucking together.

And then our waitress’s eyes catch mine as she walks toward us with a jug of water.

She’s fucking gorgeous. Blue eyes, red hair done up in a bun.

Jeans and blue shirt, apron and above all, her scent is intoxicating. Her breasts basically pop out of her top. Am I crazy, or have those things gotten bigger in the last months since I’ve seen her? Clearly she is using those cocktailing instincts to get some solid tips.

“Hi boys.” She drawls. “Y’all need any coffees or orange juice with this water?”

And my night just got a lot crazier.

I guess I don’t have to go to New York after all.

Haley Rosebaum, my Dagny, stands right in front of me.