Can't have nothin' nice.

[Jamie Mills]

Dated: October 28, 2014

Of all the days that this could happen.

Stony faced, standing with his arms folded over his chest, chin tucked and legs spread as if his unconscious mind still couldn’t break the habit of parade rest, Jamie watched through the windows as the mechanic popped the hood of Nissan Frontier he’d bought from his dad when he started planning on moving back to Vermont. He should have known not to trust the damn thing, and the 2,000+ mile journey seemed to have been enough pushed it over the edge.

He’d even woken up early this morning, with the goal of not sleeping on the floor of his new apartment that night. After a quick shower and breakfast, Jamie was about as ready to face the day as he ever would, and headed out. Only ten minutes later, the engine of his truck had sputtered and stopped with pathetic little hiss. Now it was nearly noon, and he’d done little more than call a tow truck and end up here at James’ Auto.

He never got the hang of fixing vehicles. His father was decent at it- taught him the basics like changing the oil, a flat tire, some troubleshooting if it started bumping or something. But it’d never been something that held his interest. Though it wasn’t like he’d have been able to fix whatever the hell was going on with the truck now.

Jamie turned away from the window looking into the garage, pulling out his phone to check the time and resigning himself to the fact that he probably wouldn’t be accomplishing much today, and whatever money he had set as a budget for the foreseeable future until he found a job would be going toward fixing the hunk of shit in the garage, or else buying a slightly-newer-slightly-less-shity hunk of shit if this one was beyond repair. Sleeping on the floor wasn’t so bad for him, he supposed. He was used to more uncomfortable circumstances as it was. Though, he’d been looking forward to buying a something gaudy and over the top bedroom set. With the biggest, fluffiest mattress he could afford.

Sliding his sunglasses from the collar of his shirt and slipping them on, Jamie exited the little auto shop and walked across the parking lot, up the little grassy hill to the sidewalk running along the street. It wasn’t so busy, and there was a gas station just across the street. He barely pondered it for a moment, before stepping off the curb and jogging across the street, barely glancing each way to make sure there wasn’t a car coming at him, and hopping back up the curb on the other side. His ability to resist buying a pack of cigarettes was dwindling, and today was a special case.

[Deleted]

Okay, so Kayla was a little late leaving the house this morning.

Okay, so maybe Kayla was very late in leaving the house this morning. Late enough that her little, driver’s license-less sister was screaming at her to get out of bed and get ready to go because she “was not going to be late because you had to stay up until 3 o’clock playing The Sims.” So Kayla rolled herself out of bed, didn’t even have time to take a shower, tossed on some clothes, and rushed out to the car with Rory practically pushing her from behind, a piece of toast hanging from her mouth, and a hairbrush hanging from her tousled, tangled hair. For anyone who thought that Kayla went to bed a goddess and woke up an angel, well they obviously had never lived with her. The girl had damn crazy sleeping habits, so bad that even Theodore gave up on sleeping with her when he was still a piglet. So while she might go to bed looking like the picture of fucking perfection, Kayla woke up about as disheveled as the next person. And she didn’t give a shit if her sister saw her that way. It was at least an hours drive into town, plenty of time to set her hair smooth and get some make-up on.

Yes, Kayla was one of those women. The kind who kept an arsenal of toiletries in her car so she could put on her face while stuck at a stoplight…well, maybe she’d do it at a stoplight, if she wasn’t running behind too badly.

Kayla was always running behind.

Thanks to massively exceeding the speed limit and having the bird flipped out at her at least eleventy times for cutting off asses who were driving too damn slow - and lingering in the left lane, as if they were trying to slow her down(jerks!) - Kayla was finally able to drop Rory off at the school. And only two hours late!

Next stop was the college for her first class of the day. Ugh…she got there on time, but the lecture put her to sleep something terrible. By the time she emerged from the classroom, Kayla had pretty much lost all her steam from the morning and desperately needed a pick me up. Did she have time to go to the Starbucks and still make it to work on time?

We. Shall. See!

Kayla hopped into her car and sped down the main road, her eyes heavy and straining like she was trying to take a massive crap or something just to keep them from falling closed. Her eyes crossed as they went out of focus. She turned the corner sharply, but still undershot it and rolled right up onto the curb with a shocking bu-dump! that had her ramming her foot hard on the break. Then there was a thunk, as if she’d just hit something the size of a man…

Wait a minute, that was a man!! FUCK!!

Wide awake now, Kayla felt the adrenaline surge through her as she unbuckled her seatbelt and barreled out of the car to inspect the scene. “Holy fuck! Did I just hit you!?” she screamed to the man who was propelled a good 10 feet across the gas station parking lot. Maybe it wasn’t that bad…that could be a thing, right? Oh, holy shits, what if someone else saw, oh shit she was so going to jail for this, wasn’t she!?

[Jamie Mills]

Jamie had learned the hard way on many occasions that quick reaction times were a necessity in dangerous situations. Still, it’s hard to react quicker than a 4,000 pound vehicle bumping up the sidewalk towards him as if the driver’s main mission was to take him down. For the split second he had to act, he  simply tried to jump up onto the hood of the car. Healing factor or not, he figured it was safer to go up and over then down and under the damned tires.

It didn’t help, not really.

The car stopped abruptly when the driver applied the breaks, but it did little to help the momentum transferred to Jamie- who went sailing across the empty lot of the gas station and landed with about as much grace as a sack of sand. Knee torqued, wind knocked out of him and feeling the burn of the asphalt along his forearm, Jamie only remained down for a moment before getting his bearings and pushing himself up off the ground. Upon realizing the force of the hit had managed to knock one of his sneakers clean off his foot, Jamie bent and picked it up. His left knee hurt like hell, and not for the first time, he found himself wishing his ability dulled the pain of injuries in addition to healing them quickly.

Turning to the woman for the first time, Jamie waved his empty shoe at her, ready to give her a real piece of his mind. She looked mortified, asking if she’d hit him, obviously in some sort of a state of shock. Wasn’t it her lucky day. Of all the people she could have run down, at least it was him. Still, whether or not he knew it was an accident, he was mad as hell for the experience. Add it to the pile of crap that was becoming this day, and all for pack of smokes. 

“No, nah. I like to just fly around sometimes.” he replied sarcastically. As he spoke, he felt his patella slip back into it’s correct position and the pain in his knee slowly began to subside. He let out a puff of air from his lungs, his stomach turning.  

“What the hell, lady?” he said, dropping his arms to his side, and hissing when he disturbed the still-unhealed road rash on his arm. “The whole damn road wasn’t enough for you?”

He took a moment to pull the tongue of his shoe forward before balancing on his good leg to slip the sneaker on, and then pushing it the rest of the way on using his foot on the ground. He’d only give her a minute or two more to really freak her out- hopefully so she’d never be tempted to go curb hopping for strangers again. The next poor bastard wouldn’t be as lucky as he was. He mumbled a few choice curse words until his breath, wiping away bits of dirt and debris from his arm in a rather futile attempt to speed up the process and finally took a decent look at the young woman in front of him.

“You ok?” he asked, his voice was still seething, but he meant it- eyes glancing over to her car. The airbag hadn’t deployed from what he could tell, but there was always the chance of a neck injury from stopping the car so damn fast. And again- it wasn't like she'd done it on purpose.

[Deleted]

The red-head stood there, somewhat(completely) in shock at what just happened, replaying the events of the past minute over and over in her head, trying to convince herself that, yes, this was a reality!! Kayla took a step forward, wondering for a second if the guy was even still alive? Oh, shit, she totally just killed a man, didn’t she!? Good GOD, WHAT THE FUCK WAS WRONG WITH HER!?!?!?

Kayla scampered across the rocks and onto the asphalt of the parking lot, a look of horror on her face when, wonder of wonders, the dead body moved!!!

She squeaked instinctively, pulling her hands up to cover her mouth.

Kayla watched with eyes as wide as saucers, completely frozen as the dead body got up and retrieved it’s fallen shoe, all casual-like, as if it were the most natural thing to do in the world. And then…the zombie shot a look at her like it wanted to make a feast of her brains! And then it spoke! Good god, this was an intelligent, talking zombie! It was trying to get her to drop her guard, wasn’t it??

“Well,” she started with a shaken up voice. “Fuck, I do too, but not from being sucker punched by a fucking car grille!” Her pitch was heightened, desperately struggling to not freak out and panic at having nearly killed a guy! Actually, she still wasn’t sure she hadn’t, what was this dude’s problem anyway?? Did he normally just get up after being run down by a fucking car??

Her mouth hung open as her brain tried to think of a comeback to his jibing question. “No, it’s fucking sport, didn’t you know that? And randomly invulnerable dudes getcha a good 100 extra points, right up there with the old grannies with walkers and babies left in their strollers.” Why the fuck was she arguing with this guy? Hella not productive, nope! “And lucky me! Now that I know a guy who can just shrug off being plowed into by a 3-ton sedan, I can totes just keep running you down and rack up the points! Hallelujah!!” She jazzed her hands down to her sides stiffly, though it was more jittery than jazzy.

Then…then the zombie had the audacity to ask if she was okay! “No, I’m not okay!!” she screamed in a shrill voice, a pitch high enough to deafen dogs. “I could have killed you! And then you just get up like you're a fucking Superman zombie, and why the hell are you asking me if I’m okay, you’re the one who went skidding across the asphalt like a goddamn Raggedy Andy! We gotta get you to a hospital, call an ambulance, the fire department, the national guard….!” Kayla gripped her hair in two large clumps as she continued to ramble on and tried not to hyperventilate.

[Jamie Mills]

Perhaps if the circumstances were a little less...messed up, Jamie would have had the presence of mind to ask what she meant when she decided to answer his rhetorical sarcasm that he flew with a high pitched affirmation that she did too. However, he was a little more preoccupied with the throbbing in the back of his head that he hadn’t felt at first and the slight ringing of his ears.

He brought his hand up to the back of his head, touching the sore spot before his ear and pulling it back to see blood on his hands. It wasn’t much- not for his standards at least. Head wounds were notorious for looking worse than they really were, and he’d be tip-top again in a few minutes anyways. Still, the blood had triggered something uncharacteristic in him. Between her panicked talking, and the slow burn of his healing wounds, he felt his stomach churning again and for the slightest of seconds, he had the overwhelming desire to protect himself from some enemy that definitely wasn't there. Instead, Jamie stood there looking in the general direction of the red-head, perhaps looking completely lost. Red Hair. He wasn’t actually sure he’d ever met anyone with red hair before. He realized he wanted to ask her if it was actually her own color- not that he cared if it was. 

Blinking, coming out of his daze after only a second, and if Jamie looked at the young woman in front of him as if it was the first time he’d seen her, he wasn’t aware of it. He wiped the bit of blood on his hands onto his jeans and shook his head. “It’s a suck-ass sport.” he grumbled, secretly thankful that she was talking...and talking. When he focused on her, he thought a little less about what the sight of a little blood had done to him.

He even smirked when she hollered that she wasn’t ok, raising his hands a little to get her to quiet down, feeling more like himself as he now started to try and shift the attention away from him and toward her. While he was aware that Pilot Ridge itself was about as close to a haven for Meta’s as there was in America, he had long gotten used to hiding what he was and her screaming about hospitals and would-be dead men was sure to bring attention, even in this nearly empty gas station lot.

“Look, hey.” Jamie took a few cautious steps towards the woman as she pulled at her hair. “You need to calm down ‘cause you’re making me nervous.” he took a moment to glance at his arm before showing her- stopping once they were maybe 5 feet apart. “I’m fine, see? You just woke me up, is all...That'll teach me to walk on the sidewalk in broad daylight.... Although i think a hit like that is worth more than 100 points...”

[Deleted]

“No shit!” she retorted with fervor. “To hell with the points, next time I’m leaving that shit to GTA. Or better yet, I’m throwing that POS down the garbage disposal because clearly it was the violence in that game that compelled me to go all fast and furiously homicidal on your ass!” Not that any of that had to do with anything. Kayla had the tendency to drift into extreme sarcasm when she was stressed. It was more than a defense mechanism, it was completely offensive, a preemptive measure to keep people from chiding as if she didn’t know that what just happened was completely insane. She wasn’t stupid and she wasn’t some dumb bimbo who was going to come out of the car like an oblivious twat and innocently ask “are you okay?” in the hopes that her “cute” was going to let her off easy.

Nuh-uh, sistah. Things didn’t work that way.

Kayla was gonna go to jail over this, wasn’t she? Even if this guy didn’t press charges, someone else had probably seen and was already calling the coppers and they were going to come in with their sirens blaring and take her away in handcuffs and, oh, she’ll never see her stupid sister and Theordore the Pig again!!

The rag-doll’s gestures to get her to calm down went nearly unnoticed by the wiccan woman, who was still rambling off an endless list of “what if”s and “could be”s and “omg my life is over”s. There was even something in there about how the aliens in Roswell told her this would happen, but everything was spilling out with such incoherence that it probably wasn’t recognizable anyway.

Kayla finally stopped when he approached and shoved his roadkill arm right in her face. As if that was supposed to calm her down! Kayla cringed back, not wanting to see the results of her epic blunder. Kayla wasn’t normally so squeamish around cuts and bruises and a little blood, but those were also not on an arm that they were probably going to have to amputate. His words meant nothing, nothing I tell ye! Though the fact that he was staying calm was likely the only thing keeping Kayla from completely breaking down. “More you say?” she said, taking a peek out from behind her arms, which had flown up in front of her face when he tossed his limb out at her. “Yeey, me….” she celebrated in a quiet, shaky voice. “We’ll print up bumper stickers….or maybe t-shirts…!” Kayla wished she had a mini-flag to wave around in her “excitement”. Add to the effect, ya know?

[Jamie Mills]

Jamie looked at the woman with a mixture of amusement and exasperation as she prattled on. Were the circumstances of their meeting different, he would have found it all rather endearing. Hell, even circumstances standing, he was finding it hard to continue to be so mad at her. Frustrated? Annoyed and pained as hell? Yes. All of the above. He'd shout at her if he thought she might actually listen.

Cocking his head to the side when she mentioned something about Roswell, Jamie cleared his throat- as if willing the conversation to at least veer away from Aliens. And as it seemed his plan of showing her that his arm was indeed healing (not quickly enough, the air around him stung and bit at the little raw skids running along his skin) was not working, he clicked his tongue, took a breath and dipped his head a little so he could see her through the small opening she was using to peek out at him. He felt his ear pop a little as he did so, and figured that was enough of a signifier that the wound on the back of his head was healing up. Wouldn’t know it by the dull throbbing in his head though.

“Listen,” he said on the exhale. “This is what we’re gonna do...but you gotta put your arms down first,” he glanced around for a second.

“You...calm down. I’m a quick healer, ‘kay? Like...really quick... So I really have no reason to call the cops on you, and ‘buddy-Jim’ in there” he nodded towards the gas station window. Inside, the back of the attendants head was visible, but it was obvious how oblivious the guy was to the events going on on his watch. “wasn’t paying attention…”

“So. First. We’re gonna find my sunglasses, because they were 25 bucks and i like ‘em.” It’d taken him up until a minute or two ago to realize they were no longer on his face.

“Then...we’re gonna move your car because it’s poking out like a sore thumb,” Perhaps two or three cars had passed since Jamie’s impromptu flight, but none seemed to feel the need to stop, “and see how much damage I did,” he added as an afterthought, with a tilt of his head, actually trying to keep the small smile off his face at the thought.

“And then you can buy me a pack of cigarettes and a burrito and we can call it even.... and we can both go our own ways...safely.” He finished, and wondered why he felt a pang of regret at the finality of it. “Sound good?”

[Deleted]

Oh, fuckers, Zombie man was just trying to distract her with the sight of his arm healing, right? Like, he could heal, but that was because he was a denizen of the underword, right? Not because he was obviously a meta and that made a hella lot more sense. At least she wasn’t squealing anymore, she was shaking so much she could sing an opera at this point and miss every single note.

“T-t-t-t-that good…r-r-right?” she stuttered, slowly lowering her arms to her side. “M-my future’s in the hand of p-people who aren’t paying at-t-tention….lucky me, huh?” Because if even one person gave a damn, then Kayla would have about 10 years of orange jumpsuits and bad musical numbers to look forward to. Wow, wouldn’t that make for a TV drama, maybe she should market that?

“Twenty five bucks for sunglasses?” she repeated, turning her head to start looking for the spectacles. She wasn’t calm in the least, but looking for a pair of shades was more appealing than shaking and shivering in the parking lot in front of a guy she forced into an Evel Knievel stunt. “Shit, where’d you get them from, fucking Paris?” For sunglasses, Kayla was only willing to fork over ten bucks per pair. They weren’t worth anything more than that if they were going to break after a week. Kayla didn’t see them anywhere. She curled her arms up over her chest, still feeling quite skittish.

“Trust me, I think my car can handle running into a 200lb man more than said man can handle being run into by my car, but who knows? Maybe we’re secretly stuck in bizarro world and any minute the cops are gonna roll in wearing hot pants and singing the YMCA.” Kayla was rambling. Mumbling and rambling still and she didn’t see any sort of thing around that looked like sunglasses. Either way, he was right, she should probably move her car before someone decided it was worth pulling over and finding out if everything was kosher and whatnot.

Kayla gave up on the sunglasses and slipped into her car, rolling down the window so she could keep spazzing at him. “Wow, you really gotta raise your standards a little. Only a pack of cigs and a burrito for getting car clobbered? I say that that at least deserves a pizza too. Or maybe Funyuns.” She turned the key until the engine revved up gloriously then started to roll forward towards the parking spaces in the lot. There was a distinct crackling sound as she slowly rolled over something….

Kayla winced. “Tellmethatwasn’twhatIjustthoughtitwas??”

[Jamie Mills]

Jamie raised an eyebrow and bit a little at the inside of his cheek at the woman’s reply, nodding once as if he knew exactly how she felt. His future could have been nullified from her lack of attention, but he already decided that it was a moot point to make her feel any worse than she obviously already did. And he knew more about how it felt to be in that state of shock- the shivering, shuddering and stuttering as if all the heat had disappeared from the atmosphere.

Watching her for only a moment as she looked away from him, Jamie too began to search around the area for his missing sunglasses. He’d bought them at the PX just a few weeks before his last deployment, and had received them back with the rest of his belongings some time after he’d returned to the States. So their value wasn’t too sentimental, but enough that he’d rather they be found. He chuckled under his breath at her sarcasm, and shrugged lightly, “I know...way too expensive, but worth the money,”

Jamie walked over towards where he’d landed on the asphalt, scuffing at a bit of red on the ground with his shoe until it looked just like the rest of the dirt and grime around it. He tried to keep from showing his back to the woman, unsure of what his head looked like and not wanting to send her into hysterics or something. Bending down, his knee unexpectedly creaking and groaning as if it belonged to an arthritic sixty-year-old, Jamie peered underneath her car, returning his gaze to the redhead and using the side of her car to get him back up. “YMCA, huh? That could be interesting, though.” He took his leave of the car as she made her way towards it, stepping up on a little raised curb with grass and folding his arms over his chest to watch as she got in.

It was hard to try and keep a somewhat severe attitude when she had a quip for everything. He snorted, shaking his head when she told him to raise his standards. “Pizza, sure. Funyu-” he cut off when her car rolled forward over what must be his sunglasses. He crinkled his nose, figuring he hadn’t been looking in the right spot when he checked the car, and squinted as he stepped off the curb and walked over to the unfortunate scene of shade destruction, mumbling a quiet that sucks.

“Alright, standards raised- I want another pair of sunglasses too,” Jamie said- with no real animosity in his voice, backing away in order to let her pull into a parking spot, checking his arm again and slipping his hands into his pockets, pleased with the speed in which he was healing. He paused for only a beat before clearing his throat, “and a beer...or three.”

[Deleted]

It’s true that at the moment, Kayla was thinking much more about herself and how she fucked up than about the person she could have potentially fucked up. Had he not been such a chill guy, and a healer at that, then it wouldn’t have mattered if anyone saw, because there was no way that was something that Kayla could’ve gotten away from. She’d probably turn herself in, throwing herself to the floor of the police station at the feet of several (sexy) uniformed men, pleading and begging for them to go easy on her. But since that wasn’t the case, and the man she’d barreled down was okay, the only thing on her mind was self-preservation.

Kayla had beat the living shit out of plenty of boys before, but she’d never almost killed them before. There was a big fucking difference in her mind and she could not handle the latter!!

“Is it? Prove it!” she quipped, still on the subject of the sunglasses.

Obviously, he didn’t have to prove it…or rather he had no way to do it now that said sunglasses were crinkled and cracked and steamrolled into a million pieces beneath the tires of Kayla’s car. Every move she made was just making things worse! This…this was most definitely the gods of karma punishing her for eating that bacon cheeseburger last week…and the week before that…and the week before that.

Kayla let her forehead drop hard onto the steering wheel, her face contorted into what must have been the result of demonic possession. New sunglasses? “Okaay,” she squeaked. Pull yourself together woman! she cried to herself internally. At least the guy’s not turning you in for attempted murder! Which really was the bright side.

She snapped her head towards him when he finished that sentence, though. Beer? She was only 20, she wasn’t allowed to buy beer! Not that that had ever stopped her before, she knew a guy who knew a guy who knew a guy who made fake IDs and she’d gotten one of those a long time ago. Though she didn’t actually use it much. “Okay…” she said again, somewhat confused, but hey, at this point, anything seemed reasonable as compensation for nearly launching this guy straight through to the other side of the tunnel. Kayla had more to say, but decided that rolling her car further into the parking lot took priority. She did so, slowly, and as she did, she called back to her victim. “So like what? You want this now? And in which order? Come on, help me out man, make me a fucking list of priorities here!” She hit the steering wheel for effect, but inadvertently blared the horn. Kayla yelped at the sound and jumped in her seat.

[Jamie Mills]

In an attempt to look somewhat innocent at his last request, Jamie raised his eyebrows a bit and smiled a little at the woman when her head snapped towards him. However, it was easy enough to see his last request had irked her as she confusedly affirmed his request. Rolling onto the balls of his feet, and unable to keep from fidgeting as the back of his head seared a bit, Jamie took his hand from his pocket and held it out in a sort of mock surrender at the sharp honk of her horn, bending a little to look into her car window, but keeping a respectable distance from it all the same.

“Listen... you don’t actually have to buy me anything,” He paused for a moment, feeling slightly awkward and chuckling, “And uh...the beer is optional, of course. I just figured it might be good to unwind a bit after..” he waved his hands a little at the scene, “and ya know…”

Jamie had never been good at asking people out. (Good lord, is that what he was doing? He didn’t even rightly know) He always got nervy at the prospect of them turning him down. This coming from a guy that survived being blown up, too. The thought brought him back momentarily to the sheer panic he’d felt for just a second after he’d seen the blood on his fingers. Sure, who didn’t panic when hit by a rampaging car? But this had been different than his usual run of the mill scared.

“I’m Jamie, by the way,” he offered, a bit introspectively, pulling himself from his thoughts before they started to surface again and blinking at the red head.

[Deleted]

Irked her, yes. But not totally, not completely. Actually, she was just a little more…what was this? Pizza and beer? And a burrito? Maybe? Granted it was her suggestion to get the pizza, but even so, this was beginning to sound a little bit less like him trying to get compensation and more like him asking her on a….!

He was, wasn’t he??

Kayla’s brain, however, had officially shut down. Frozen. Glitched. Did not compute. Processing error, try again later. She stared at the undead hunk(which she didn’t really notice until just now) standing outside her window, her eyes wide as saucers and her mouth uncharacteristically gaping open like a strangled fish.

Then her brain rebooted.

……WHO THE FUCK ASKED A PERSON ON A DATE AFTER BEING NEARLY KILLED BY HER CAR!??!!?? WAS HE INSANE?? NO, CLEARLY HE’D HIT HIS HEAD AND WAS DELUSIONAL!

Despite herself, Kayla felt her cheeks flush. She turned back to her steering wheel and scoffed loudly, unable to immediately think of a sharp and clever quip for once. Kayla took a breath and shook her head, scrunching her face into some weird mold of incredulity. “…..alright,” she relented finally. “Alright, I…fuck, then, get in Superman.” Kayla waved her hand, gesturing towards the passenger seat beside her. “I know a place. We’ll pizza and booze it up, and I promise, I’ll try not to kill you again with my driving.” She blinked several times, darting her eyes to the right, then down to the left, then finally up to the man called Jamie, her lips turned into a cautious, though not an unhappy, frown. “I’m Kayla,” she said.

[Jamie Mills]

Jamie waited apprehensively for the woman’s reply, hoping that if anything, she’d take this as purely platonic. He almost regretted it now, chastising himself for appearing to be that asshole when he really wasn’t (well, he didn’t think he was, but the jury was still out). Honestly, he felt just as surprised as her about it- even if he had been the one that asked, and it’d only happened because she’d just...well...he didn’t know exactly what she did, but there was something about her that had caught him completely off guard (and he didn't mean the whole accidental attempted homicide thing.)

She scoffed and Jamie nodded once as if in understanding. He hadn’t really expected her to say yes anyway, and it didn’t help that this was probably the worsttime he could have chosen. What if she thought he was trying to blackmail her? He opened his mouth, intent on apologizing but she beat him to the punch and motioned for him to get in car. One side of his mouth upturned in a sideways grin, Jamie only hesitated for a second before he began to make his way around the car- momentarily surveying her hood as he passed it to see if any damage had been done. From what he could see, the car had come out of their match-up completely unscathed. He should have known that; of course any force that would ding up the car would have had him down a lot longer than just a few seconds.

He opened the door to the passengers side, and had only just slid inside before remembering that his head had been bleeding (blame the slowness on his head wound?), and in an attempt to both save the woman from whatever the sight back there was, and to save the upholstery, he turned a bit in his seat so he his top half was facing nearly diagonal. His saving grace was her introducing herself to him, so perhaps he didn’t look like such a toolbag sitting like this.

“Kayla, you’ve made quite an impact on my day.” Jamie offered her another smile, before looking out the windshield and clearing his throat, “My uh…” he nodded out across the street and chuckled once “..My truck died this morning. Hasn’t really been my lucky day,” But the jury was still out on that too.

[Deleted]

No matter how “platonic” your intentions were, it was incredibly hard to take them as anything other than either “insane” or “an utter sleeze” if they’re asking you to pizza and beer 5 minutes after the girl tried to kill them. This wasn’t some action movie or something! None off this Mr. and Mrs. Smith crap where they get all hot and heavy while trying to kill each other! People didn’t actually do that…did they?

Apparently they did. And, apparently, Kayla was that girl, who accepted. She must’ve been just as crazy as he was to not throw it back in his face…but if she had then… It only just now occurred to her that “Jamie” here might decide to turn her in if she refused.

And then her mind continued to play out a million different scenarios that could result from her saying yes, including the one that ended with her screaming out “daddy” as she writhed against the ties of a St. Andrew’s Cross.

Not that there was anything wrong with that. But she barely knew this guy!

But…aww…he looked so happy. Which didn’t exactly ease her nerves, but it…well, it was nice to see him smile. And pun. Badly. Which didn’t stop Kayla from smiling. “No shit, now I’m wondering if I shouldn’t kick you out now and save myself. Who knows what kind of bad karma you have emanating from those…Chippendale arms of yours!”

Fuuuck, why did she say that?

She took another breath then put the car into reverse. “You got a place in mind, Superman?” she asked, turning to Mr. Indestructible beside her.

[Jamie Mills]

Ah, bad karma, she hit the nail on the head there. There’d been a few solitary nights Jamie had wondered about that very same thing, even if the circumstances had been completely and totally out of his own control. The doctor had said it was his very own brand of survivor’s guilt. That the outcome would have been the same whether he’d been there or not, but his professional opinion didn’t stop Jamie from blaming himself- from thinking he could have saved his fireteam if he’d just had a little luck on his side. How many nights had he replayed the events in his head- both willingly and not- with little details changing just slightly in the hopes of a better ending?

Perhaps this thought process was running in the back of his mind; that incessant little dinging that wanted to be heard, even on days when Jamie was feeling particularly fine- that needed to remind him that he shouldn’t be here and that everything would always end badly for him.

But, at the present time, it didn’t matter- Kayla had his full attention instead.

“Chippendale arms?” Jamie repeated incredulously- eyebrows raised and mouth hanging slightly open. He’d definitely never been called Superman before. Or Raggedy Andy for that matter. And now she was talking about his arms? Don’t get him wrong, he was flattered and took it as a compliment, but he just couldn’t figure out how she came up with the stuff that came out of her mouth.

Eyes lingering on her for a moment longer before he forced himself to look away, Jamie made a noise- half-way in between chuckling and clearing his throat, and returned his gaze to the garage across the street as she put the car in reverse. And if he brought his arm up to clutch the ”oh-shit” handle, it was obviously only because he was steadying himself (he didn't like wearing seatbelts anyways). And sure, maybe that was laying it on a little thick, but he managed to keep a straight face well enough.

“I do not.” he replied, clicking his tongue absent-mindedly, “Not for pizza. But now i’m jonesing, so I hope you know a place.”