A Perfectly Sonny Daye

FUCKIN' KIDS. Who thought giving rich kids a nice car was a great idea? I got no idea who thinks you should cut a kid loose with no responsibilities or any fuckin' thing and a fine automobile and goddammit, it was Jai's day off and Ace was workin' the window and I want someone to swear at.

"Ace!" I hollered from the well under the goddamned fucking Mazda3.

"Yeah, Sonny," he called back. He was doing shit too, but he lets me do the hard stuff 'cause he says I'm better and faster at it, which sometimes I think is Ace just being nice, and sometimes I think it's Ace being lazy, but most of the time I think it's Ace being practical, because he's solid with cars and a right fair mechanic, but he's right. I'm faster. And in this case, getting this fucking thing done—somebody had put some fucking low-grade fuel in this fuckin' car, and I needed to rebuild the fucking catalytic converter, which I'm not supposed to be able to do, but God, how stupid do they think I am.

"I gotta rebuild this bitch. Them kids across the street?"

"Not sure."

"You wanna go tell them I can either rebuild this thing, or they can pay to have one shipped out here, or they can pay to have this fuckin' car towed to civili-fuckin'-zation?"

"You sure you don't want to tell them?" he asked. "You got such a way with words."

"I swear to fuckin' Christ if I gotta tell one of them douchey college kids how to not fuck up their car, I will clock him across the face with a tire iron, and you keep telling me that shit is bad ."

Ace made a sound suspiciously like laughter, and that put me in an even fouler mood. "You're right, Sonny, that shit is bad. I don't like leaving you alone, though. You come outta there so you can see what's doin', okay?"

"Yeah. I need a soda anyway."

"Want me to get us some sandwiches?" he asked, probably to jolly me out of what I had to admit was a shitty mood.

"We got leftovers," I said reluctantly, but he did have a way of breaking up my cooking with takeout so we didn't get bored.

"Yeah, but they just started carrying a new sandwich," he said with decision. "Now unhook the catalytic converter and bring it up here, and I'll go tell them kids to get comfortable or call their daddies."

"You mark my words," I replied sourly, "one of 'em's gonna offer you a blowjob before that conversation's over."

Ace snorted. "Oh, I don't think it was me they were all soft on," he said. Then he smirked. "Or hard on."

I let a grin slip through. I did love me a good dirty joke, and Ace was pretty sharp that way, but he was crazy if he thought them kids were all hot and bothered for my scrawny ass. Every now and then someone thought I was cute, sure. Jai sure had held a torch, and I was glad he'd found George 'cause it's hard from your best friend, right? But Ace? Ace was… what's the word? Incandescent . He was all lit up inside with sex and heat, and that was before people even saw his cock, which was somethin' special.

Naw, if them kids wanted anyone, they wanted Ace.

I finished up detaching the damned converter and came up out from under the well so I could take the thing apart and clean it and put it back together again and not die from heat, because it was hot down there.

Ace took it from me when I got halfway up so I could use the handrails on the concrete stairs, and it was all I could do not to stare at him, all soft and shit, 'cause… 'cause he was Ace, and he did nice things for me without thinkin'.

I set the converter on the workbench and then turned to him, feeling trouble in my soul.

"What?" he asked.

"You… you do good things for me," I said. I knew this, but I was not good at saying thank you. I think you get used to taking crumbs of good things—most of them thrown in your road like trash—and running away like a feral raccoon, clutching the good thing to your chest. Mine mine mine! Mine mine mine! That was me and Ace—he was mine ! And I was clutching him to my heart and not letting go no no no no no no.

But he was Ace , and he did a thousand and one miracles for us every day. This place, this garage, our house. The people around us—like family , but better 'cause we got to pick 'em, and my family threw me away for meth. Our fuckin' dog . One day on our day off Ace just up and took me to a shelter in Santee. Said he'd been lookin' on the computer for a little one, since we were afraid a big one would run into the road, and we couldn't fuckin' fence the whole goddamned desert. And there was Duke, almost a baby and scared we'd hurt him like he'd probably been hurt before and…. Ace did that for me. And he saved kids and helped people, and then he came back and did for me , and who the fuck was I? Some thrown-away street trash who looked at him one day and said, "Mine!"

"What you thinkin', Sonny?" Ace asked, and I came aware that I been staring at him as he shucked his coveralls to the waist and grabbed his wallet from the lockbox.

"I'm thinkin' you're mine," I said, and then I hated that. "But more. I'm thinkin' you do nice things for me. I need to say thank you."

He has this way of smilin' at me—his eyes crinkle, his lips curve gentle-like, and we been in this desert nearly three years, which means we've known each other for five, and it's only now, this last year, I been realizin' that smile is shy . That when I say something nice to him, it embarrasses him 'cause I mean somethin' to him.

My eyes burned. "I ain't never said thank you enough," I murmured, embarrassed. All this time and he ain't complained once.

"You do," Ace said, and since we were alone, no Ernie, no Jai, he moved into my space like if we were in the house together, and we got sweet.

I gazed up at him, so bright, so shining, and he lowered his head for a kiss. I didn't get skittish like I might've once. I raised my face and let him kiss me—but I didn't agree with him.

"Do not," I argued softly.

He pulled back and feathered his lips along my temple. "Your brain is doing other stuff," he argued. "Trying hard not to beat up the stupid kids who drive their cars into the ground. Remembering to get up and turn your face to the sun and feed the dog. And then most of the time, you feed me, which I'm getting real partial to." His voice dropped even further. "Staying in the here and the now and not getting lost in all the dark places. That's my favorite thank you, Sonny. You being here with me."

God, I loved him. We'd made a resolution, me and him, to say it more often. To make it real all the time. "I love you," I remembered to say, and that smile again…. I kissed him, hard, no apologies this time, no holding back.

He kissed in return, and that's where we were when we heard the crunch of gravel as a car skidded down the hardpacked dirt drive and around to the entrance of the garage.

Ace jerked back, frowning, and I was with him on that, because dammit, we were getting somewhere with that kiss. But Ace's frown was more of his military frown, the thing that said something wasn't right and he had to fix it, and I tried to focus. Then I realized that the car's motor was still on and we could hear footsteps crunching on the gravel, like somebody was running from the blind side of the garage to the window.

Goddammit, were we getting robbed again?

"Stay here," Ace said, and I did it 'cause he said it, and he always wanted to protect me, but part of me was still fuming because that kiss !

Ace went striding out in that way of his that said, "Ain't no threat, just a simple country boy here, no worries 'bout me, folks," that stupid people bought. When he didn't call to me, though, didn't let out a peep that he wasn't the only one there, I knew something was wrong. I did what came natural, I picked up a tire iron and peeked out of the garage.

He was facing me, which meant he'd managed a little bit of magic there, because he should have had his back toward me. There was a guy in front of him. All I could see was the crown of his head, and he had a greasy brown mullet, brand-new jeans, and a zip-up hoodie in deference to the March cool of the desert.

"Why here?" Ace was asking, sounding irritated. "There is a gas station and a sub shop and a convenience store right across the road. Why's it always gotta be here ?"

"No cameras," the man in front of me said. "If you don't want to get robbed, you need cameras."

Ace's expression turned to disgust. "You think cameras are gonna save you? That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard."

"Save me?" said the would-be thief. "Save me from what ?"

And that's when I brought the tire iron down on the back of the man's head. Three or four times.

"GOD, HEAD wounds bleed a lot," Ace said as he took his position at the guy's head and reached under his arms.

I got his feet. "He's still breathing, right?" I asked, a little concerned for Ace's sake. Ace wasn't fond of killing people. He'd do it if he had to, but most of the time he'd just rather they go the fuck away. Although he didn't seem to mind victims of their own stupidity, which I thought was some common ground between us. Anyways, I wouldn't have minded if this asshole was dead since he'd been holding a gun on Ace , but Ace, like I said, got concerned.

"Yeah. He'll recover. Why'd you hit him so many times?" Ace asked, grunting, as together we hauled him toward the Sportage he'd driven in. Not bad, really—I was going to enjoy refurbishing it, filing off the VIN numbers, redistributing some of its parts, and hauling it off to Maaco for a pretty new paint job. Ernie seemed to like blues and greens, and I thought maybe we'd do this one up right for him.

"Tire irons don't got the heft I need to feel real satisfied with the job," I told him, feeling my nose wrinkle. "When I'm pissed, I need to feel like I'm moving some metal."

He blinked and nodded, like he was filing away a new thing he'd learned about me, and together we moved the guy on top of the tarp Ace had set up, and then we grabbed the tarp and hauled it to the passenger seat of the vehicle. It was hard to get blood out of upholstery, even leather, and since we'd decided to keep the Sportage and ditch the felon, we figured we'd keep it clean.

"How far you going with him?" I asked.

"Primm," Ace said, and I nodded. There wasn't a sorrier stretch of land than Primm, Nevada. Its only real claim to fame was having a foot in Cali and a foot in Nevada and some of the saddest giant casino hotels backing up against the desert that the world has ever seen.

"Sand dunes?" I asked, feeling a little bit evil, but Ace shook his head.

"Naw, back parking lot. I don't want to kill him, Sonny, I just need someone to find him without getting on camera."

I grunted. "What if he tells the police what happened to him?"

"What's he gonna say?" Ace asked. "I'm sorry, officer, I was holding up a gas station, and suddenly my head exploded. I have no idea how it happened? No, he'll be fine as long as we get him some medical attention. After that, maybe his bad life choices will be his own."

I grunted. "With any luck, he lost the brain cell that remembered us when it ran out his ears."

Ace made a sort of snerking sound that said he was both highly amused at me and also horrified. It was the sound he made at something only he and I thought was funny, and that made me proud.

Together we loaded the guy up into the Sportage, and Ace grabbed the guy's keys from his pocket. He checked the gas and water before he hopped in, pleased when the car, at least, seemed to be well-kept.

"Think he stole it?" I asked.

"No doubt in my mind," Ace said. "Let me pop the hood and we can disable the GPS."

Took me five minutes.

Ace sighed as he started the thing up and peered at me through the open window. "I was gonna get you lunch too."

"Well, let me work on the fuckin' converter," I told him. "Ernie and Burton got a day off. I don't want to call him in, but maybe Jai can back me up for a few."

"Yeah, I think George is on shift until later tonight," Ace agreed. "Tell him I'll bring…." He paused. "What kind of food you want?"

"Steak sandwiches," I said, feeling like we'd earned it.

"I'll get extra," Ace said, nodding. He glanced down at himself; he'd shed his overalls after we'd moved our robber into the back seat, and now he was dressed simply in an OD green T-shirt and blue jeans. When you had that much sexy, simple was all you needed.

I suddenly didn't care about who was watching, even though we were in the open drive of the garage. I leaned in through the window and kissed him, suddenly just as het up as we'd been before the asshole with the head wound had shown up with his gun.

Which reminded me. "Did you put the gun in the lockbox?" I asked, pulling away a little.

"Yeah, it's in under the safe."

Burton and Ace and Jai had built the place—it had a cunning little door under the regular safe. Money we could lose, but the cache of weapons we'd picked up from guys like this asshole over the years we really couldn't afford to have found. Burton could only make so many trips to the military munitions dump without making people all nosy.

I kissed him again, and he winked at me and drove off, and I went back to the garage to ask Jai for help and to rebuild the catalytic converter.

Them damned kids were in my face before Jai arrived, and I scowled at them. There were three, and I don't think it was just 'cause I liked guys that made me think two of 'em were crushing on the other and that one didn't have any interest in boys at all.

But one of the crushing ones was the one who owned the car and had the daddy who made lots and lots of money and thought he owned the place.

"What's taking so damned long!" he yelled, waving his arms, and I thought longingly of my tire iron and the gun Ace had put in the special lockbox.

"What's taking so long is that spoiled little rich kids don't know how to drive a fucking car," I snarled. Maybe I should have gotten a peanut butter sandwich—I've been known to get hangry. "You feed it crap, you drive it too fast on the straightaways, you hard-brake it all the fuckin' time. You're lucky the damned thing hasn't rolled over and died to escape you, you little college puke! Now I'm in the middle of rebuilding your catalytic converter. You can either call a tow truck, which'll cost you a thousand dollars, have me order the part instead, which'll take you three days, or leave me alone to fuckin' rebuild this thing and install it! Which'll cost you five hundred but won't be done until tomorrow!"

"Five hundred dollars for a day's work?" the kid asked, sounding super put out.

"Well it was gonna be two fifty until you treated me like shit. Keep being an asshole and I'll push your stupid car to the side of the road and let you sort it out."

I glared at the kid, unmindful of the money I could lose. I know it was stupid—Ace and I were always working on a shoestring. But God! That sense that he could be mean like that to me because I was working for him. I felt like I should have a T-shirt that said I've Killed Men for Less, even though mostly I leave the killing to Ace.

The kid got a sly look on his face then, and with a sidelong glance to the one kid who wasn't gay, said, "You know… I could do other things to, uhm, pay."

I stared at him for a minute. He was probably only a little younger'n I was, agewise, but in life?

I started to cackle, 'cause it was really the funniest thing I'd ever heard, and the kid slunk backwards until he was even with his friends.

"It's okay, Kev," said the kid who was gay—and who was suddenly regarding his friend with the sort of kindness that meant maybe this whole little enterprise wasn't doomed. "Me and Freddie'll help pay. There's a little hotel 'bout two miles down the road. I looked it up. Let's grab some subs and some sodas to go and walk there. We don't need to be back until tomorrow night as it is." The kid glanced up at me with the expression of a little kid talking to an elder. "I'm sorry. We didn't mean to be disrespectful. We just spent more money than we planned on the trip is all. We got it to spend."

He glanced at "Kev" and then at the straight kid, who also looked earnest, and they all nodded.

I let out a growl of frustration and then let it drop. "You walk to the hotel now, we can drop off the car tomorrow 'round eleven. Fair enough?"

"You know where it is?" said the nice kid.

I stared back at him. "Is there another hotel in Victoriana that I don't know about?"

"What's Victoriana?" asked the kid.

"This town," I said. "And if you go past the hotel, there's a street with some fast food and some restaurants on it that you can't see from the highway. Get water, take a hike. You don't need to cart your shit all over hell."

"Can we grab a shaving kit and some underwear from the back?" asked the kid.

I gestured toward the auto well and told the little assholes not to fall while they were popping the trunk. They got their stuff and a small backpack to carry it in and were ready to go by the time Jai pulled up. He slid his Crown Vic in front of the house, where company parked and where we sort of hid the SHO, and strode up to the kids, who were staring at the highway dispiritedly.

"Jai," I said. "Can you give these kids a boost to the hotel? Their converter started blowing smoke, and they've had a shit day."

Jai looked them over, rolled his eyes, and gestured with his shoulders. "You will all sit in back. I will be your chauffeur." He laughed then, because it was a pretty good joke, and I went back to work on their damned car.

Jai came back and started to help. About a half hour in, he said, "That was nice thing you did. I would have let them walk."

I shrugged. "At least one of those kids was gonna be heartbroke by the end of the night. That's no fun. Besides. I broke another guy's skull today. I was trying to get it to balance out."

We kept working, and Ace texted me when he stopped for food. I told him Jai was there to help, and he got his order too. He was about fifteen minutes out—he should have been an hour out, but damn that man could drive—when our last customer came in. Jai and I rolled our eyes at each other because this was the guy our little Mazda3 kids were trying to be.

"It's making a knocking noise," he said, like we couldn't have heard that coming in. "How long to fix?"

"Three days for a new engine," I told him bluntly. "Or call for a tow to your dealership. Or abandon the car, tell your insurance it was stolen, and hitchhike home."

The man blinked. I remembered the first one of these who showed up at our door and who had tried to pick up on Ace. Didn't make me any friendlier toward this one, but still he cracked his nicotine gum 'cause who did he think he was foolin', lifted his sunglasses, and gave us that used Mercedes smile. "You saying you can't fix this?"

I shook my head and glanced at Jai. "Where's a fuckin' tire iron when you need one?" I asked, feeling surly.

Jai shrugged. "Is okay. Either way he will have to walk two miles to find a place to sleep tonight."

The man's cocky swagger leaked out of him, and he almost swallowed his nasty gum. "You really can't fix it?"

"You heard the knocking?" I asked him.

"Yes. Started about twenty miles ago."

"Look at your car's trail as you pulled in. What do you see?"

The man obeyed, his thick lips opening into a juicy little O. "Is that oil?"

"Yessir. That is the look, smell, and sound of you reducing that fine Audi to a useless pile of slag. Now, we are a waystation . I do know how to fix your engine, but I would have to order parts, and they would have to get here. Did you see the Audi dealership on your way into town?"

"No," said the man, very confused.

"Neither did I. The closest thing is down in LA, which would be"—I made a "gimme" motion with my fingers—"how far away?"

"About two hours," he said with injured dignity.

"Yessir. And what time is it?"

The man checked his watch, which I didn't need to do because it was getting close to dark. "About six."

"Yessir. Now me and my friend are gonna finish this job, and in about fifteen minutes my boyfriend's gonna show up with takeout, and you, sir, will have a decision to make. Fish or cut bait. Sleep in the hotel two miles away or call a cab or a tow truck or wait three days for the fuckin' parts because everybody at the Audi place has already gone home, and I can't order them until tomorrow. But no matter what you choose? Me and my boyfriend are going to go and shower and sit and watch some fuckin' TV and pet our goddamned dog, 'cause it's been a shitty day. So you let us know. Just understand that absolutely nothin' is getting done tonight."

The man swallowed, close to tears. "Oh God," he muttered. "I'm going to miss work tomorrow."

"That's too bad," I said, turning my back on him.

Jai and I worked in silence before we heard him clearing his throat. "Uhm… is the sandwich shop the only place to eat?"

I started searching for my tire iron, but Jai gave the man directions and saved me the trouble. I'd gone back to the catalytic converter, which was just about ready to reinstall, when the asshole—erm, potential customer—started his own trudge down the road to the hotel after getting his small suitcase from the trunk and paying a fee for parking his vehicle here while he arranged for a tow.

As he made the mad dash across Hwy 15, Jai said, "This one I am not driving to the hotel?"

"This one needs to contemplate his goddamned navel," I said shortly. "George is almost off shift, and I've had about enough of people today."

Jai grunted. "A Sportage, you say?"

I smiled, 'cause besides me and Ace making out in the garage, that was about the best part of my day. "It's nice," I said. "I know Ernie's been hoping for a luxury SUV. It's not a Chevy Tahoe or a Navigator or nothin', but it's a notch above our usual piece of shit."

"You are sure the owner won't come back looking for it?"

I shrugged. "If he can remember where he left it when he recovers from the concussion, he'll still have to tell the police what he was doing when he left it here. I'm thinking he's going to remember he stole it and live his life."

"Fair," Jai agreed.

We had put the finishing bolt in place when Ace pulled in, parking right in front of the garage so the Sportage was out of sight.

"I took it to get detailed," he said. "So hopefully any blood trace is gone." He grinned. "Thanks for coming in, Jai. You guys about done?"

"I have time to shower before George gets home," Jai said happily.

"Here's some steak sandwiches for the two of you," Ace said, handing him a separate bag. "You two have yourself a good night."

Jai took the bag and smiled. "Thank you. It was a good day."

He left, and Ace turned to me as I closed the auto bay and locked the place up. "What about you?" he said. "This a good day?"

"Shower," I said. "Steak sandwich. Pet the dog. Watch the movie. Eat the ice cream. Have the sex. We still got a ways to go."

Ace let out a positively filthy chuckle then, which should have been my warning.

I was still surprised when, after our showers, and after we'd each had a turn taking Duke out for a run behind the house and then giving him his treats, he moved up behind me as I was shutting the door.

"Sonny?"

"Yeah?"

"You starving?"

I felt his breath in my ear, his hands splaying across my stomach, the warmth, the strength, the kindness that was always my Ace when he was being sweet.

"Not for food," I whispered. He was going to take me to bed and use me and give to me and suck me and fuck me and come inside me, and I'd earned that today by only picking up the tire iron once and stopping when it was time.

"Me neither," he said, running his lips along my neck.

I wanted him more than steak, more than ice cream, even more than violence.

We raced for the bedroom, shedding our sleep clothes as we went, and all of the rest of the day disappeared, and it was this—me on the bed, hips in the air, Ace slicking up my asshole and getting ready to drive out all the demons in my soul with his cock.

Any day that ended like this, me crying out, coming all over my own goddamned chest, ass clenching on Ace's erection as we used each other the way only people who loved fierce and hard could—

That was a good fuckin' day.