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rainbowfic2015-07-23 06:27 pm
starphotographs) wrote in rainbowfic2015-07-23 06:27 pm
Skyblue Pink with Striped Polka Dots 3
Name: starphotographs
Story: Corwin and Friends
Characters: Spenser, two strangers.
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Summer Carnival)
Colors: Skyblue Pink with Striped Polka Dots 3 ("The more that you know, the more places you'll go.")
Word Count: 1,177
Rating: R (or higher PG-13?)
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Spenser tries to help some strangers with a problem. But he has a problem of his own.
Note: Vaguely inspired by a tumblr post about standing by the road looking confused when your car breaks down, because a mechanic might stop and help or whatever.
Smells Like Summer
Since I usually work in pretty out-of-the-way places, I tend to just leave the bodies wherever they fall. Let god and vultures sort it out. I don’t give a flying fuck. Whatever.
But, sometimes, I get a job that’s a little too close to town for me to feel great about doing that, so I have to haul the corpse into my car and drive it off to the reservoir. And spend the whole fucking ride trying to think of creative ways to lure or chase a target out to the middle of nowhere so I’d never have to do it again, because it sucks. About every third time, I end up hurting my back. And it makes…
…Well, my car always stinks, so it doesn’t really make things worse. But still, it’s difficult, gross, cumbersome work, which puts an extra drive between me and dinner, or going home to work on a project, or going to a movie I don’t even want to see just so I can sit in the air conditioning, or, I don’t know. Whatever the fuck I even do. And today, on top of all this, it was hot, so the body really was making my car smell. It made me think of this one idiot I used to know, who had a thing for inviting entire armies of people to his house and grilling hundreds of hotdogs for all of them. Which sound pretty great, if you’re hungry all the goddamn time like I am, but the jackass didn’t own a cooler, so the wieners just sat in the sun on the patio, getting rank and unfit for consumption.
Of course, I consumed them anyway. And they only made me throw up once, but right now, with the rotten-meat smell filling the car, that’s the only Warm Hotdog Cookout I can remember with any sort of clarity.
I cracked a window and turned up the radio, trying to drown out the stink, telling myself that soon the deed would be done, the body would be dumped. And I wouldn’t have to think about hotdog vomit anymore. I actually kept to one train of thought for a good while, at least by my standards, but then I saw something that distracted me: a guy and a girl, probably a couple- and a bad one at that, by the way they seemed to be laying in to each other, standing next to their dead car and having what looked like a very colorful argument.
Just keep driving.
No, this is gonna bother me.
There’s a festering corpse in your car.
It won’t take long.
I put a stop to that one-man argument, pulled over, squealed to a stop, and went to see what they needed.
“Your car, like, break down or something?”
The lady was wearing a dilapidated baseball cap. The dude was wearing flip-flops. And they had very different opinions about their situation. Baseball Cap was about to answer in the affirmative, but Flipflops cut her off.
“I just need to try and start it again.”
Baseball Cap wouldn’t stand for that.
“No, it’s dead! It’s been dyin’ all week, but you wouldn’t listen to me!”
That ain’t all that’s dead, lady, so hurry it up.
“It made some funny noises and the dash lights were a little flickery, but I’d hardly call that dying!”
Baseball Cap and Flipflops shouted at each other for a while, and that was their business, but I got sick of it after about the third volley, and yelled “hey” at the top of my lungs so they’d pay attention. They whipped around and glared at me, both convinced that they should be the only one yelling, dammit. I banged on their hood a few times.
“…Both of you, shut the fuck up! Look. I’ve been working with cars for, like… Since before I was legally allowed to drive one, okay? If it’s ‘dead,’ I’ll be able to tell you.”
Flipflops shrugged. Baseball Cap warned him not to “let that creep touch our car.” They went back and forth about this, long enough for me to get tired of waiting. While they went at it, I crawled in the open driver’s side door, saw that the keys were still in the ignition, and tried to start the car. Part of me thought that, if it wasn’t dead, it might be funny to just drive away and see if they’d even notice.
But the car was, like Baseball Cap had told me, dead as a doorstop. The lights wavered, there were some weird sounds, and the air started to smell like burning rubber, but that was about it. I climbed back out, walked over to the still-bickering couple, tapped Baseball Cap on the shoulder, and handed her the keys.
“Your alternator is fucked.”
This, apparently, meant nothing to her. She stopped yelling at Flipflops, and whipped around so she could yell at me.
“The fuck does that mean!?”
I reminded myself she didn’t want the real explanation. She just wanted to know why the car wasn’t functioning as a car.
“It means your car can’t draw from the battery.”
Flipflops, by far the stupider of the pair, cut in.
“Well, do you have jumper cables?”
Jesus assfucking Christ, you’re an idiot.
“Yeah, but they’d do about fuckall.”
He wouldn’t take no for an answer, and would probably never understand that jumping a battery that the car can’t use would be absolutely pointless.
“Can you fix this!?”
They still weren’t quite grasping the situation, so I plastered on my best smile… And gave up.
“I sure can! But, I don’t have the shit to do it, so just be glad I told you what the specific problem was so the next guy doesn’t try and rip you off! You’re welcome!”
I started to storm off. They went back to sniping at each other. Baseball Cap knew, just knew that the burning smell meant something. Flipflops thought it was just the hot weather cooking the tires or some stupid shit like that. Baseball Cap thought that was bullshit. Then she did the unthinkable. She whipped around and called out to me.
“…Hey, can we smell your car!?”
Oh god.
“Fuck no, you can’t smell my car! The hell is wrong with you people!?”
“Well, if the smell is ‘just the sun melting the tires,’” She glared at Flipflops, and threw air-quotes with so much aggression that I half expected her to take those hooked fingers and gouge out his eyes. “…Then all cars would smell like that today, right? Let us smell your car!”
“No!”
By now, I was running at full speed. Then I realized I had one more thing to say, so I turned around and ran backwards.
“Also, if you want my opinion, I don’t think this relationship is goin’ anywhere!”
That said, I turned around, hopped in my car, and left the two of them to fight things out for themselves.
I have my own fuckin’ problems, man.
And one of those problems was moldering in my trunk.
Like a hotdog on a sunny deck.
(Gross.)
starphotographsStory: Corwin and Friends
Characters: Spenser, two strangers.
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Summer Carnival)
Colors: Skyblue Pink with Striped Polka Dots 3 ("The more that you know, the more places you'll go.")
Word Count: 1,177
Rating: R (or higher PG-13?)
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Spenser tries to help some strangers with a problem. But he has a problem of his own.
Note: Vaguely inspired by a tumblr post about standing by the road looking confused when your car breaks down, because a mechanic might stop and help or whatever.
Since I usually work in pretty out-of-the-way places, I tend to just leave the bodies wherever they fall. Let god and vultures sort it out. I don’t give a flying fuck. Whatever.
But, sometimes, I get a job that’s a little too close to town for me to feel great about doing that, so I have to haul the corpse into my car and drive it off to the reservoir. And spend the whole fucking ride trying to think of creative ways to lure or chase a target out to the middle of nowhere so I’d never have to do it again, because it sucks. About every third time, I end up hurting my back. And it makes…
…Well, my car always stinks, so it doesn’t really make things worse. But still, it’s difficult, gross, cumbersome work, which puts an extra drive between me and dinner, or going home to work on a project, or going to a movie I don’t even want to see just so I can sit in the air conditioning, or, I don’t know. Whatever the fuck I even do. And today, on top of all this, it was hot, so the body really was making my car smell. It made me think of this one idiot I used to know, who had a thing for inviting entire armies of people to his house and grilling hundreds of hotdogs for all of them. Which sound pretty great, if you’re hungry all the goddamn time like I am, but the jackass didn’t own a cooler, so the wieners just sat in the sun on the patio, getting rank and unfit for consumption.
Of course, I consumed them anyway. And they only made me throw up once, but right now, with the rotten-meat smell filling the car, that’s the only Warm Hotdog Cookout I can remember with any sort of clarity.
I cracked a window and turned up the radio, trying to drown out the stink, telling myself that soon the deed would be done, the body would be dumped. And I wouldn’t have to think about hotdog vomit anymore. I actually kept to one train of thought for a good while, at least by my standards, but then I saw something that distracted me: a guy and a girl, probably a couple- and a bad one at that, by the way they seemed to be laying in to each other, standing next to their dead car and having what looked like a very colorful argument.
Just keep driving.
No, this is gonna bother me.
There’s a festering corpse in your car.
It won’t take long.
I put a stop to that one-man argument, pulled over, squealed to a stop, and went to see what they needed.
“Your car, like, break down or something?”
The lady was wearing a dilapidated baseball cap. The dude was wearing flip-flops. And they had very different opinions about their situation. Baseball Cap was about to answer in the affirmative, but Flipflops cut her off.
“I just need to try and start it again.”
Baseball Cap wouldn’t stand for that.
“No, it’s dead! It’s been dyin’ all week, but you wouldn’t listen to me!”
That ain’t all that’s dead, lady, so hurry it up.
“It made some funny noises and the dash lights were a little flickery, but I’d hardly call that dying!”
Baseball Cap and Flipflops shouted at each other for a while, and that was their business, but I got sick of it after about the third volley, and yelled “hey” at the top of my lungs so they’d pay attention. They whipped around and glared at me, both convinced that they should be the only one yelling, dammit. I banged on their hood a few times.
“…Both of you, shut the fuck up! Look. I’ve been working with cars for, like… Since before I was legally allowed to drive one, okay? If it’s ‘dead,’ I’ll be able to tell you.”
Flipflops shrugged. Baseball Cap warned him not to “let that creep touch our car.” They went back and forth about this, long enough for me to get tired of waiting. While they went at it, I crawled in the open driver’s side door, saw that the keys were still in the ignition, and tried to start the car. Part of me thought that, if it wasn’t dead, it might be funny to just drive away and see if they’d even notice.
But the car was, like Baseball Cap had told me, dead as a doorstop. The lights wavered, there were some weird sounds, and the air started to smell like burning rubber, but that was about it. I climbed back out, walked over to the still-bickering couple, tapped Baseball Cap on the shoulder, and handed her the keys.
“Your alternator is fucked.”
This, apparently, meant nothing to her. She stopped yelling at Flipflops, and whipped around so she could yell at me.
“The fuck does that mean!?”
I reminded myself she didn’t want the real explanation. She just wanted to know why the car wasn’t functioning as a car.
“It means your car can’t draw from the battery.”
Flipflops, by far the stupider of the pair, cut in.
“Well, do you have jumper cables?”
Jesus assfucking Christ, you’re an idiot.
“Yeah, but they’d do about fuckall.”
He wouldn’t take no for an answer, and would probably never understand that jumping a battery that the car can’t use would be absolutely pointless.
“Can you fix this!?”
They still weren’t quite grasping the situation, so I plastered on my best smile… And gave up.
“I sure can! But, I don’t have the shit to do it, so just be glad I told you what the specific problem was so the next guy doesn’t try and rip you off! You’re welcome!”
I started to storm off. They went back to sniping at each other. Baseball Cap knew, just knew that the burning smell meant something. Flipflops thought it was just the hot weather cooking the tires or some stupid shit like that. Baseball Cap thought that was bullshit. Then she did the unthinkable. She whipped around and called out to me.
“…Hey, can we smell your car!?”
Oh god.
“Fuck no, you can’t smell my car! The hell is wrong with you people!?”
“Well, if the smell is ‘just the sun melting the tires,’” She glared at Flipflops, and threw air-quotes with so much aggression that I half expected her to take those hooked fingers and gouge out his eyes. “…Then all cars would smell like that today, right? Let us smell your car!”
“No!”
By now, I was running at full speed. Then I realized I had one more thing to say, so I turned around and ran backwards.
“Also, if you want my opinion, I don’t think this relationship is goin’ anywhere!”
That said, I turned around, hopped in my car, and left the two of them to fight things out for themselves.
I have my own fuckin’ problems, man.
And one of those problems was moldering in my trunk.
Like a hotdog on a sunny deck.
(Gross.)
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Also, gross.