Axle: A Devil’s Nightmare MC Novella

by Lena Bourne

  “The what?” the guy asks, making me wince.

  “Le Mans,” I repeat. “The black with the gold stripes.”

  “Yes, that’s the one,” he says. “But I’d like it to be red with white stripes. Can you do that? I’ll pay extra. I can pick it up this weekend.”

  I almost slam the receiver down hard enough to break the phone. Almost. The younger me would’ve.

  “Man, that car is practically one of a kind. Only about 800 of them were ever made, and this one is as true to the original as it’s possible to get. There’s no way in hell I’m painting over it,” I say. It took me nearly six months to get those colors just right. But explaining all this to this dimwit would be words wasted. He gasps.

  “You can take one of the other Mustangs,” I offer. “Maybe the turquoise 1967 one. I’d be happy to paint that one whatever color you want. Baby pink and blue if you want. But not the Shelby.”

  His breath hitches and I can practically see his mouth opening and closing on the other end of the line. I might’ve refrained from slamming the phone down, but I let every bit of that anger into my voice as I spoke.

  “Alright, we’ll see,” he says and clears his throat nervously. “I’ll be there this Saturday. We’ll talk then. I’ll have the money with me.”

  He says it like I’m supposed to piss myself with glee at the mention of money.

  “I suppose I’ll see you then,” I say and hang up without waiting for him to say anything more.

  It would’ve been so much better if I hadn’t picked up the phone. What little peace I found working this morning is gone.

  I should let one of the younger guys handle this buyer on Saturday. But good luck to me getting any of them to come to work on a weekend. Sunday night is usually the earliest I can depend on any of them to be here. I was that young and reckless once. I was the guy who’d drink and party the weekends away. But now I’m older and wiser and can’t hold my liquor the way I used to. I’m closer to fifty than twenty and all I’ve got to show for my life is a garage full of old-timer cars and little else.

  This garage has been my life since I could walk and my dad would bring me to work with him almost every day. Now he’s gone and I’ve got no sons to pass it on to.

  I should just sell that car. And all the rest too. Start something new. I’m ready for a change. I think that’s the reason I haven’t been sleeping.

  3

  Mia

  Only my mom can cut and style my hair in a way that perfectly complements my face. The waves she created are bouncy and light, and full of volume and shine. They frame my face and rest easy on my shoulders. No other hairstylist has ever been able to give me a cut even remotely as good as my mom’s. And that’s over now.

  I bite the inside of my lip to banish the thought and smile wide at her through the mirror in front of me.

  “It’s amazing, Mom,” I tell her. “Thank you.”

  She nods and smiles back, that damn edge of sadness and grief outlining both her lips and her eyes.

  “Why don’t we go look for a new place?” I ask, swirling in my chair to face her. “I’m sure we can find an affordable place for you to relocate the salon to.”

  She holds up her hand to stop me talking and shakes her head. “It’s over and I have to accept it. You know the state of my finances, you know how high the rents are, and now you’ve seen the town, you know that’s unlikely to change. There’s no space for me left in this town. All my regular customers are aging and I’m aging too. It’s high time I retire anyway.”

  She gives me a lopsided grin, picks up the broom and starts sweeping up my hair.

  My mother’s always been a proud woman. She was widowed while pregnant with me, and she raised me and built this business all on her own. She’s also always been a woman who speaks her mind and says what she means, so I should respect her decision to throw in the towel, and retire. But I just don’t understand it.

  “Mom,” I say as I stand up and face her. “What’s really going on?”

  She snaps her head back to look at me. “Nothing’s going on. I’m just tired. I’d much rather just spend more time with my daughter from now on.”

  She smiles weakly. And I know she means it, because my mom always tells the truth. But I also know something about this whole thing is making her very, very sad.

  “Come on, let’s go get some lunch now. I can clean up later,” she says, leaning the broom against the little table in front of the large mirror. “I’m starving. There’s this new place that just opened up and they make the steak.”

  I chuckle at that. I don’t much care for meat, never have, but my mom loves her steaks, burgers and even sausages. She’s been very unhappy with the way everything around her salon suddenly turned vegan and vegetarian, and she was forced to bring her lunches from home if she wanted to eat a decent meal. Her words, not mine.

  “Let’s do that then,” I say. “I can have a salad and fries.”

  She gasps in mock outrage, but laughs right after. “The usual, in other words. You’d fit right into this new Pleasantville that’s growing around us.”

  “I doubt it, Mom,” I say and take her arm to lead her towards the door. “Never have, never will.”

  “Ain’t that the truth,” she replies, as always.

  I exit the salon first, while she turns off the lights and locks the door.

  The champagne colored Range Rover is gone, but so is the rearview mirror of my rental.

  “Damn that, woman!” I exclaim.

  “What is it?” my mom asks in alarm, rushing towards me. “What’s happened.”

  I just point at the broken, shattered mirror on the ground by the passenger side door, noticing a long car key scratch across in as I do.

  “There goes my deposit for the rental,” I say, bending over to pick up the ruined mirror.

  My mom just stands there shaking her head. “Did they at least leave their insurance information?”

  I shake my head. “Though I’m pretty sure I know who it was. This uppity lady accused me of scratching her car when I parked here. You saw her.”

  My mom nods. “And we could track her down. I have a pretty good idea who it was.”

  “No,” I say, unlocking the door and tossing the broken mirror on the back seat. “I have no proof.”

  “We could call the cops,” mom offers. “They could get the proof.”

  “I don’t want to make a fuss. I’ll handle it,” I say. I’m fuming inside, but fact is, I have no proof and I doubt the cops are going to find any either. I’m also in town for only a week, and there’s a lot to do to help mom pack all this up. I don’t need the added complication of dealing with the police over an issue that will go nowhere.

  But damn it, I needed the SUV to help my mom move all the stuff from the salon to her house. The task is going to take at least fifty times as long if we have to use her small hatchback.

  “Get in, let’s go get that lunch. I’ll figure out what to do after we eat.”

  “All these new people in this town,” Mom mutters as she climbs in. “I swear, nothing is the way it used to be.”

  I’ve never heard such bitterness in her voice. Never.

  “Axle could fix this for you real nice,” she says once I turn on the engine, making my stomach do a serious flip. “He’s very good at this sort of thing. Everyone says so.”

  I’m feeling legit fear of going to see him after all these years. And what’s even more baffling, a real desire to do it. We didn’t end it on the best terms. He didn’t want to break up with me and took a while to accept that it was over.

  “I’ll see,” I say, speaking barely above a whisper.

  I was sure I was over him completely. But clearly I was wrong.

  4

  Axle

  Saturday morning found me in the garage early again. Four AM, to be precise. The sky was still pitch dark when I arrived, the breeze cold, but not as cold as the interior of the warehouse where I keep my cars. It’s a caverno
us concrete building with a white metal roof I built about ten years ago, when my passion for restoring old cars, and lack of passion for selling them first started to become a problem. I still have no passion for selling off my collection, although it’s worth upwards of ten million. That’s what a guy from Arizona offered me for the lot. Everyone at the garage, and most of my MC brothers, agreed I should take it. Most of them also think I should start working solely on building custom choppers like my father used to. But Diesel took over that part of what we do here long ago. I love building a solid custom bike, but not as much as I love bringing a rusty heap of American history back to life.

  Every era of automobile history is represented here. From the Model T, through the 1980s when they, in my opinion, stopped making cars worth noting. I’ve been standing by the 1966 Le Mans Shelby for a long time now. And the only thing I know is that there is no way I’m painting over it. But I’m also pretty sure the guy will want his Shelby. I asked Diesel to be here when he comes, because I know myself, and I know I won’t be able to let the matter go with a simple no. It’s best he handles the guy.

  The metal gate leading to the loft is creaking and clanking open outside. It’s most likely Diesel arriving and opening up the garage for the day, or the morning more like, since it’s the weekend. The gate needs to be oiled, and I’ve set the task to at least three of the young guys working here, but none of them is in any hurry to do it. Guess it’ll have to be me after all and I best get to it. It’s fucking embarrassing to have a creaking gate on a garage where you charge people money to fix that sort of thing.

  Diesel is dismounting by the office when I exit the storage area.

  “I see you haven’t brought out the Shelby,” he says with the type of grin that tells me clearly what he’s not saying.

  “We probably won’t be selling the Shelby today,” I say, replying to the part he left unsaid.

  “Didn’t really think we would be,” he says as I pass him to enter the office.

  I press the big yellow button to open the metal shutters on the garage.

  “Do we have a lot scheduled for today?” I ask Diesel once the noise of the shutters opening stops and the echoes die down.

  He’s messing with the coffeemaker and turns to me just as jet black coffee, the color of oil, starts trickling into the pot.

  “Tom’s picking up his Buick, and Hawk says he might have a couple of cars to strip down and make vanish for us today,” Diesel says.

  I nod. While Diesel and me are both long time members of Devil’s Nightmare MC, as were our fathers before us, the sum total of our tasks for the club has always been working on the brothers’ bikes and getting rid of stolen, damaged, or otherwise hot cars the MC needs gotten rid of.

  “And I saw a pretty messed up SUV parked by the sidewalk,” Diesel adds. “Rearview mirror missing, driver side door scratched to shit. I bet whoever it belongs to brought it here to be fixed.

  “Eagle or any of the others coming in today?” I ask.

  “Your guess is as good as mine,” Diesel says and flips off the coffee maker switch. “You want some of this?”

  I nod and he pours us each a cup. I take a sip, the liquid so strong it’s corrosive as it goes down my throat. But it wipes away the last dregs of lethargy form my brain, as Diesel’s strong black coffee always does.

  “Looks like you called it right,” I say, nodding at the gate through which a silver SUV with a missing driver side mirror is driving. “Mind taking care of it? And I’ll grease that damn creaking gate.”

  “Sure,” Diesel says, but takes his time drinking some more coffee before going outside to see to the early morning customer.

  Whoever it is, they’re just sitting in the car for some reason. Probably getting their insurance papers and whatnot together. I really don’t care. I’m in no mood to converse with customers today. Haven’t been for months now. I don’t know why, and I don’t care enough to figure it out. Most likely it’s just one more sign I’m ready to move on to something different. But my roots go deep in this town. And something different is a very unsettling thought.

  Diesel places his cup on the table with a thud. “Best go see what’s taking them so long.”

  I head into the garage proper in search of the grease to oil the gate, the sound of the SUV door slamming shut out front following me.

  “Damn,” Diesel exhales more than says. “Axle, you’re gonna want to take this one.”

  There’s something very edgy, though kinda gleeful in his voice. I turn to ask what the fuck he means.

  But I don’t have to ask.

  Mia is walking toward the office, her auburn curls shining like copper in the early morning sun, her curves bouncy and soft and clearly visible even under the baggy white shirt she’s wearing tucked into a pair of not quite skinny jeans.

  I was wrong.

  She still looks better than Miss July from the calendar.

  The years only made her more beautiful.

  And I don’t think I’m ready to talk to her.

  I was certain, one hundred percent sure, I’ve been over her for a long time.

  But clearly, that was just a lie I’ve been telling myself.

  5

  Mia

  Mom didn’t exactly pester me about taking my car to Axle to get it fixed, but she mentioned it often all day yesterday, and a bunch this morning as she made me the first homemade breakfast I’ve had all year. French toast, pancakes, homemade blueberry syrup and the best coffee I’ve tasted in a long time. She also made a banana, strawberry and raspberry fruit salad to complete the feast.

  She’s probably right about me needing a quick solution to the car problem. I could take it to be replaced, but the nearest rental company is an hour’s drive each way, and if Axle can just get it fixed in a day or so, that is my best option. I’d hoped to have mom’s salon packed up by Wednesday, so we could have a couple of days just to ourselves, to talk and such, make some plans. But that looks like it’s off the table now.

  Either way, when she mentioned I take the car to Axle once more after breakfast, I didn’t argue, but just took my purse and keys and left, trying not to think too hard about seeing the man I very nearly married, for the first time in almost twenty years. And trying even harder to ignore the butterflies in my stomach the thought of seeing him again woke.

  I arrived at the garage too early. The gate was firmly shut and the street was empty. I almost took it as a sign that it was a very bad idea to go poking around in the past, and I should turn around and leave. But I pushed that thought away and instead took it as a sign to take a walk and see what has changed around here.

  Back when we were together, Axle’s father still ran the garage, and it was situated at the very end of the rough part of town, which started with the mall where my mom’s salon is. But there’s nothing bad about this neighborhood now.

  Several of the buildings lining this street are new, and the rest have brand new facades. By the looks of things this area is now home to a mix of office buildings and restaurants, all closed this early on Saturday morning.

  The gas station near the garage was bought up by a national chain, and there’s even a large modern convenience store here. Back in the day, you’d be in real danger of getting mugged in this part of town, day or night. But now, everything seems in tip-top shape, even the road and the sidewalk, which used to be so messed up and pitted, it was downright dangerous.

  I sprained my ankle in one of the potholes running back to my car on the day I broke up with Axle. I probably should’ve taken that as a sign that it was a mistake.

  The sound of something large, heavy and metal creaking open snaps me back from those pointless, moronic thoughts. It’s the gate of the garage opening.

  I turn and hurry back to the SUV, refusing to question anything anymore. I’m here to get my car fixed. That’s it. If there was another place reasonably nearby to get it done, I’d go there. But there isn’t.

  Axle probably won’t even recogni
ze me.

  Maybe he won’t even be there.

  Both those thoughts fill me with a very deep sadness instead of making me feel better.

  So I refuse to think at all as I climb back into my car and drive in through the gates.

  No one’s in sight in the huge open lot that’s almost half full with cars of all shapes and sizes. The lot is much larger than it was when I was here last, at least five times larger, as is the garage itself. And that large metal roofed rectangular building in the far left corner of the lot that looks like an airport hangar definitely was not there before. A copse of scraggly pines grew there if I remember correctly.

  The metal shutters of the garage proper are open, but no one is in there. The windows and glass door of the office are shuttered. I’ll have to just walk in. And I don’t know if I should.

  Despite how much this place has changed—becoming nearly unrecognizable—since my youth, it still holds such deep, conflicting emotions for me I’d like to just run, or more like drive away from here as fast as I can.

  I’ve had some of the best dates of my life here. And some of the most boring afternoons watching Axle work on some car or other that just couldn’t wait. Not even for me. That used to make me mad until I grew up enough to understand that I must accept and respect his passions even though they bore me to tears.

  It took me longer still to realize that his passions and mine were so far apart, on opposite sides of the spectrum, that neither of us would ever be happy if we stayed together, no matter how much we loved each other.

  And remembering that sobering, rational, adult realization and decision, I’m finally able to get out of the car.

  Leaving him was for the best. I’ve made a good life for myself since. And clearly, so has he. Breaking up with him was the right decision.

  And I know that right up until the moment I see him.