by C L Green
Wow.
I don’t think I’ve seen five customers out in the shop front the entire time I’ve been here. This is good. “Holy shit,” I announce as I rub sleep from my eyes.
“Holy shit alright. The goon sitting at the front desk got the shock of his life when he had to deal with people lining up at the counter and he almost fucking lost it. I reckon the dumb fuck was about to tell the people waiting to get the fuck out of the shop because he was too busy. Lucky I heard him growling and went out to help. I reckon the boys need to get someone with real skills out there. This won’t work with their goon friend snarling at prospective customers.”
“Fuck,” I mutter again as I absorb what’s she telling me. It had not even occurred to me that guy out the front didn’t know how to deal with multiple customers at the same time. “I’ll talk to Jake when he gets back.”
“Good. Here. Catch.” I turn just in time to see fresh jeans, a shirt and underwear flying through the air at me. “I’ll be working from one of the tables in the communal room so I can listen in on the shopfront goon and helping out if he flusters again. You’re gunna have to take over. I need privacy to do what I do.”
“Sure,” I agree as I push to my feet ready to head for the bathroom. “Fifteen minutes. Tops.” She nods as she disappears through the doorway. “Now that’s a woman on a mission,” I mutter to myself as I move to follow her.
*****
The next two days move through in a blur. Flat to the boards, Emma and I barely speak to each other as we become fully absorbed in our separate tasks. Emma spends hours in her room, doing what she does and I alternate between different tasks as needed. Working on my laptop at a table in the communal room, I break up my day by spending some time unpacking boxes and stacking shelves. I also help the man out the front when he gets busy.
Having found out that his name is Reggie, I am now as convinced as Emma that we need a skilled shop assistant for the front of the store. Reggie, although not the sharpest tool in the shed, seemingly got the job out front because he knows the most about the ‘shit’ Jake sells. And I have to agree he does. When it comes to the items that are for sale, he knows all about the bike parts and the bits and bobs that are now on display on the shelves. The look of pure bliss on his face as he explains Harley products to customers is a sight to behold. He just doesn’t cope with the pressure of totaling multiple sales, managing complex transactions and wrapping products when under any pressure. Considering he also told me that most days of the week, not a soul normally walks through the front doors of the shop I can see why he is struggling.
We need someone else out the front to work with Reggie so he can sell the products while someone else rings them up.
It’s now late Wednesday night and I’m sitting on Emma’s bed while she keeps tapping away madly at her computer. “How are you going? Can I help?” I ask.
“I wish you could, but not yet. I need to show you some shit first and I just don’t have time right now. I think I’ve just about got these two cracked but there have been a couple of issues that slowed me down.”
“I got the wireframes finished,” I announce thoughtfully as I study her working furiously at her desk.
“Cool,” she replies without moving her eyes from the screen. She looks like a woman possessed. Her fingers moving over the keys on her keyboard at the speed of light.
“Are you gunna take a break?” I ask as a sneaking suspicion that she hasn’t eaten all day crosses my mind.
“Nope. People pay me to do this shit quickly. That’s why I charge so much.”
I look at the floor next to her and notice five empty cans of Red Bull strewn haphazardly. Jambo is wandering among the cans flicking them with his beak and rolling them over. He seems oblivious to either me or Emma as he focuses his full attention on the shiny items he has gathered on the floor.
“Have you eaten?”
“Nope,” she mumbles as her fingers continue to fly over the keys.
“Jesus,” I murmur and push from the bed. “I’ll go make you something to eat.”
“Thanks,” she says as I leave the room. I doubt she even realizes I have left.
Returning a short time later with a huge ham and salad roll, I place it gently on the desk next to her mouse. She flashes me a grateful look, picks it up, takes an enormous bite and then returns to tapping madly on her keyboard. I smell the hot smell of a printer working hard nearby and look to see she has a small table set up to her left that now has several new ID’s sitting with two different men’s faces on them. My mind briefly registers that one of them looks vaguely familiar and within a few moments I realize who one of them is. “That guy was on last nights ‘Australia’s Most Wanted.’”
“Yep,” she grunts between chews as she grabs her mouse and clicks something on the screen. She spreads an image wide and drops it onto a driver’s license.
“Holy shit,” I mumble as I stare at the guy’s picture.
“Don’t ask questions. Just do the job and move on. You can probably understand why he wants this done quick now, yeah? I guess he needs to be out of the country as soon as possible.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” I nod my understanding. “No questions it is.”
“Hate to be rude, but I need to concentrate,” Emma mumbles as she grabs her roll and takes another huge bite.
“Gotcha,” I reply as I turn to head for the door. “Jake’s supposed to be back tonight so I might just go start on his new ordering system and wait for him in my room.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” she flicks me a glance and grins quickly before her eyes return to the screen.
Sighing, I head back to my room, set myself up at my laptop and without a second thought, start pouring code onto the screen.
*****
“Babe, I don’t think your awake but I’m gunna ask again. How do I save this shit for you?” I hear Jake murmur against my ear.
“Save’s automatically,” I mumble against my arm where my head fell sometime after one o’clock in the morning. I had been too exhausted to move to the bed.
“I hope for your sake you’re not dreaming because that shit looks fuckin’ crazy. Something as fucked up on screen as that can’t be easy to do and I doubt your gunna wanna lose it.”
“It’s code. What time is it?” I mumble again as I feel myself hoisted from my seat and thrown against Jake’s warm, insanely good smelling chest.
“Four in the morning.”
“Late.”
“Yeah babe, late.” Jakes voice rumbles in his chest against my head.
Barely able to remain conscious, I feel Jake lower me to the bed. He flicks my thongs off my feet, slides my jeans off and then covers me with the doona. Burying my head into my pillow I mumble, “Thanks.”
Vaguely aware of the sounds of Jakes boots hitting the floor, I fall asleep for a few seconds. I know this because the next thing I feel is Jake tucking me under his arm as his warm lips kiss my forehead. My mind registers the tiny time warp as it starts to drift back to sleep.
“Night babe,” he murmurs.
“Night Jake,” I mumble back.
“Missed you,” he murmurs settling his head back on his own pillow, sighing.
My mind registers his words.
He missed me? That’s cool.
I slide back to sleep with a smile on my lips.
*****
I hear my mobile phone ringing somewhere nearby.
Groggy, I sit up and look around the room confused. Jake’s voice growls next to me.
“There a reason you’re ringing my woman at eight in the fuckin’ morning when you should be sleeping to make up for the two fucked up days we just spent together?”
Shocked, I frown at Jake and try to grab for my phone. Capturing my hand with his, he stops me. I hear mumbling coming from the phone. “And you think she couldn’t work that out considering what time I crawled into bed with her?”
I hear more mumbling on the phone and Jake says, “I
know your fuckin’ game Luke and there’s no point trying to impress her. It won’t get you anywhere. I’m not planning on fucking this up. She won’t be looking for the next contestant while I’m still breathin’. Go back to bed.”
I hear more mumbling and Jake says, “Fuck you too.” Then he pushes end on the screen.
Handing me my phone he announces, “Luke’s gunna be late. Probably after lunch. Go back to sleep.”
Blinking in shock at how rude he just was to his friend, I ask, “Do you always speak to your friends like that?”
“Not always,” he mutters as he reaches out to grab me and settles me back under his arm again. My face presses to his chest. He sighs before continuing, “I do when they’re being fuckin’ stupid though.”
“What makes you think he’s being stupid? Wasn’t he just ringing to arrange our road trip to photograph setups today?” I ask innocently, wondering why Jake had to be such an asshole to him. My guess, today he’s not a morning person.
“I know he’s being fuckin’ stupid by the fact the dumb fuck set his alarm to wake himself up and ring you at eight in the fuckin’ morning. He did that because he was planning to drive you around with his eyes hanging out of his fuckin’ head. Doing that he was putting you both at risk. Neither of us have slept since we left here yesterday morning and he’s more concerned about keeping you happy than he is about his own welfare. And even worse, if he fell asleep at the wheel, yours.”
Understanding Jake’s logic, I nod and turn my head to kiss his chest softly. “You love him don’t you?”
“Like a brother.”
*****
“Please…” I beg unashamedly.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“You don’t need to. That’s not why we are here,” Luke says flashing me an annoyed look. “Take your photographs of the panels, turbine and the batteries and we are out of here.”
Bastard.
He won’t budge. I want to look inside the house and see the hydroponic setup. Who wouldn’t? I’m sure it’s a sight to see. Lines of lines of marijuana plants all growing happily. I can imagine it smells pretty strong too. Instead Luke is insisting I don’t need to go in there.
I wonder why?
“Why not?” I ask batting my eyelids at him.
“Don’t bat your fuckin’ eyes at me woman, I said no.” He growls as he grabs me by the elbow and drags me away from the house and towards a small shed. “Battery setup is in here.”
“But Luke…” I plead as I try to shake his hand off my elbow. “I wanna see.”
“You don’t need to fuckin’ see,” he growls again. “Haven’t you ever heard of plausible deniability?”
Rolling my eyes I stumble along next to him as he drags me towards the battery shed. “Of course I’ve heard of plausible deniability but I don’t care. I want to see them. Pleeease.”
Stopping in front of the shed, he lets go of me elbow to start fiddling with a set of keys in his hand. Finding the right key, he opens a huge padlock on the shed door and swings the door open. “Take photo,” he mutters as he steps back and pushes me forward through the door. “And shut up. If you don’t, I’m locking you in here and calling Jake to come let you out. Considering we are two hours from home, it could be a long hot afternoon for you stuck in a battery shed.”
“You will not do that,” I grumble as I lift my camera to my eyes and start focusing the lens. The batteries are huge. Lined up in four banks of six batteries, each battery is about four times the size of a normal car battery. To one side of the room, two large boxes are hanging on the wall with lights flashing and they are whirring loudly.
“Inverters,” Luke says looking through the doorway and towards the boxes on the wall. “They convert the power down and feed it into the batteries. And yes, I will.”
Lowering the camera for a moment I study his face for a moment and decide that he looks serious about his threat.
Damn.
Disappointed, I sigh and lift the camera back to my eye before rolling off another half dozen shots.
“That should do,” I mumble as I turn to exit the shed again.
Luke steps aside and turns to face the house. Pointing towards the roof he and says, “The panels face north. This is the best side to get a picture of them. The turbine is on the other side of this shed, in a clearer area to make sure it catches the most wind. Take a photo of the panels and then we’ll do the turbine.”
Nodding I set about photographing the panels. My camera clicks widely as I move about, adjusting the lens to take various shots at different angles. Surveying the panels through my lens I note there are lots of them. Every square inch of the roof is covered in panels to make sure the maximum amount of solar energy is collected.
“During the day, as long as the sun is shining, everything runs straight off the roof. Excess power not used at the time feeds into the batteries for storage. It’s a bit different with the turbine. It just turns and generates power whenever there is enough wind. The power produced goes straight to the batteries. The good thing with the two systems is that generally the batteries are full all the time because there are not many dead calm, cloudy days in a year. We have enough battery storage to run the setup inside for about a week if no power is generated. So far, we’ve never run out of power.”
“Wow,” I’m impressed. A truly standalone green energy setup. “Would this setup run an entire household under normal circumstances?”
“Depends on the size of the family and their power usage. Mostly, yes it would. The family would need to consider low energy devices however such as LED televisions and laptops that could run standalone some of the time.”
“I’ll have to get you to write some of this information up for me for the site,” I drop the camera again and turn in the direction of the turbine as I announce, “Turbine next.”
A short walk, and a few short minutes later I have run off several different shots of the turbine. I have also taken some video footage of it turning in the gentle breeze that is blowing softly in from the paddocks surrounding us.
As I flick through the screens on the camera to check that I have enough good quality photographs to finalize Luke’s new website, I hear his mobile phone ringing. From the corner of my eye I watch as he pulls it from his jeans pocket, looks at the screen and then answers the call. Turning his back on me, he starts to walk away. “Yo,” I hear him greeting his caller as he disappears around the side of the shed and out of sight.
Deciding I should give him his privacy, I finish flicking through my photographs. I turn off my camera and slide it over my shoulder, hanging it gently behind my back. Then, as one always does when they are waiting for something to do, I pull my mobile phone from my pocket. Realizing that I don’t even have a Facebook page to scroll through, I am suddenly at a loss with what to do with myself.
Staring blankly at my phone, the past weeks come crashing down on me like a tidal wave. The harsh reality that I now have no past that I can reach into for comfort slams me for a six. Feeling my knees buckle beneath me, I drop to the ground and start drawing huge breaths as images of my school friends, parties, fun road trips and work colleagues flash through my mind. People I will never see again, people I can no longer keep in touch with. Not even via Facebook.
I don’t exist.
Who will I be able to celebrate my birthday with? What will I do at Christmas when everyone else goes home to catch up with family and friends? Emma might be able to hide from her family for a year or two, but she still plans on going back to her old life and when she does, what will I do?
Visions of me sitting in my room behind the Harley shop, alone while everyone else celebrates Christmas with their loved ones hit me and I feel the first prickle of tears burning at my eyes. Dropping my phone into my lap I lean forward and let my head fall to my hands. As soon as my palms contact my face, a flood of tears pour from my eyes and I start sobbing silently.
Fuck.
A wave of grief hit
s me and my body lets go. Pouring all of my energy into tears and sobbing, I lose track of time as my mind flies over all the horrible events in the past few weeks.
Finding out Tony was cheating on me. Finding out what he was doing with my website. Being attacked and beaten. Tony dying. My life ceasing to exist.
“Fuck.” I startle at Luke’s voice behind me and I hear his heavy steps crunching through dry grass as he hurries over. “What the fuck?”
Ducking down in front of me, I feel his arms instantly wrap me tight as he pulls me forward into his lap. My senses are assaulted with his warmth and his warm woodsy male scent. I instantly feel comforted. “Jesus Arianna. What’s wrong. Are you that upset that I won’t take you inside? Fuck.”
With my face planted firmly against his chest, my sobs turn to stilted chuckles.
“Fuck. I’ll do it. You can have a fuckin’ tea party in there if you want. Pick a plant. We’ll hit a bud with a blow torch and dry it out. You can mellow out. Whatever you want. Just don’t fuckin’ cry. I hate it when women cry.”
Sniffing and drawing a deep breath, I work hard to control my chuckle sobbing as I register what he is saying and how good it feels wrapped safely his in arms.
Damn.
Pushing away from his chest, I look up to see two, very blue, very concerned eyes. “Mellow out?” I ask with a hiccup and another sob chuckle.
Sliding his hands from my back he moves them to my shoulders to hold me at arms-length in front of him. “What the fuck ever. Jesus Christ, what’s wrong?” His eyes scrunch up and the look of concern on his face nearly undoes me.
“Psycho woman blow out,” I mumble looking away from him and trying to focus on a point to his right.
With a soft shake he draws my attention back. “Huh?”
His eyes burn into mine as he waits for me to explain. “It’s just…”