Half Past Five.

Chapter Five: Mechanical Problems For A Mechanical Whiz.

“I told you not to be late.” Billy mutters when Elijah saunters to the car.

“It's only two minutes, mom.” She mocks, flashbacks from the previous conversation playing over in her head.

She got lucky today. Or maybe it was just Nancy's charm to help her friend, but Steve announced out of the blue that he'd be spending the afternoon at his girlfriend's place. He gave Elijah another buck or two to buy pizza again, and left the keys with her to be able to drive herself, and her new clan of people (that Steve definitely doesn't know about) back home.

“What did I say about that endearment, darling?” He whispers seductively, watching as Max approaches the car, skateboard in hand. “Call me mom again and I'll pull you over my lap and spank you.” He whispers almost inaudibly, greeting Max the second she actually gets to the car.

Max suspiciously glares at him, finding his new sense of manners extremely strange.

“Hi, Elijah. Thanks for waiting for me.” Max greets as soon as she gets in the car.

“Of course, I wouldn't leave without you.”

“That's a nice change of scenery.” Max adds, referring to all the times Billy sped off without her. The man only rolls his eyes at her comment, not even bothering to defend himself.

The conversation topic switches again, the two girls conversing about their days and how it went. Like usual, Billy is silent, only staring out the window at the houses passing by.

God, he misses his car.

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That afternoon
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“I told you I already checked the pistons!” Billy yells in frustration, starting to lose his cool with the girl who created this mess for him in the first place.

“Liar.” She states, trudging over to the car and yanking the wrench out of his hand, inspecting the pistons herself. She can feel Billy's eyes trail her as she leans into the car.

What? You thought she'd pass up on an opportunity to make Billy miserable? Never.

“You know, when I said short, I didn't expect you to show up in your second grade pajama pants.”

“I'm sorry, are you complaining?”

“No. No.” He quickly answers, Elijah mumbling a 'that's what I thought', before continuing her delve into Billy's car.

“You're an idiot, you know that?” She asks him rhetorically, screwing both of the spark plugs into their sockets, properly connecting them like they once were.

“Pray tell, how did the queen of intelligence come to that conclusion?”

“I told you twice to check the pistons! Twice. You told me you did. Twice. What happened when I checked it for the first time? I connected the spark plugs, like I said would happen if you listened.”

“Why would I want to do it, if I could just watch you do it?”

“You're just afraid to admit that I have a more broad understanding of mechanical problems than you do.”

“Yeah, maybe because you're the one that caused the mechanical problems to start off with.” He counters, Elijah huffing and bending over the hood again, securing the spark plugs and reassuring herself that they were connected successfully. “I like the view from here.”