So, this is my Valentine's exchange fic for JessieBess. Her prompt: Tom and Sybil meet for the first time on Valentine's Day while one of them is working. I hope you all enjoy the story and please review if you can. After all, it is Valentine's Day - spread the love!
February 14th
Sybil had been dreading Valentine's Day since the beginning of February. It's not that she hated the concept; she rather liked the idea of exchanging gifts and declaring love so openly for no other reason than the day of the year. Her last (and first) boyfriend had gone for the whole shebang every year. He'd given her flowers, she'd given him chocolates, they'd gone on romantic frosty walks together and he'd made her romantic candlelight dinners, which, each year, were followed by the two of them falling into bed to make love. Sybil and Max had broken up three months ago. Though it had been a mutual agreement, and Sybil had been the one to bring it up in the first place, she still felt the sting left behind by the memory of him. They'd had three Valentine's Days together and each had improved upon the last. When Sybil thought of love she thought of those Valentine's Days with Max, and, in turn, of their breakup. With all the love songs on the radio today, she couldn't help but think of her ex and of how she was now single and wished not to be. Love causes pain. That was a fact as far as Sybil was concerned.
She was on her way to visit Edith who'd invited her round for a cup of tea and a chat. Sybil wasn't working that day, and she saw no reason to decline the offer, so she was on her way to her sister's house with the sun making the rain-sodden roads glisten brightly, creating sparkling diamonds in the tarmac. With the choice of songs on the radio station centred entirely on the theme of love, perhaps it wasn't wise for her to be tuning in, knowing how she would ultimately feel the pain of her past relationship. But with no CDs in the car, she would simply have to endure the cheesy love songs that were inevitably going to continue to play. And that wasn't too hard until 'Can You Feel the Love Tonight' started playing, prompting her to raise her voice at her car stereo, saying, "It's three in the afternoon! You can't play that now!" Sybil felt the song better suited to a calm evening romance than a mid-afternoon get together.
Suddenly she was forced to stop thinking about the, as far as she was concerned, poor song choice, as she realised her car beginning to handle oddly. She indicated to the left and pulled over to the side of the road. She waited for the car behind her to drive past and then scrambled out of the driver's seat to inspect the car. Hopefully nothing was too seriously wrong; she always wanted to know how an engine worked, but she and cars didn't mix well. "Oh bugger it!" she exclaimed under her breath as she spotted the rapidly deflating tyre – she had no option but to change it. All she had to do was figure out how. There was a spare tyre in the car; she knew that much, but she couldn't remember anything about how to change it. Though a tyre on her car had been changed at the roadside once before, Max was the one who did most of the work; Sybil just handed him the tools he asked for. She hated how it was so stereotypical, but it was a fact – Max had a way with cars that Sybil could only dream of.
She remembered how Edith had said to her a few weeks ago, "There's no time like the present," regarding her own job at the publishers. All Sybil had to do now was apply that mantra to this situation. She found the tyre in the back of the car and brought it to the pavement, leaning it against the car as she waded her way through the rubbish in the glove compartment looking for the manual. She stood next to the car, enjoying the brief moment of sunshine while she could, as she was flicking through the manual looking for any guidance.
She barely even noticed the man walking towards her until he said, "Hi, do you need any help?"
Sybil jumped what she later would insist was about half a mile, and was instantly embarrassed. Who the hell gets scared about a stranger greeting them? And oh God was he attractive!
"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you," he said, his Irish accent becoming clearer.
"No worries. I should have been paying more attention, really," Sybil laughed, trying to brush off the situation, or at least make it seem that way.
"So, er, do you need any help?" he asked again.
"Only if you know more about changing tyres than I do, which actually isn't hard, considering that I know absolutely nothing about it."
"I worked for a mechanic for about four years – I know a lot about cars," he said.
"Well, thanks, but it looks as though you're about to go to work. I don't want to make you late. Or covered in grease or dirt… or… whatever it is that happens when you change a tyre," Sybil said, causing him to chuckle. He was wearing a nice suit and he scrubbed up well. Oh, for God's sake, Sybil, pull yourself together!
"I'm only going to a meeting. It isn't even really my area; I'm doing it as a favour for a colleague. It doesn't really matter if I don't go. Besides, I'd much rather help a beautiful English rose like you than sit in a stuffy conference room for a few hours with incredibly tedious men."
Sybil felt her cheeks fill with colour at his compliment.
"How about I get my tools from my car and I'll help you change the tyre?" he offered with a kind smile.
"Sure," Sybil said. "Thank you. As long as you're sure it isn't any inconvenience."
"None at all." He smiled at her and walked off to his car, which he'd parked a few spaces behind hers. He returned no longer wearing his jacket and tie (and he had his top buttons undone), and carrying a toolbox and a wrench. He carefully placed his things on the damp pavement and said, "I'm Tom, by the way. I'm not sure I mentioned it before."
"Sybil," she replied simply. "So, Tom, if you don't mind my asking, what do you actually do for a living?"
"I'm a journalist. Not exactly freelance, but my boss gives us so much freedom that I may as well be. What about you?" he asked as he took out his tool kit and inspected the wheel to determine which tools he'd actually need.
"I'm a paediatric nurse," she said, with the manual for the car now firmly closed and forgotten about.
Tom fiddled with the bolts on the wheel and then moved to wrench the car off the ground. "Very honourable profession," he said kindly.
"I suppose," Sybil said. "It can get quite stressful at times, if I'm completely honest."
"All jobs do at some point," Tom pointed out.
"True," Sybil said. She heard a clunk from the car, followed by another. A few moments later, the tyre fell off and landed on the pavement.
"Phase one complete," Tom said cheerfully. Before fixing the new tyre to the car, he wiped his hands on a rag he'd brought from his own car and rolled up his shirt sleeves. Sybil couldn't stop staring at his arms, both his forearms, now free to the air, and his upper arms straining against the seams of his shirt. Sybil used all the effort she could muster not to let out a small squeak at the sight of his body. He was a stranger for heaven's sake! A kind, attractive, Irish, well-muscled stranger, but a stranger nonetheless.
The two of them continued to talk about menial things; the weather, pets, work, family – little things that didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Or, at least, they shouldn't matter to a stranger. Once the tyre was firmly in place and Tom was happy that it was secure and wasn't going to throw Sybil off the road, he lowered the car back to the ground and returned the old tyre to the back of Sybil's car to do what she wished with it.
"Thank you so much," Sybil said, unsure of how to behave in this situation. "I really appreciate the help."
"Don't mention it. I'll always be happy to help a woman as beautiful as you," he said with a highly attractive lop-sided smirk. To Sybil, he appeared smooth with his words and good at gaining attention from women, but she wasn't aware that he'd spent the entire time it took to change the tyre planning what to say and hoping he didn't screw it up.
"How about coffee then? Not today, but later on in the week, perhaps?" she asked, more forward than she usually was.
"Sounds great," Tom said, the smirk making a cheeky return. "Just wait two seconds," he said, returning to his car with his tools. He ambled back towards Sybil with the toolbox replaced by a scruffy scrap of paper. He handed it to her and said, "My contact details. Just let me know when and where and I'll be there," he said.
"Will do," she said, looking down at the paper, which had on it his name and number in scrawled handwriting followed by the words, 'Happy Valentine's Day!'
"See you soon," he said, walking away slowly.
"Thank you so much," Sybil called after him.
When she got back in her car she put the paper in the empty CD compartment and vowed to contact him as soon as she'd finished with Edith. Perhaps, in some cases, breaking down wasn't such a bad thing after all.