Chapter 2 — Call me, beep me

Tessa eyed the extension cord out on the concrete as she made her way outside for her morning run. It snaked its way from the building over to a particularly familiar eyesore, and her eyes caught the glow of flashing light inside, white and blue and definitely suspicious.

A moment later, she was pounding on the back door again.

"Jesus—!" Nero looked up at her in the dark, dropping the controller in his hands as his TV shone more colors. "What do you want?"

"Where the hell did you get a TV overnight?" she said, feeling the chill of the morning air hit her. She had half an hour to run a couple blocks and then shower before she had to catch the next bus to school— she didn't exactly want to dawdle, but if he could get his hands on a TV so quickly, why couldn't he just pay her back?

Nero restarted his game and stuffed what looked like a cheeto puff into his mouth. Gross. "I borrowed it from a friend. Is that illegal?"

"No, but you couldn't have borrowed a couple hundred bucks from them?"

"They're not that good of a friend," he shot back. "Look, I told you I'd get to work on your car tomorrow, alright? Give me a moment."

She gave him an unimpressed stare. "It is tomorrow."

"What?" He glanced out over her shoulder to the cloudy, morning sky and cursed. "What time is it?"

"Five AM."

He stared at her, disgusted. "What are you doing up?"

"I could ask you the same question," she said, crossing her arms. Though if she had to guess, he had probably just pulled an all-nighter. She cracked her neck to the side and shifted her weight from one foot to the other. "I have a bio class in an hour, sue me."

He rolled his eyes and went back to playing mega man. "Sounds like a waste of time if you ask me."

"Good thing I didn't," she said coolly. With her toe, she wrapped the extension cord around her foot and tugged— cutting his game short and the cord out of the wall.

"HEY!"

"I don't need you passed out when you're supposed to be fixing my car," she said, turning her back on him. There was a park a little ways down the street she liked to run through each morning— if she spent her time wisely, she could do a couple laps around the duck pond before her time was up. She glanced back at Nero as he hopped out of the van, angrily heading back to go plug in the extension cord. "Take a nap, get some sleep. I'll be back at noon to access the damage. We can talk then."

"Wouldn't miss it for the world," he muttered, watching her jog out of eyesight.

The TV flickered back to life as he eased himself back into his spot, and he dumped the last Cheeto crumbs into his mouth as he pressed New Game, sleeping the absolute last thing on his mind at the moment.

X

Whatever opinions he had of the blonde before backing into her car were overshadowed by how much of a pain in the ass she was once she actually opened her mouth. It was worse than dealing with Dante— or, well, actually, dealing with Dante was its own type of headache in itself. At least he could beat the hell out of the guy if he was getting on his nerves, but some random girl? Ugh. It was such a pain.

He thought it'd been a lucky break when the owners of the apartment complex had given him the green light to do whatever he wanted— kill a couple lesser demons for their grandkids, no big deal. Job done. It hadn't been a paying job, per se, but it had come with some benefits. Being able to park somewhere reliable was awesome, and he needed to save up for more gas money anyway, but this? this was out of his area of expertise.

"Bumper, hood and both lights are out. One tire is punctured, axel out of alignment, and the engine requires maintenance..." she murmured, circling off each damaged part on a childishly renditioned drawing of own car. He caught a glimpse of it over her shoulder as she paced, and it looked like she had done it in crayon. Didn't she have anything better to do with her life?

Nero stifled a yawn and leaned back on the hood of his van, but he didn't do a good job of it. She shot him a glare as he yawned again, this time without bothering to hide it. "Cry me a river."

"Isn't that supposed to be your job?" she said, gesturing to his logo.

He shot her an exhausted glare. "I'm on vacation," he lied.

"That's too bad. Here I was hoping to bottle your tears and sell them on the black market. Maybe then you'd be able to pay me back."

Ugggghhhh. The more he had to put up with her the more his patience wore thin. Nero closed his eyes and counted the seconds until she had to leave again. He was so freaking tired.

The girl—Tess or whatever— was something of a walking stereotype as far as he was concerned. Preppy, blonde and uptight. He had been homeschooled by the Order on Fortuna, but she had a whole... uppidy cheerleader vibe to her that reeked of private schools and sweater vests. Like she expected everything to be handed to her on a silver platter. It rubbed him the wrong way, and when she made her final round of her car, he scowled down at her and her little notebook.

"Besides the cosmetics, it's the engine that needs the most work," she said, tossing her ponytail over her shoulder in a way that irked him even more somehow. "Thankfully there aren't any leaks and the fuel line is fine. If it had caught fire, I would have kicked your ass."

Scoffing at how implausible that was, Nero jumped at the other opportunity she presented. "Does this mean you have a full tank just... sitting there?"

"You're not taking my fuel," she said flatly.

"It's not like you're going to need it anyway," he groaned, rubbing one of his eyes with his palm. This conversation could not end fast enough— he needed coffee or an energy drink or something, stat. "I need to be able to drive to work to get the parts you need. How am I supposed to do that without gas?"

She glared at him, pretty pink lips twisted into a frown. "That wasn't a part of the arrangement."

"Sometimes deals need to be flexible. You want your car fixed, right?"

She grimaced and turned her back on him. "Yes."

"So? give me the gas."

"No."

He glowered at her. "Why not?"

"Because—" she floundered. It looked like she was refusing just to be difficult. "Because I'm the one who paid for it!"

"If it turns out there is a leak, and I set your car on fire while I'm working on the engine, you don't think that won't be a problem?"

Her shoulders dropped. Good girl. "Maybe. Ugh, fine, whatever, take it."

"Sweet," he clapped his hands together and pushed off the side of his van. "So you'll also be siphoning it out yourself, right?"

She bristled immediately. "Absolutely not."

"What, are you saying you're too good to suck some fluid out of a tube?" He smirked as Tessa turned and gave him a scathing, scandalized expression.

"You suck it yourself if you want it that bad," she shot back, and Nero snorted. "I'm going to go take a cold shower for the second time today."

"Don't strain yourself—"

"Shut up."

"Right," he said, turning back to the car. He had maybe five, ten minutes, depending on how much time she took playing with her hair. Ten minutes until she'd look down from her window and see him not working on it. What did he have to lose?

Absolutely nothing. That's what.

X

WHAM!

Nero's eyes opened and on instinct, his hand reached for his sword.

"You're unbelievable, you know that?"

But it was only Tessa, not a freaking demon trying to tear through his car to kill him. Jesus fucking Christ, he hated it when she did that— what the hell was her problem?

"I told you to take a nap when it wasn't wasting my time. You know I have things to do too, right?"

"So you tell me," he groaned, sitting up. He watched as she curled her lip up in disgust as he kicked away an old box of pizza and pulled himself into a sitting position. "So you have a job with the mortuary, why can't I have five more minutes?"

"I work in a hospital, that's the opposite of a mortuary."

Nero rolled his eyes and made himself comfortable. He wasn't about to get pushed around by some uptight nurse.

(though in theory, it wasn't such a bad idea.)

(ugh, was there nothing this girl didn't ruin?)

"What do you even do that's so important," he said, propping his head up with his hand. "If you're still going to school, do you like, change bedpans, and wash old people?"

"In a manner of speaking," she said, irritated. Outside the van, the lightest smattering of rain started to pour down, and Tessa hugged her denim jacket close, watching him lounge, dry and unbothered. "It's a step towards getting my doctorate. Everyone has to start somewhere."

"Gross." He flipped open the old takeout box and picked at a piece of cheese stuck to the cardboard. Probably still fine to eat, right?

Tessa's lip curled as she watched him consider the cardboard cheese, and then put it in his mouth. She closed her eyes and turned away as he chewed it far longer than necessary— long enough to tell that it was, in fact, no longer edible.

"At least I'm not living in my van," she said pointedly, after he subtly spat the cheese back into the box, quietly hoping this was the first time he had done so. Okay, so he lived like a pig, what the fuck ever? There was no way in hell she was allowed to look down on him when she just openly admitted to being the person who removed back moles and powdered diapers for a living.

"Yeah, well— at least I have—" Shit, what was something normal people gloated about that didn't end in having the cops called on you? The statue definitely didn't count (he really needed to get rid of it anyway). "A fucking sword."

Nice. Nailed it.

"Yeah, I saw." She didn't sound impressed. His impression of her plummeted further than it had before. Rock bottom apparently had a basement. "You treat it pretty well. Is that your girlfriend or are you just friends with benefits?"

"Yamato is a family friend." He paused and narrowed his eyes at her. "Bitch."

For the first time they had met, Tessa expressed a positive emotion and laughed. Or, well, sarcastically expressed a positive emotion. Baby steps— she was probably still new to the whole concept, having a heart made of liquid nitrogen and all.

"Okay, well, if that's the case, sorry for interrupting your moment." She audibly rolled her eyes, he could hear it in her voice as he considered his options for throwable objects— would a shoe be too cliche or should he go for one of the takeout boxes? She turned to him. "If you can't get you off your ass, you can expect me to drag my heels with your insurance just as long."

That had him moving. Outside the van, it was thoroughly starting to pour, and he looked over to her car in the corner of the parking lot, vacant of shelter and sitting in a pool of rainwater. He raised an arm over his head to keep the rain off his face and found her doing the same. "You're crazy if you think I can fix anything in weather like this. I need my van!"

"Then act like it. Give me some hint that you're not going to bolt the moment I look away," she huffed, blonde curls sticking to the side of her face. It really was raining unnecessarily hard. Nero considered hopping back into his van in a moment, but if he couldn't stare down some dumb girl in the parking lot while she was holding his livelihood hostage, what good was he?

But... Ugh, fuck it. He had a gig a couple blocks away and less than two hours to catch up on thirty-six hours of sleep.

"Give me your phone."

"What?"

He snatched it out of her hand and flipped it over, wincing at the default background and the fact that she apparently didn't feel the need to lock it. He punched in his contact info and tossed it back at her. She caught it, thankfully, and looked down at the screen, honestly surprised.

"Don't call me unless you're dying or something's on fire. In fact, don't even call me then—" He watched her rename his contact to something he couldn't quite make out. "—I'm not your ward. I have my own things to do. A deal's a deal—" He hopped back into his van and reached for an old towel sitting out to dry off his face and hair. "Insurance first, repairs second."

Tessa mulled it over for a moment, growing increasingly more soaked. Then, finally, backed down. She peeled one of her wet curls off her face and shoved her phone into her pocket. "Fine. When the weather clears up—"

"When the weather clears up," he nodded, hoping the forecast called for flooding. Or at least enough rain for him to actually... learn what the hell he was supposed to do to fix her car. "I'll do it."

She didn't look like she believed him, but the rain was hitting her flat in the face and making things unbearable.

"I'll hunt you down," she threatened, and it was pretty cute how she thought scaring him was actually a possibility. He'd like to see her try. "I'll fill out the forms for the insurance, but you're gonna regret it—"

"You've got me shaking in my boots," he said from the warm dryness of his van. Nero smirked as she wiped at her face with her sleeve, wet and miserable. "Not so bad for a guy who lives in his car now, huh?"

"Asshole," she said, winding her arms around herself as she trudged back towards her apartment.

Nero continued to smirk as he reached over to flick on his new TV, only to see the cord unplugged from the building again, and Tessa nowhere to be seen.

He dragged a hand down his face and groaned. What a pain.