Chapter 5
Emma climbed into Daryl's truck and he started them towards home. She looked down at her stained uniform and felt embarrassed by it. She had coffee on her and god knows what else. Busy days always meant messy days and as hard as she tried to stay clean, Emma never could. She quickly looked over at Daryl and realized that he was in the same boat. They both worked dirty jobs.
"How'd my tires do?" she asked him finally breaking the silence.
"Good. The spare only needed air and the other one had a nail in it that I plugged. Easy fixes," he told her. He wished he was comfortable making small talk, but he wasn't.
"That sounds good. What do I owe you?"
"Nuthin'"
"C'mon, Daryl I must owe you something," Emma asked again.
"Naw. Garages never charge for plugs and I was happy to do it. Didn't have that much going today so I had plenty of time fix 'em." It seemed like he was helping a lot of women in need these last few days. It made him feel surprisingly good.
Emma was happy that she didn't have to spend any money to fix her tires. "Thank you Daryl. I really appreciate it."
"I'll put the front tire back on when we get back. Shouldn't take me long at all," he told her. The rest of the trip was done in silence as neither knew what to say to the other, but wished they did.
Daryl finally pulled the truck into the trailer park and he pulled to a stop in front of his trailer. Merle's motorcycle was gone much to his relief. "Looks like my brother's gone," he said making conversation.
"He's not like you," was all that Emma could think of saying.
Daryl quickly turned and looked at Emma before she got out of the pickup. He put his hand on her arm, 'You've met Merle?" he asked surprised. The way Emma said yes she had, he knew Merle had been his usual dick self. "Did he do or say anything…stupid?"
"He just makes me feel uncomfortable," she told him looking at her hands.
"Sumbitch!" he said under his breath. "Emma I'm sorry. I'll talk to him. I don't know why he is such a …such a…" Daryl couldn't think of a word that he wanted to say in front of her.
"Jerk?" Emma volunteered.
"That's a nice way of putting it, but we'll go with that. But Emma, if he bothers you or makes you feel uncomfortable again, you need to tell me right away. Okay?" He waited for her to look at him. When she finally did he could see the relief in her deep green eyes.
"Thank you Daryl. He's so not like you," she told him with a smile. Daryl loved the way her face lit up when she looked at him that way.
He hated being so shy around woman, only when he had been drinking did he ever get lucky and that was usually because they came on to him. "Naw, we're not alike much anymore. When I was younger I was trying to be like him, but I just couldn't do it anymore." Daryl had spent enough wasted time being angry and acting like a jackass like his brother. He finally started to become his own man. "Enough of me, let's get that tire back on the car for you."
They both got out of the truck and Daryl easily grabbed a tire from the back. Maybe he would think of something to say to her, if his hands were busy doing what they did best…fixing cars. The car was still up on the jack, so it was easy to get the front tire back on. He noticed that Emma had gone inside and he was disappointed. He was taking the jack off when she reappeared wearing jeans and a t-shirt and holding two glasses of what looked like tea. Daryl stood up wiping his hands on his pants. "Damn, she sure looked good in those jeans," he thought to himself.
"I thought you might be thirsty, so I brought us out some sweet tea," Emma said holding out a glass. She felt bad that he had done all of this for her and she had nothing to offer him. On the spur of the moment, she decided to get out of her messy work uniform and offer him a drink of tea. It was all she had. Maybe he would stay longer if she invited him for a drink on her little bitty porch…just maybe.
Daryl drank down half the glass before he stopped. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. "Thanks, that's good."
"It's the least I can do, since you fixed the car." Emma leaned against the car and smiled at Daryl "What am I doing?" she asked herself. Guys like him are off limits, aren't they? Maybe he didn't fall into that bad boy category that she thrown him into… maybe Daryl was different? Maybe? Hopefully.
Caution went flying out the proverbial window. "Wanna sit for a second?" she asked him. "You never told me about the garage you work at."
"Never asked," Daryl replied. He lit up a cigarette and slowly inhaled the smoke. He was nervous sitting here with Emma and smoking always helped.
'Well I just did, so what's it like?" Emma knew the best way to get a guy talking was to ask him about something he liked. This was a start. Emma started walking toward the two chairs he had on her small front porch and Daryl followed.
He was comfortable talking about cars, so this was good. He had never met a woman that after they knew he worked in a garage, wanted to know more, but Emma did. Daryl did something that he rarely did, he relaxed and talked. Emma kept plying him with questions and before he knew it he had told her about the job, about Mack and how he got into cars. He could not believe how easy it was to talk to her.
"I know Merle rides the motorcycle, what about you?" Emma asked. She had always wanted to try riding one, but never did. It was the side if her that she kept hidden that had always wanted to ride and right now she would give anything to ride behind Daryl. "Oh God, Cassie was right," she thought. "I don't stand a chance. I'm falling for him already."
This was Daryl's other passion. If he wasn't working on cars, he loved working on motorcycles. "I ride 'em, fix 'em and build 'em. I sold mine a while back and just haven't gotten another one yet." The money from the bike that he loved went to paying for a motel room for a week and paying off a dealer that Merle owned that was threatening to kill him. Just another time he had to bail his brother out of a jam. Damn, he had really liked that bike too.
The roar of a motorcycle engine started to fill the quiet air. Daryl could see Merle coming down the road toward them. "Speaking of the devil," he mumbled.
Emma giggled. "It was like he knew we were talking about him." Emma was not looking forward to Merle coming over to join them, but she knew he would. His type always did.
Daryl stood up, not wanting Merle to ruin this great time he had with Emma. "Let me get the spare out of the truck and put it in your trunk," he said suddenly. Daryl handed Emma the empty glass and he went and quickly grabbed the tire out of the pickup. It was in the trunk before Emma could blink.
Merle was on his way over to Emma's and that was the last thing Daryl wanted. "Thanks for the tea Emma. See ya around," he told her before turning to talk to Merle.
"Thank you!" she called out, but she could see that he wasn't paying attention. Her heart sank a little.
"What you got going on over here little brother?" Merle asked with that snide smile he always had. "Cozying up to our pretty little neighbor, I see. Proud of you, boy. Usually you ain't got enough balls to talk to 'em. She sure looks ripe for the taking."
"Couldn't he keep his fuckin' mouth shut just once?" Daryl wondered. "Just fuckin' once." He had to get him out of there. "Bro, I just fixed her flat tire, that was it. I was just being neighborly, she sure as hell ain't my type. C'mon let's go inside, we got any beer left?" Daryl put his hand on Merle's chest and turned him around back towards their trailer. He didn't look back at Emma, who heard everything he said.
"Just being neighborly," she mimicked. Good thing she found out the truth before she fell too hard for him. He was a jerk like his brother. Then she said the first thing that came to mind, "Fuck you Daryl," and she slammed the door behind her.
Daryl heard Emma's door slam and knew he had screwed up. All he had wanted to do was to get Merle out of there before he embarrassed him in front of Emma. Now it looks like he did that all on his own.
"She's a nice piece of ass," Merle snickered.
"Get inside," Daryl told him. "She ain't a piece of ass, jackass. She's a nice girl and our neighbor, so just leave her alone."
"Awe, c'mon bro. You know I don't mean her any harm."
"Just stay away from her, okay?" It was impossible to control Merle, but he would do his best.
Daryl looked around the trailer and saw it was a mess from the weekend. "C'mon let's get rid of this shit that's all over the place. Help me out, man." Daryl grabbed a couple of garbage bags that he has seen under the sink and tossed one to Merle. He could see that Merle didn't want to do it. "C'mon this is the best place we've lived in years. Let's try to keep it that way."
"Okay, little brother, but you need to help me fix the sink in #23. Damn bitch has it all jammed up," he told Daryl.
Daryl rolled his eyes at Merle. This was exactly what he expected, he was going to get stuck fixing shit for his brother, even though it was Merle's job. He was a mechanic, not a plumber. "You're comin' with me," he told Merle.
After bickering back and forth and cleaning up the garbage around the trailer, they both finally headed out to fix the sink. Daryl threw his toolbox in the back of the pickup and together with Merle they drove off.
Emma was nowhere in sight.
