“What the hell is wrong with you?!” Ella seethed, stomping to the passenger side of the Ferrari, which happened to be closest to her. There were five young men inside, all of whom were close to Ella’s age.
“Hey, calm down, girl,” laughed the boy in the passenger seat, the window rolled down. Ella reached through the window and grabbed his arm, pulling it up roughly.
“Hey-ow!” yelped the boy.
“Get out of the car!” Ella shrieked. Four of the five reluctantly got out of the car, but the one in the driver’s seat remained, his hands not leaving the steering wheel. Ella bent down, removed her sunglasses and peered through the passenger side window at him. “Did I fucking stutter?” she asked him with an awful calmness that was somehow worse than the shrieking.
The driver begrudgingly exited his seat, sauntering over to stand by his entourage. While the rest of the boys looked at the least perplexed, at the worst embarrassed, the driver smirked slightly, not removing his own shades. He kept his hands in his pockets and watched Ella, waiting, seemingly patiently, for whatever was to come next.
“This--” Ella gestured to the dented bumper of Lon’s car, “is my boss’s car. And, unlike you five frat boys, I don’t have a daddy to pay for the damage. I need to return this car in perfect condition, or I don’t have a job, which means I won’t have a home, which means I’m coming after you five and making your lives absolute living hell. Do I make myself clear?”
The four passengers glanced between each other, then one spoke up. “It’s Dave’s car,” he said lamely.
Ella’s eyes shot to the driver, whose gaze was turned in a direction totally opposite her own. “I’m sure he has insurance,” the boy added lamely.
Ella pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed. “All right,” she concurred. “I suppose, if he has insurance, we can simply exchange information and be on our way. I didn’t mean to frighten you all-I’m under a lot of stress, and this just didn’t help,” Ella finished in the way of an almost-apology.
“I mean, it’s okay,” the boy added. “One time, when I was still in high school, I accidentally ran over the neighbor’s cat. I felt really terrible. They were mad at me for a long time, even though I bought them a new cat and everything. I even used my own money.”
Ella smiled slightly. “Well, luckily, this is only a car, not a living being, so it can be easily fixed.”
The boys looked around awkwardly, but still Dave did not speak. “This last semester, one of the professors hit my car. Can you believe that?” one of the boys spoke up. He looked a little older than the former, and more collected. “A professor, of all people. But I figured, hell, at least now I’ll pass fucking Calculus.”
The boys chuckled and Ella laughed lightly, her anger subsided.
“What if I don’t want to pay for the dent?” the driver suddenly spoke up. Ella could hardly make him out, with his dark shades and his face turned away from her almost entirely, but she was once again immediately fuming at his words. She opened her mouth to cuss him out, or threaten his life, or both, but he finally turned to face her before she could. “Just kidding,” he said.
Ella shook her head and exhaled. She certainly did not need a car accident today, and she definitely did not need the rich frat boy who ran into her to be telling rude, misleading jokes at a time like this.
“You’re cute when you’re angry,” the driver added. Ella threw her hat and sunglasses to the ground out of anger, her fists balling up.
“Dude, chill,” the last boy who’d talked spoke up. “She’s going to slap you.”
Suddenly, Ella slunk in on herself, uncurling her fists and placing her hands on her hips defiantly. “I know what you’re doing,” she announced.
“Do you?” questioned the driver.
“Uh-huh,” Ella affirmed.
“What am I doing?”
“You’re trying to get me to hit you so you don’t have to pay up for the damage you did to Lon’s car! Well, it won’t work. I’m cool as a cucumber.”
“Sure you are,” said the driver, sounding almost amused. Ella kept her nose turned up to him and held out her palm.
“Insurance information, please,” she announced.
“All right,” sighed the driver. “Look, I’ll give you my phone number, and you can come around and I’ll have someone fix it for you. All right?”
Ella cocked an eyebrow. Rich kids, she thought to herself. They must have so many family cars they have an auto bodyman on retainer.
“Well, I’m going to have to call the number to make sure it’s really you,” Ella said.
“Of course, you’d be stupid not to,” the driver said smugly. He reached into his pocket and took out a pen, but instead of writing down his number on a piece of paper or a napkin, he suddenly grabbed Ella’s hand.
“What--” Ella glanced down, yanking back on her hand, but the driver didn’t release her. She had been so busy turning up her nose at him, trying to appear aloof, that she didn’t see him come up and reach out to grab her hand.
The driver took quite a while to scrawl out his name and number on Ella’s palm. He looked up at Ella when he was done, not releasing her even though he’d finished writing down the required information. He finally met her eyes with his, and was startled by the boldness of Ella’s deep blue eyes. They burned with an intensity that aroused his curiosity, causing his hand to linger on hers. Ella snatched her hand out of his grasp as soon as she realized he had finished.
Ella quickly typed the number into her phone, then hit the call button, half expecting there to be a pizza joint or something on the other line, but instead Dave’s phone rang. He answered and held his phone to his ear.
“Hello?” he answered, smirking. Ella ended the call, deadpan.
“I’ll be calling you,” Ella said briskly, turning on her heel to the gas pump without taking another look at any of them.
The five re-entered the Ferrari, Dave the last to get in, stealing a glance at Ella before calling out “You’re welcome.” Ella rolled her eyes, her back still turned to him.
“Kind of a crazy bitch,” muttered one of the boys in a voice low enough he thought Ella wouldn’t be able to hear him.
“All hot girls are crazy,” one of them responded to him. “That’s why you do the ol’ hit it and quit it…” the Ferrari pulled out of the gas station.
Ella was both disgusted and intrigued. Did Dave think she was attractive? Was that why he’d held her hand so long?
Who cares? Ella thought to herself. At least he’s going to fix the car. That should appease Lon. I think.
By the time Ella finally got back to the office, she was exhausted. Lon had already been picked up by Isabella. Ella had explained the situation with his car to him on the phone and, although he hadn’t been thrilled, he’d understood. It wasn’t her fault, and it was fixable, which was the important thing.
Ella uploaded the photos on the computer at the office before emailing them to Lon and driving to his house. She made sure to be as quiet as possible to avoid waking him up and having to deal with him seeing his car, when she really just wanted to get in her car and drive home so she could finally get some rest.
As she was finishing her cigarette on the cliff near the Tremaine house, Ella’s phone buzzed with a text from Jack.
Are you going to come to the baseball game this weekend? :)
Ella grimaced. She didn’t have any particular desire to attend Jack’s baseball game, nor did she ever really have a desire to attend any baseball games, as a general rule, but she hadn’t been very attentive to her only friend lately, so she figured she probably should.
I will, Ella texted back. She slipped her nearly-dead phone back into her pocket and walked tiredly back to her car. Not feeling especially in the mood to return to the Tremaine house from Hell, Ella reclined in the driver’s seat, closed her eyes, and quickly fell asleep.
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