The Mechanic

SIX

I slammed my laptop close, my nose flaring in anger. I grabbed my blazer that was hanging on the chair and donned it over my sundress. With my mind cursing recklessly, I ran away from my room to head to Harry's house.

"Harry! Open the door!" I yelled while hammering his door with loud knocks.

"Oi! What are you doing there?"

I whirled around and found Dirk in front of Harry's lawn with his bike.

"I need to speak to Harry," I replied casually. "And why are you late? It's almost 9 in the evening!"

He grinned sheepishly. "I went to my girlfriend's house," he confessed, rubbing the back of his head and discomfort obvious on his tone. "By the way, Harry isn't there. He's still in the shop, I saw his car there. Probably working late."

Crap. I was so angry that I failed to see his empty garage.

"Give me that bike. I'll use it," I demanded. Dirk obeyed even though he was confused.

I drove off, ignoring the fact that my dress was too short to go biking. I honestly didn't care anymore, all I wanted to do was confront Harry.

And maybe tear him up to pieces.

After minutes of furiously hitting the pedal, I reached the automotive shop. The gate was partly closed now but Harry's car was still parked outside. The lights inside were also on.

I dropped the bike nearby and walked inside. Aside from the cars and machines, the shop was completely deserted.

"Hello?" I called out while looking around the place.

No one answered me. I continued to walk until I reached the shop's locker room.

"Is somebody here?" I called out again, standing still at the locker room's door. 

Again, it was silence who replied to me.

I decided to walk inside the lockers. He might be there, fixing his things or changing his shirt, or even taking a shower.

At the last row of the lockers, I finally saw what I was looking for.

"Fucking hell!" Harry exclaimed upon seeing me, his face almost white in shock as he snatched the earplugs from his ears. He obviously didn't hear me calling out his name.

He let out a deep breath. "Jesus, Jade. You almost scared me," he sighed, brushing away some strands of his wet hair from his face. I could tell right away that he just came out from the shower. He was only in his pants and there were still beads of water on his chest and torso.

Hot damn.

I cussed myself inside. God. I didn't need this right now. I had to think straight.

I cleared my throat. "We need to talk."

He crossed his arms over his chest. "Are you gonna apologize for slapping me?" he asked proudly.

"No," I replied with a hard tone. "I want to know why you're sabotaging me."

His brows met. "Sabotaging you?"

"Don't play dumb, Harry. You didn't approve the new stories that I submitted and I know you did that on purpose," I told him, my fists curling. I submitted the new parts last night, following the suggested plot. I wrote it all by myself without watching Harry's window or whatever but I was confident about them.

But just minutes earlier, I received an email from the website saying that my work was poor and lacking action. They wanted me to write another one or they would drop my whole story and probably even me. And I'm a hundred percent sure that it was Harry who wrote that email.