Mary Meets Driver

Chapter 1

Fate is a concept held onto by the weary and guilt-ridden. It is an easy excuse for poor decisions, and a way to tell yourself that you aren't a waste, a piece of garbage, a broken bottle in some alleyway, suckled on and drain of pleasure long ago. At least, that was its purpose for Wren Beamish.

For as long as she remembered, she modeled herself after a cigarette. For so many nights, she had stared at the one her father so often grasped in his heavy, stained hand as he sat her in his lap. At first, her longing was for the recognition they received. The little sticks worked themselves into people, digging into their subconscious like worms, until they became a part of their being. People leaned on them. Stress, happiness, depression, anger, every possible emotion could be quelled or flared by a smoke. She longed to be that comfort, that catalyst, in someone's life.

Her attraction changed as she matured. As she grew, she found herself drawn to the tendrils of smoke that drifted out of them. They slithered out from the glowing tip, dancing up to the sky to frame the heads of those around in wispy halos. She'd watch her father puff out rings like a rambling train in full steam; gaze longingly at the smoke lob itself out of the mouths of the boys who hung around the corners of the corridors at school. She wished to move with such grace and agility; to be able to slip into people's lives and absolutely hook them on her. No one takes a drag to sign a death warrant. They know what they're doing, that they're playing around with a fatal little stick. But they want it, they need it. Any pain it causes in the long run is worth the brief euphoria it gives them. And so they take a smoke once, and come back to it.

So she practiced; got a job in a supermarket as a cashier (the fact that you could find her and a carton of smokes, she noted with bitterness, was an ironic similarity between the two that she hadn't longed for). In the evenings, she'd go to bars and try to talk her way into boy's minds. She aimed to diversify the ones she went after, and soon enough had herself a nice collection. Names quickly became lost to her, replaced by labels. Lost Puppies and Rebels without Causes were always easy to pick up; the former seeked her comfort, and the latter wanted to take any risks she presented. Every once in awhile, she'd gain the attention of the Eager Businessman, whose curiosity and intellect drew him to her, and whose ego made him think he could tame her. The Starving Artists romanticised her, tried desperately to gain her approval and glorify her every action. No matter the man, she made sure to waltz effortlessly into, and out of, their lives. It was an emotional, psychological hit and run: get in and get out quick.

Wren Beamish was a parasite, living off of men's libidos and whatever they had in their fridge that night. When she didn't get a catch, she lived in a dingy little apartment with her hooker of a cousin, who didn't show her face to the girl except to make sure she got breakfast. It wasn't a fulfilling lifestyle, but Fate is an impossible beast to wrangle. If her purpose was to be passed around from man to man, it was out of her hands.

Then she met Miss Margaret Goldberg, and, to say the least, things changed.

It happened on a busy Wednesday in August. August is a peculiar month, one that is so late in the year that a person is used to the monotonous tone that life has established, and yet it is the hazy month, wedged somewhere between summer and fall, a time when things change. It is fickle, twisting its head to give you a smirk and reshape your life just as you are settling into it.
On this particular Wednesday, Wren had slunk out of work an hour early, desperate to tend to her wounded pride (working in retail doesn't particularly help one's self-esteem) and hit the bottle. Normally, she changed out of her uniform in the store, but due to her, ah, rule-bending, there would be no possible way for her to get dressed for a night on the town and not attract any attention. She knew that the probability of being able to hook anyone at a nice establishment while still in-uniform was slim, and rested on the potential of a cashier fetish, which, in her opinion, wasn't worth shit. She was still desperate for a drink, though, so ten-minutes found her in one of the sketchier bars within walking distance of her home.