"Happy birthday Cyrus," I grumbled, as I worked under the car, pulling bits and pieces out and then back in. Don't get me wrong - I loved this job because I'm good with cars and gears and such, but spending my twelfth birthday in here while my boss buggered off to get drunk? This wasn't my idea of a good time at all.
I sighed and pushed myself out from under the car, standing up to brush myself off which resulted in me just getting more grease on my jeans and hands. Great. I wandered over to the sink and washed my hands and splashed some water on my face, sighing to myself. There was a loud crash behind me and I jumped, seeing a large chunk of metal fall off the car and I groaned to myself, rubbing the bridge of my nose. I guess my boss would have to come back and fix that part himself, because that was the third time I'd tried to get it to stay, and it wasn't frickin' working.
I dried off my hands and face, throwing the ragged towel onto the bench before plonking myself down on it, grabbing my cup of cold coffee and downing it in one, pulling a face at the bitter and rather unpleasant taste to it. My father would have screamed at me if I'd left it, and for some strange and unknown reason the thought brought a small smile to my face - there were moments where I did miss him, but most of the time I didn't care for the bastard.
I went through to the small kitchen built on the side and started making myself some more coffee, putting on a big kettle of water and dumping two spoonfuls of the instant stuff in my mug and a couple sugars as well - as long as my boss didn't see me doing it, he couldn't slap me for it. The kettle hadn't quite boiled when I stopped it to pour the water in, but it did mean that I could just down it in one - which is what I did, smiling as it took the stale taste from my mouth that the cold cup I had moments before had left me. I then helped myself to another cup and trudged back through to the workroom floor.
I wandered over to the only motorbike that was sitting waiting to be repaired and stood in front of it, placing the cup beside me on a table. I'd always wanted to fix one of these up, but my boss had always been very protective over the clients that came in with them, said if I ever broke one or messed up a job with them I'd be dead... And when you put it like that, it does kind of put you off going near them completely. But that didn't mean I couldn't admire them.
I jumped as another loud noise came from behind me, and I spun round ready to yell at the stupid car that was falling apart, but instead a boy came stumbling through the doors, knocking over a couple of metal gears and pipes on the table top. I should have shouted at him as well, but he looked sickly pale, and when he came round the corner so I could see his whole body I saw the bottom half of his shirt and jeans were soaked through with a red stain, and he was clutching at his stomach.
"H-Help..." he squeaked before stumbling over his own feet and toppling over his feet to the ground.
I ran forward and grabbed him before he hit the ground and caused himself more damage, hoping that he'd at least still be awake to talk to me about what had happened, and thankfully he was, his breathing ragged and short, coming out in pants. His face was screwed up in pain, but unfortunately because of the way his clothes were drenched in blood I wasn't sure where he was bleeding from - or if this was even his, for all I knew this could be someone else, he could be a murderer... But he didn't look like one.
He was small, very thin as well, brown floppy hair that fell just above his eyes and his cheeks were very flushed compared to the rest of his pale skin, but that could be more down to running around away from... well, whatever it was the boy looked so scared of.
"I-I-Inside," he croaked, pointing to the inside of the workshop.
I heard someone shouting outside and thought that it was better to help the lad in here, but not in the workshop - he'd be too exposed - so I carried him to the little upstairs room, lying him down on the small single bed in the corner.
