Ash
Tuesday. Noon.
I pull into the lot and kill the engine, but I don't get off the bike right away. Just sit there for a minute, helmet in my hands, looking at the building.
It's a nondescript warehouse, the kind of place you'd drive past without a second glance. No sign out front, no indication of what's inside. Just a squat industrial building with a handful of motorcycles parked out front and a garage bay around the side.
What am I doing here?
I know what I'm doing. I'm here to see Jason. To eat food he made for me—food Robin said he's been practicing, four batches to get it right. To watch him light up when I compliment his cooking, watch him flush when I flirt with him, watch him want me the way he so obviously does.
I'm here to play with something I have no business touching.
Robin's right. I should stay away. Jason's soft and sweet and clearly the kind of person who falls hard and fast. He makes four batches of vindaloo for a guy he's met once. He looks at me like I'm something special when I've given him nothing but a few compliments and some charged eye contact.
He deserves someone who can catch him. Someone who knows how to stay. Someone who won't wake up one morning and realize they need to run.
That's not me. Has never been me.
But here I am anyway, sitting in this parking lot like a man about to make a terrible decision and fully aware of it.
First thing I check—the dent.
Gone. Paint touched up perfectly, blended so well you'd never know it was there. I crouch down to examine it up close, running my fingers over the panel. Professional work. Seamless. Probably cost Robin a fortune for the rush job, but my car is pristine again.
Good. One less thing to be irritated about.
I stop at Jason's bike on my way in. She's sitting in the lot like she's waiting for me, chrome gleaming in the midday sun. Custom Harley Sportster S, and he's modified the hell out of it. I circle her slowly, not touching—never touch another man's bike without permission—but taking in every choice.
Upgraded suspension. I can tell by the stance, the way she sits slightly lower in the rear than stock. Aftermarket exhaust, custom bend, probably hand-welded from the look of the joints. That would sound beautiful when she opens up, a deep throaty rumble instead of the stock rasp.
Hand-tooled leather seat with careful stitching that speaks to hours of patient work. Flame pattern, intricate and precise. Not the kind of thing you pay someone to do—the kind of thing you do yourself, late nights in a garage, because you want it exactly right.
The engine's been bored out. I noticed the sound difference on Sunday, that slightly deeper rumble that says someone's done internal work. 1250cc instead of standard, if I had to guess. Smart choice—bigger would throw off the handling on a frame this size. The SportSter's strength is its agility; going too big sacrifices that.
He could've made this a show bike. Chrome everything, flashy paint, the kind of machine that looks impressive parked but handles like a boat. Instead, he built a rider's bike. Function over flash. Performance over appearance.
Jason built this for himself, not to impress anyone. That tells me more about him than anything Robin's said.
Inside, the bar smells incredible.
Proper Indian spices hit me the moment I open the door—cumin and coriander and fenugreek and something with serious heat underneath. Not the generic "curry powder" smell of cheap takeout, but the layered complexity of someone who knows what they're doing. Toasted spices, bloomed in oil, built into something real.
My stomach growls. I skipped breakfast, too restless to eat, too busy pacing my empty house and wondering what the fuck I was doing. Now I'm regretting it. Whatever Jason's made, I want all of it.
Robin launches himself at me before I'm three steps through the door. I catch him automatically, wrapping him up in a hug that lifts his feet off the ground. He's lighter than he should be—always has been, burns through calories faster than he can eat them—but he's solid and warm and here.
"You came," he says into my shoulder.
"Said I would."
"You say a lot of things." There's no accusation in it, just fact. I've made promises before that I couldn't keep. Letters I said I'd write and didn't. Calls I said I'd make and forgot. Robin knows better than to trust my words without action to back them up.
Fair point.
I set him down and look at him properly. He seems good. Rested, despite the macaron disaster he was texting me about last night. Happy to see me in a way that makes some tension I've been carrying finally ease.
"You fixed the dent," I say.
