Title: How We Are
Author: Caty
Rating: R
Disclaimer: If I owned TFATF, there would be a lot more Dotty.
Feedback: Very much appreciated.
Note: I started writing this fic almost 7 years ago. Unbelievable, right? It's been almost 4 years since I've updated it, but about a month ago I started getting inspired again. So thanks to those of you who are writing awesome fics, thanks to everyone at this site for being so welcoming, and special thanks to Mimi and Anjel for the help getting my ideas on paper. While this is posted in a few places now, this will be where I update first - kind of a thank you to you guys.
Summary: Pre-TFATF. Other than that, it's a little hard to summarize.

Enjoy!

**

"Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does.
Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up."

-James Baldwin

Chapter One - You Gonna Stick By Me?

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

“Maybe,” I say, but he and I both know I’m not really serious. There’s no way I could ever leave Dom. I owe him too much. I love him too much. I wouldn’t even know how to begin to let him go.

Dom saved my life, and he doesn’t even know it.

I used to idolize Dom, when I was little. When I was about ten, my mom met this guy and moved him into our house. Ray. He was the biggest asshole. My mom always did attract guys like that, for some reason. She always surrounded herself with them. Like they were a drug she couldn’t get enough of. I couldn’t do enough to stay out of the house that summer. Pretty soon, I found Dom and his dad.

They lived down the street from me, about three blocks away. Just far enough that I was safe from Ray seeing me if he happened to go outside looking for me, but close enough that I could get myself home quickly if I had to. Dom had just turned fifteen and Mr. Toretto had promised to help him build a car. Not that I knew any of that at the time. What I did know was, it was interesting to watch them as they worked, interesting to see Mr. Toretto interact with Dom. I’d never seen any father just hang out with their kid before; never even knew my own father, just that he was from the Dominican Republic and the reason my skin was so brown and my mom could barely stand to even look at me.

There was a huge tree in Dom’s front yard, right next to the garage. An elm, I think - it’s not there any more. But it was big enough for me to hide behind without being noticed. Or at least I thought it was.

I watched them for almost a week before either one said anything to me. I nearly had a heart attack when Mr. Toretto sidled up to me one day and asked, “You here to see Mia?” I just shook my head, scared to death he’d make me leave. But he didn’t say anything else. I guess Mr. Toretto knew about needing to get away from things.

Anyways, he didn’t make me leave, and so I kept coming back, day after day. Mr. Toretto didn’t let me just watch for long, though. “If you’re going to hang around, you might as well help out,” he said. Dom just laughed at me. Eventually, I was right there, working on the car with them, wearing one of Mr. Toretto’s old shirts so my clothes wouldn’t get too dirty.

It took nearly six months to finish that car, and I loved every second of it. The day it was done, we drove out to the beach. I thought I was going to die - not only because Mr. Toretto let Dom drive. With the car being done, I didn’t have any excuse to hang around the Toretto house. Mr. Toretto saw my disappointment, though, and kept coming up with reasons for me to come over. He claimed to want my opinion on ways to improve the car, or to need my small hands to poke into some mechanism and help fix it. I never said much about Ray, or my mom, but Mr. Toretto knew. He knew that I desperately needed something to keep me away from my house, and so he provided it. He was the first adult who ever really showed any affection towards me on a regular basis.

Over the next three years, I practically lived at the Toretto house. I was happy there; for the first time in my life I felt like I belonged somewhere. It didn’t last long enough, though.

Mr. Toretto raced cars on the semi-pro circuit. Usually, Dom, Vince and I went with him, sometimes Mia did too. Mia was always kind of a girly girl, pretending she hated the cars. She didn’t really, though. She loved the adrenaline rush as much as the rest of us. Every time we went out, she’d beg whoever was driving to go faster.

We didn’t always all go to the races, but I never missed a single one. At least, not until Mr. Toretto’s last. It was my mom’s birthday; I couldn’t get away from the house. I remember, I was so mad. She didn’t even really want me there, she just wanted company because she’d just kicked Ray out - found him fucking some high school girl in their bedroom. My mom never was very good at being alone. She preferred the company of men, but I would do if there was no one better around. I screamed at her for hours that day, telling her she didn’t understand, that she had to let me go. It didn’t do any good, though. I was stuck at home.

I heard about the accident on the radio. They said Mr. Toretto’s car had hit the wall at the track, that it exploded and he died. I didn’t believe it was true, and I immediately snuck through my window and ran over to the house. It wasn’t real to me, not until I saw all the cop cars parked outside. Mia was sitting on the front porch, tears streaming down her face. I’d never seen her cry before, not once. Vince was there too, trying to comfort her. He wasn’t doing a very good job of it, though. Dom was nowhere to be found. No one knew where he’d gone after the race. He just disappeared - didn’t even show up at the funeral.

I didn’t see Dom for almost a week. By that time, Mia had gone to stay with their grandmother. The house was empty. He finally showed up at my place Friday night, I guess because he couldn’t find anyone else. I was shocked; I didn’t think he even knew where exactly I lived. I could tell as soon as I saw him that something was wrong. Very wrong. He looked like the world had ended. He grabbed me, squeezed me until I thought I would break, and the blood that was all over him got all over me, but all I could think was that it was the first time he’d really touched me. I was thirteen, and I’d been in love with him for over two years.

“Where’s Mia?” he asked, shaking me a bit. There was a look in his eyes…it scared me. His face was hard, his voice gravelly…he looked crazy.

“She went to stay with your grandma,” I whispered in reply.

“Good,” he nodded, letting go of my shoulders. I wished he hadn’t. “I fucked up, Letty, did something really dumb. I’m gonna have to go away for a while,” he told me. He started crying, and that scared me to death but I tried to comfort him, tried to tell him everything would be okay, tried to tell him that I loved him. Before I could ask him what’d happened, though, three cop cars pulled up in front of the house. He grabbed me again, pulled me behind him like he was trying to protect me. Yep, I was in love.

w00h00!!

i love this fic even more now that it's on MRU!!

Ch. 2 - Have to Laugh

Eventually, I found out what Dom had done. He’d beaten the man who caused the accident that killed Mr. Toretto, taken a ¾” torque wrench to the man’s face and nearly killed him. I still can’t say I blame him, couldn’t even if he had meant to do it.

Dom had just turned eighteen, so he was tried as an adult, sentenced to five years at Lompoc Prison. I didn’t even get to say goodbye to him. They wouldn’t let me into the courtroom without parental supervision, and there was no way in hell my mom would agree to let me go. “I always told you to stay away from those Torettos,” she said with a smug grin on her face, even though she’d done nothing of the sort.

After that, my life went completely to shit. Mr. Toretto, Dom and Mia, all gone. And things kept getting worse. My mom let some new asshole move in right before school started. Steve. He was an even bigger jerk than Ray, if that was possible. He never had a job, drank all the time, smacked my mom around just because he could. She said he loved her, like that made it all okay or something. And, as if he weren’t hanging all over my mom every second she was home, practically fucking her in the middle of the living room, Steve would give me the dirtiest looks, like he was undressing me with his eyes and just waiting for the chance to do it for real. I was worried, but Vince told me everything would be okay, that he would look after me and make sure I was all right. I was shocked as hell when he told me that. I always thought he saw me as just an annoying little girl who constantly tagged after him and Dom. I guess he liked me, at least a little bit. Or maybe he just felt sorry for me.

But three months later, Vince was gone too. He got pissed off thinking about Mr. Toretto and Dom, got drunk, stole a car, wrecked the car. Luckily for him, he was still seventeen, or he probably would have ended up at Lompoc with Dom. Maybe he would have preferred that to juvie, though. Luckily for me, the last thing Vince did before he got locked up was put a deadbolt on my bedroom door.

I started staying away from my house again, trying to avoid Steve, but I didn’t really have anywhere to go. At first, I had school during the day so I only had to stay away until he got drunk enough to pass out at night. But then Vince left right before Christmas break, and during vacation I had to avoid Steve all the time. I tried staying at Dom’s house, but I just couldn’t do it. The emptiness just freaked me out. I started hearing things, imagining I saw Mr. Toretto walking out to the garage to work on a car. I had constant nightmares - dreams of car crashes and fires, with Mr. Toretto’s voice telling me that if only I had gone to the race that day, things would have been different, or that if I’d only tried to find Dom after the accident, I could have kept him from going to jail. Heavy shit like that.

After I couldn’t handle staying at the house anymore, I started to go to Hollywood Blvd. I would stay out all night on the streets, just watching people. After a day or two, I started hanging out with this small group of girls who worked the boulevard to pay for their drug addictions. One of them, Angel, had lived two houses down from me, used to baby-sit me when I was little. Strangely enough, I felt comfortable, safe, out on the streets with those girls. I was almost happy again. Eventually, though, my mom noticed that I wasn’t coming home at all. We got into a huge fight one night when I stopped by to get some clean clothes. I told her I was staying away because Steve freaked me out and I didn’t like being alone with him. She actually seemed to believe me, which completely surprised me. She said she’d keep an eye on Steve, make sure he didn’t bother me. I spent that night at home, for the first time in nearly two weeks. I thought everything would be okay as long as I could make it through the three days until school started again. I should have known better.

The next morning, I slept in until ten. My mom had promised me that Steve would be out of the house, that I wouldn’t have to worry about him. She had left for work hours ago, but I didn’t mind being alone in the house as long as Steve wasn’t around. Plus, I had the deadbolt on my door to protect me. That day turned out to be one of the worst in my entire life. I still can’t believe how dumb I was to trust my mom when she said everything would be okay. Like she’d ever kept her word before…

My mom, being the woman she was, thought all she had to do was tell Steve to stay away from the house for a while and he would do it. She was incredibly naïve, sometimes. Or maybe just dumb. Or maybe she just decided that Steve was more important to her than I was. Anyways, while I was in the shower that morning, Steve came back to the house. He didn’t even have to break in or anything, he still had his key. At the time, I didn’t really know what was happening. One minute I was washing my hair, and the next I was trying to hide behind the shower curtain, with Steve all up in my face.

“Don’t you dare scream, you good for nothing bitch,” he yelled at me, and I remember thinking I was going to die. “You’ve been holding out on me too long, you little slut,” he growled, and reached to grab the shower curtain away from me. He pulled me out of the shower stall so I was standing naked in front of him, trying as hard as I could to just disappear. I was frozen, I couldn’t even move, let alone try to get away from him. “You’d better do exactly what I tell you,” he said, and then ordered me down on the floor.

I guess I didn’t respond fast enough, because the next thing I knew he was slapping me across the face over and over again. I still have a tiny scar on my forehead, right at my hairline, where one of his gold rings cut me. A souvenir of the occasion, I guess you could call it. Mia tells me all the time that no one can see it, but I still know it’s there. Obviously she does, too, or she wouldn’t remember to mention its supposed invisibility. Dom sees the scar more often than either one of us, but he never says anything about it. Every time he brushes my hair away from my face, though, I can feel him tense up with anger. We don’t talk about it, but I know he feels guilty for not being around to protect me. That’s okay, though. I managed to protect myself just fine.

Steve pushed me down, and I remember blood running down my face, and I started making these whimpering sounds, deep in my throat, and I was so disgusted with myself because I sounded like such a baby. I didn’t even recognize my own voice. I said no, so low I could barely hear it. I screamed, once, and then he kicked me in the side, knocked all the air out of me. I don’t know quite how I did it, but as he started to reach down to undo his pants, I pulled myself up and punched him in the balls. He ended up on the floor and I ran out of the bathroom, racing for the safety of my bedroom. I slammed the door shut, locked it, got dressed as fast as I could, grabbed some stuff out of my drawers, threw it into my backpack, and climbed out the window. I didn’t even know where I was going, I just ran.

I ended up back on the streets with Angel. I still have to laugh to think that at thirteen years old, I was safer hanging out with prostitutes while they walked the street than I was in my own home. I have to laugh because if I didn’t, I would start screaming, and I don’t know if I would be able to stop.

Eventually, my aunt came and took me to live with her. I guess my mom had told social services that I’d gone to stay with my aunt for a while, but forgot to tell her that. So she got worried when a social worker came over to check up on me and she had to fake like she knew what the guy was talking about. She started looking for me that same night, found me a few days later, and brought me home with her. I still hung out with Angel and the rest of the hookers on Hollywood all the time, though. I just didn’t give a shit about what might happen to me.

Ch. 3 - Developing

When I was fifteen, I started developing. I’d always been really small for my age, looked more like a boy than a girl except for my hair. But almost overnight I grew six inches, gained about thirty pounds - most of it in my tits and my ass. And Sly, Angel’s pimp, was the first to notice. He’d always been somewhat aware of me, hanging around in the background. And he’d tried to get me hooked to crack and heroin, just for the hell of it. But, after I got the tits and ass, he decided that I could make some money for him. He wanted me to work for him, and he needed to get me addicted to drugs to make sure I wouldn’t go anywhere. He started harassing me all the time, even following me to my aunt’s house, hanging out on the street in front or even in the yard.

My aunt was a great woman, she made me feel more at home than my mom ever had. I came first for her; she never ignored me because some guy was around. She made sure I went to school, stayed out of trouble, all that. For just over two years, she was the best thing in my life. Everything else completely sucked, especially school. It didn’t take long for the other kids to find out that Sly was practically stalking me, and it seemed like their best entertainment was coming up with stories to explain it. My favorite one was that I’d fucked him, stolen several thousand dollars from him, and he was on a mission to get it back. Anyways, all the girls treated me like I was a pariah, and all the boys acted like I’d do anything they wanted me to. Beating the shit out of a few of them went pretty far in showing how wrong they were, but there was always a new asshole taking a dare from his friends or trying to improve his rep by saying he’d conquered me. As if.

I hated school, with a passion. The only thing that kept me from dropping out was my aunt. Almost every night, after she got home from work, she would check to make sure I’d done my homework. I remember, she used to call all of my teachers on a weekly basis to see how I was doing. Which was actually pretty embarrassing. I mean, teachers aren’t supposed to know about your personal life. But hey, maybe it made them go a little easier on me.

My aunt and I had this cheesy tradition. Every Thursday she got off work early, and that would be our ‘girls night’. We’d order pizza, rent movies, spend the whole night on the couch in front of the TV. We’d talk, too, about all kinds of things. She used to tell me stories from when she was little, stories about how her and my mom grew up. They had it pretty rough, too, especially after their mom died. She never tried to make excuses for my mom, though. She just explained. It made me understand my mom a lot better, made it hard to be really mad at her. I mean, yeah, I was still bitter about how my mom was. But, my aunt made me see that my mom didn’t really mean to hurt me. She just wasn’t strong enough to overcome her own problems. I still didn’t like my mom very much, but after hearing the stories, I couldn’t hate her anymore. I just felt sorry for her. And my aunt would always tell me about how she put herself through school, how she got away from her childhood. She got me thinking that maybe I had a future, that I didn’t have to end up like my mom. I could be like her, instead. So, except for all the shit I got from the kids at school, life at my aunt’s was pretty good. But Sly scared her. It was just the two of us living at her house, and she didn’t think she could protect me if Sly pulled something more than just hanging around outside. She called the cops a few times, but they never did anything to help us. So she sent me to stay with her son, Leon, who lived back in my old neighborhood.

Leon was just barely 19, a mechanic. He’d moved out of my aunt’s house right after he graduated high school, gone to live close to his job, the only decent one he could find. It was almost funny; Leon worked for a guy who’d opened a garage in the old neighborhood after the Toretto garage closed. I’m sure he didn’t really want his little kid cousin living with him. But he didn’t have much of a choice; his mom insisted, even though he said he was too busy with work to look after a kid.

A few months before I went to stay with Leon, the owner of the garage was arrested for possession of stolen goods, sentenced to ten years in prison. After that, Leon was the only one working there, so he had to manage everything himself and was barely ever home. That was okay with me, though. Living with Leon was like heaven, compared to my mom’s house. I never wanted to go back there. And what I liked best about living with Leon was his job. I used to go hang out at the garage with him all the time, so he could keep track of me. At first, I didn’t even want to touch any of the cars. They reminded me too much of Mr. Toretto and what I’d lost. But then one day, about a month after I started living with Leon, he had a Honda Civic he was working on for some guy. Leon loved that car; he had some kind of thing for Civics, for some reason. Personally, I don’t think they’re worth crap. This one was nice, though, for a Civic. It was light blue, flame trim, chrome bumpers, dual exhaust. It got towed in one day, and I still remember the exact conversation that Leon and I had about that car. It’s what started me to getting my life back.

“Wasn’t this car just in here a week ago?” I asked. “You losing your car skills, man?”

Leon looked at me like I was crazy to insult his mechanical talent, and for a minute I thought he was just going to ignore me completely, but he answered. “Yes, it was just in here a week ago. And no, I’m not losing my car skills. This guy is just extremely talented at fucking up his car, and has tons of money to pour into the thing. He wants to race. It’s his new hobby or something.”

“Hard to race when his car has to be towed into the garage…did he just add stuff on to the engine instead of rebuilding it or something?”

“Exactly. Like I said, extremely talented at fucking up his car. And a dumbass, to boot. Besides all his engine problems, he’s burned out his clutch three times already. Pretty soon I’m going to have to try a metallic clutch, but I’m not sure even that would help him.”

“So he wants to race, huh? What’ve you done to the car?”

Leon held up his fingers and started ticking things off. “Pirelli tires, as you can see. A spoon engine, Motech exhaust system, VeilSide aero kit… The last time this car was here, I had to replace the brand new heads I’d just put in. Wonder what he did to it this time. Shit, I spend so much time working on this car I might as well own it myself.”

After thinking about it a minute, I offered a suggestion. “You should check the distributor and oxygen sensor, man. This year of Civics always have problems with those. Which is why, if he wants to race, he shouldn’t be pouring his money into a crappy ass car like this.”

“Hey now, watch your mouth, girl,” Leon protested immediately. “Civics aren’t bad for racing. Hell, just the stock model has a sixteen valve engine. And you know, if he knew the first thing about cars, he wouldn’t have all these problems. But the longer he stays ignorant, the longer I can make money off of him... You’re right, though, it probably is the distributor.”

That was the last thing we said for a few minutes, until he looked up from the engine of the car with a puzzled expression on his face.

“Yo, Letty?”

“Yeah?”

“How’d you know that these Civics have problems with their distributors?”

I laughed. “Hey, I know cars, man.”

“Oh you do, do you?” he laughed right back at me.

“Yep. One of my old neighbors used to race. He let me hang out, help him with his cars. Mr. Toretto.”

“Ah,” Leon nodded in understanding. “Yeah, I remember him I think. We hung out there sometimes when I was over at your house, right? With…Dom and Mia? And…what was that other guy’s name…Vince? They still race?”

“No. Mr. Toretto died. Slammed into the wall at the track going 120. Broke his neck, then got burned up in a car-be-que. Dom and Vince, they would probably still race. But Dom got sent to Lompoc for assault, and six months later Vince was in juvie.”

“Sounds rough.”

“Yeah,” I sighed. “Yeah, it was. I miss them.”

That was the last time we talked about how I knew so much about cars, but from then on, Leon wouldn’t let me just hang around the garage while he did all the work. Over the next few months, he taught me just about everything he knew about fixing cars. My life would’ve been almost perfect, except for Sly. Somehow he’d found out I was living with Leon. He never really did anything to me, but he’d follow me every time I left the garage. It was creepy. One night, he broke in and trashed a few cars, caused almost 100,000 dollars worth of damage. That’s when Leon decided something had to be done.

Ch. 4 - Always There

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

“Maybe,” she says, and we both know that she’s lying. If I didn’t know her well enough to see the teasing in her eyes, I might worry. But I know Letty almost better than I know myself. I don’t know what I’d do without her.

Letty saved my life, and she doesn’t even know it.

She used to be a total pain in the ass, when she was little. I remember the first time I really noticed her. I was fifteen. My dad had gotten a line on this ’69 Charger, and said I could help him rebuild it, said it might even be mine when I got my license. It was supposed to be a father-son bonding activity or something. I think he was trying to make up for Vince not being able to come around that summer. Vince had been my best friend since third grade, practically lived at my house. But that summer, his mom had a new boyfriend, a cop, and he’d gotten the grand idea that Vince ought to go to this military camp, thought he had a problem respecting authority or some shit like that. So Vince was gone for most of the summer. Then Letty started hanging around, hiding behind the big elm tree. She was a scrawny kid, looked like she was about seven or maybe eight, with matted black hair hanging down her back and big, dark eyes that always looked like she thought someone was about to hit her. I pretended not to notice her, but I did. Honestly, I hoped she’d get tired of watching us and decide to leave. But she didn’t.

Sometimes I would get into fights with my dad about Letty. I didn’t understand why he let her hang around all the time. I remember we had the same exact conversation over dinner for nearly a week. “She’s got her own home, doesn’t she? Why’s she have to hang around here? Why d’you have to let her?” I would demand, my voice rising with every question.

“Letty doesn’t really have a home, Dom,” my dad would explain, quietly. “I know her mom’s boyfriend, know the kind of man he is. Any house with him in it is no place for a little girl to be.”

And that was all he’d say. Finally, I got tired of arguing about it over and over again and just stopped mentioning Letty at all. Like if I didn’t talk about her, and didn’t think about her, maybe she’d just disappear on her own. She didn’t. Eventually, she started helping us out with the car instead of just watching, and I got used to her always being at the house. I just ignored her, for the most part, though.

That all lasted about three years. It only took six months to finish building the car, but Letty kept hanging around. That was an amazing car. Nine hundred horsepower. My dad raced her every so often, and one time she did the quarter-mile in nine seconds. Nine seconds. Amazing. He didn’t race her very often, though, had a different car he took to the track. He raced about once a month, and we would usually all go with him. Sometimes, though, it was just Letty and me. She was actually a pretty cool kid to hang out with. We had fun when it was just the two of us, even though I still didn’t talk to her much when Vince or Mia were around. Funny, seems like every memory I have from my dad racing, Letty’s there. I don’t really remember anything from before she started hanging around. It’s like Letty was always there, always part of my life. The only race she ever missed was my dad’s last. I remember wishing she had been there with me.

After my dad died, I went a little crazy. I couldn’t go home, couldn’t be reminded that he wasn’t around anymore. I don’t even really remember where I went, what I did. All I know is that a week after the accident I almost literally ran into Kenny Linder, the guy who’d clipped my dad’s bumper and caused the accident. I hit him, and I didn’t even realize there was a wrench in my hand until I saw all the blood. But it felt so good to hit him. I couldn’t stop. Over and over again, until I could barely raise my arm at all, it was so tired.

Then, I ran. I went home, but no one was there. Just boxes. I couldn’t go to Vince’s place. His mom had ended up marrying the cop, and even in my daze I knew the last thing I wanted to do was run into a cop. I ended up at Letty’s - almost passed her house, but then I recognized her mom’s car sitting out in front. Letty came out almost as soon as I got there. I think she was surprised to see me. She even looked happy, almost. As happy as she ever looked when she wasn’t working on a car or watching a race, anyways. I grabbed her, hugged her as tight as I could, and all I could think was that this was real. Nothing else was, I tried to tell myself. Letty was real. And as long as I was with her, I thought, it meant my dad was still alive, waiting for us to get home so we could leave for a race, or so we could help change the spark plugs or fix the intercooler or the fuel exhaust or the supercharger or change the tires.

I remember asking her where Mia was, but I don’t remember if she answered. And I think I told her what I’d done, but I’m not sure if I really did or not. Maybe I just imagined it. What I do know is that she didn’t pull away from me. She made some sort of shushing noise at me, and it actually calmed me down a little and I started thinking everything would be okay. But then the cops showed up.

I had just turned eighteen, and I wouldn’t see Letty again for two years.

I LOVE this fic! I used to spend hours reading it back in the day. I'm really glad you started to pick it up again.

Ch. 5 - Helping Leon

I tried to keep track of her; I remembered what my dad had said about her mom and her mom’s taste in men. I wanted to make sure she was okay. But I didn’t exactly have a smooth transition to prison life, and by the time I was allowed to write letters home, she’d disappeared. Mia had no idea what had happened to her, and no one in the neighborhood seemed to know either. Mia went by her house every so often, looking for her, but the guys she found there didn’t even know Letty’s mom had a kid. Every few months I’d get a letter, but they never said where she was, never even had a return address. Hell, I was lucky if they said anything more than “I’m okay,” scribbled on the back of a scrap of paper. I was worried about her.

Then, I got word they were letting me out early, a little less than two years into my sentence. About a month before I was supposed to get out, I got a letter from a guy named Leon Mitchell. The name sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. I had a feeling it was trouble, though, didn’t really want to open the letter. Wished I hadn’t, after I’d read it. I still have that letter somewhere.

“Dominic,

I hope you’re the Dominic Toretto who used to live at 1712 Getty Avenue. I’m writing about Letty. If you know her, call me at (323) 555-1734.

Leon Mitchell”

God, that scared me to death. I thought Letty was in trouble, big trouble. Turned out I was right.

I called Leon as soon as I could, which turned out to be two days later.

“This Leon?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s Dom. Dominic Toretto. You wrote.”

“You know Letty?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s her full name? Just to make sure, you know.”

I had to think about that for half a minute, never heard anyone call her anything but Letty. I remembered, though, when all of us went to the track to watch my dad race, she would doodle all over her program, practicing signing her name or something, some shit that little girls do, I guess. She never did that when it was just the two of us there, though; always too busy telling me about one thing or another, a regular blabbermouth. Almost like she was a different person when it was just the two of us. Or maybe I was different.

“Leticia. Leticia Gonzalez. No middle name.”

“Okay, good, good. One more question.”

“Why’re you being so careful about this, man?”

“Hey, Letty’s got enough trouble without me letting some random asshole who’s just about to get out of jail know all about her.”

“You could have a point. So what’s your question?”

“What’s her dream car?”

I had to laugh. “You do know it’s been nearly two years since I’ve seen her, right?”

“Don’t matter, her taste hasn’t changed.”

“Well then, has to be a Nissan 240 SX. One she could fix up herself. And then paint it some girly color.”

“That’s Letty.”

“So what’s up with her?”

“You know Sly?”

“Sly? No, I don’t think so. Who’s he?”

He laughed a little, to himself. “Sly’s the guy who just totaled my garage last weekend. Completely trashed five cars, did some minor damage to a few others, and put the word out that any car brought into my garage will get trashed, too. And then I had to tell everyone that since they signed a disclaimer when they brought their cars in, they have to pay to get the cars fixed themselves. That went over real well, lemme tell you. Especially with this one girl who’d just brought her car in to us for the first time. Thought I might’ve had a chance to hook up with her, until this shit happened. Now nobody will come in, I’m losing money like you wouldn’t believe. And, if the owner weren’t in jail, I’d prolly already be out of a job.”

"Sounds a bit extreme. What’d you do to this guy?”

Another barking laugh. “Nothing. Not a damn thing. Just took my little cousin Letty away from Hollywood Boulevard to try to protect her from him.”

Now, he’d gotten my attention back, and I finally realized why his name was familiar. Leon Mitchell - Letty’s cousin. Not that it made all that much difference to me who he was. Yeah, sucked about his garage, but I didn’t really care about that. Didn’t even really know this guy, so why should I care? But Letty? Her, I cared about, even if I didn’t want to show it.

“Protect her from him? What was he doing to her?” I asked. I didn’t even know who Sly was, but suddenly I wanted to find him and hurt him, badly. Especially if he’d done anything to Letty. Even though I’d never really paid much attention to Letty, thought of her like an annoying kid sister most of the time, she’d become part of my family. And my family was the one thing I cared about, besides cars.

“Well, a while back, things got pretty ugly with her mom’s new boyfriend. She started staying away from home at night, hanging out on the streets. Eventually she ended up down on Hollywood Blvd. Got in with this group of girls. Angel, maybe you know her?”

I had to think about it for a minute, but yeah, I knew Angel. She was a few years older than me, used to live in the neighborhood until she got hooked on crack when she was around eighteen or so. Last I’d heard anything about her, Vince had seen her working Hollywood Blvd. I couldn’t imagine what Letty would be doing hanging out with her, though. I remember thinking to myself, ‘If that girl’s gotten herself hooked on drugs and is out selling her body to pay for her habit, she’s going to have worse things than this Sly guy to worry about after I get out.’ I was not about to just sit back and watch Letty fuck up her life like I’d fucked up mine.

“Yeah, I know Angel,” I finally replied.

I guess Leon could hear the anger in my voice, because he hurriedly continued. “Well, Angel used to baby-sit Letty a long time ago. And when she saw Letty out on the streets, I guess she took her in again. To try and protect her, or something. Anyways, eventually Letty’s mom heard about it and dragged Letty back home. But the next day, something happened between Letty and her mom’s boyfriend. He hit her…did some other stuff to her too, I think. I don’t know what, exactly, she won’t talk about it, but it was something bad. Letty left again, went back to the streets and back to Angel. Eventually, Angel’s pimp noticed Letty. That’s Sly. He’s a nasty son of a bitch, and he’s determined to get Letty working for him. He used to harass her all the time, when she lived with my mom. Followed her home, hung out in the front yard all the time…shit like that. That’s why Letty came to stay with me in the first place. I guess he finally figured out where she’d gone to a couple weeks ago. Started calling my house, hanging around outside, following her to school...same shit he’d done before. Then, last weekend, he broke into the garage, trashed the cars. Left a message on the answering machine saying that if Letty didn’t go along with his plans for her he’d go to my mom’s house next, do the same, but to her.”

“Damn… So what can I do?”

“Well, obviously I’m not gonna just hand Letty over to him. Not that she’d let me do that, anyways.”

“Yeah,” I laughed, interrupting, remembering the dark stares Letty used to give most everyone outside of our little group. “She always was a pretty tough little girl.”

“Right,” Leon replied, laughing a bit as well. Obviously he had some similar memories of Letty. “But then again, she’s had to be pretty tough just to survive. Her life hasn’t been easy."

“Yeah, I can tell,” was all I could say to that.

“I try to look out for her, but I’m only one person, you know? There’s only so much I can do. Especially now that the garage’s trashed. No one will bring their cars to me anymore. Things keep going like this and pretty soon I’m gonna have to find another job, have to pay the rent and all. I can’t protect Letty and do that at the same time. And she doesn’t help any, acts like she’s invincible, like no one can hurt her.”

I cut him off, already seeing where he was going. “When I get out, you won’t have to worry about a thing. I’ll help you look out for her. Give me a few months to get back into racing, and your garage will even be back in business.”

“Well, that’d be great…but I can’t really wait another three years for you to get out. Just thought maybe you could suggest someone to help me keep an eye on Letty. Wouldn’t want you bustin’ out of jail or nothing…”

“Oh don’t worry, they’re letting me out in a few weeks. Good behavior or some shit like that. Besides, I’m not gonna do anything that would end me up back in this place,” I replied, very aware of the guards listening in. I knew they’d just love to find an excuse to keep me in prison for a while longer. In case anyone monitoring the phone call began to think I wasn’t quite rehabilitated yet, I quickly changed the subject. “So, Leon. You race?”

“Me? Nah, man. I just work on the cars,” he replied, apparently not at all concerned at the sudden change in topic.

“How come?”

“I’m a perfectionist, man. I don’t want to race anything but the best.”

“And what do you think the best is?”

“Skyline.”

I nodded in understanding, as if he could see as well as hear me. “Takes a lot of cash to race a car like that.”

“Yeah, man, it does,” Leon replied, laughing. “One of these days I’ll have enough saved up, though.”

Noticing Barnett, one of the guards, eyeing me, I quickly ended the conversation. “Hey, man, I gotta go. I’ll catch up with you after I get home.”

“Cool, dawg. Thanks for your help.”

Ch. 6 - Not a Little Girl

A little less than three weeks later, I was home. Mia, too. It was strange, with just the two of us in the house. Not in a bad way, just different. I don’t think either one of us quite knew how to act at first. We just weren’t very comfortable around each other anymore, which was disappointing because we’d always gotten along pretty well. But I didn’t have too much time to worry about Mia. My first priority was finding Letty and getting her away from Sly.

Leon had told me his place was just around the corner from my dad’s garage. I was supposed to meet him there Friday afternoon so we could talk some more about the whole situation with Sly, figure out how we were gonna take care of it. I got completely lost on the way there, though. Funny, how you can forget the little things about a place in only two years. I must’ve walked around that block at least five times, looking for Leon’s street. But every time, instead of finding Magnolia Street and the little yellow house with an old white van in the driveway, I would end up at this little park. Any direction I turned I would, soon enough, find myself passing that fucking park again. Worse, I didn’t even remember it being there at all before. Eventually I got so frustrated I almost just turned around to go home and call Leon, tell him something had come up and I couldn’t meet him that day after all. But, I always have been a stubborn son of a bitch, and jail only made me more so. I figured I’d try to find Leon’s house one last time, and if I couldn’t do it, I’d take that as a sign that I wasn’t meant to get involved. Well, I got a sign, all right. One of the kind that accidentally smacks you in the face and instead of apologizing says ‘fuck you’. One of the kind also known as Letty.

I ended up at the park again, but sometime in that last walk around the block, I’d changed my mind about this being my last effort of the day to find Leon. Like I said, I was stubborn. Besides, I had promised Leon my help, and I wasn’t going to give up just because two years in jail had fucked up my sense of direction so much that I couldn’t even find a house around the corner from where I’d spent half of my life.

I wasn’t ready to give in and go home, but I still didn’t really know how to get where I wanted to go. So, I sat on a bench underneath a tree and waited. There were a lot of people in that park; young mothers with their babies, scrawny boys trying to look tough as they smoked cigarettes in a corner over by the swings and huddled in their jackets despite the hundred degree weather, grandmothers feeding breadcrumbs to the birds. That’s one of the things I missed most when I was in prison - just the luxury of sitting in one place for a while, completely still, watching the world go past.

After I’d been sitting there for about twenty minutes, so comfortable that I’d almost fallen asleep, something startled me awake. “Fuck,” I thought to myself. “Here I’m not even out of jail a week and I’m already letting my guard down. Yeah, I’m gonna be a lot of help protecting Letty from Sly….”

Then I noticed what had woken me up. Well, actually, who. The sweetest piece of ass I’d seen in a long time had just walked by. Hips swaying just a little, black pants practically a second skin. I was mesmerized; I could have watched her walk all day, as long as her ass kept moving back and forth like that. Slowly, I let my gaze drift upward, taking in the small patch of skin exposed between the waist of her pants and the bottom of her tank top. I almost growled aloud, and had to laugh at myself. I guess it had been longer than I’d realized since I’d seen a beautiful woman. Not many of those at Lompoc, and I wasn’t at all interested in the men there. Her hair hung just past her shoulders and I didn’t think she was wearing a bra. Suddenly I wanted nothing more in the world than for her to just turn around and let me get a look at her front.

She slowed down a little as she got close to the corner, and for a second I thought she had noticed me watching her. But then I saw the guy standing there, leaning against an old Cadillac Seville, apparently waiting for her. His hair was dark and greasy, he wore a tan polyester suit that looked like it had been inherited from an uncle who was about twenty pounds lighter and hadn’t bought any new clothes since 1973. I thought she hesitated for a second, shied away from him almost, but then she kept walking so I decided it had to have been my imagination. I could hear the murmur of their voices as she came up next to him, but I couldn’t tell what they were saying to each other. He reached out suddenly and grabbed her arm, spun her around so she faced the street, and I finally got that view of her front that I’d been praying so hard for earlier. And it did not disappoint. Her tits were just the way I like them - enough to grab onto and have some left over, but not so much that I’d suffocate in her chest.

I could have looked at her all day, just enjoying the view, but then she did something that made my heart stop cold. She stepped back from the guy, crossing her arms over her chest. At first, I was just mildly annoyed, because there went my chance to get a good look at her. But then…there was something familiar about that stance, I just couldn’t place it. Then, I looked up at her face and saw a glare I knew almost as well as my own face. The first time I’d seen it was a few months after Letty started hanging out at my house all the time. She and I were in the garage by ourselves, working on one of the cars. Somehow we got started talking about our dream cars, she said hers was a Nissan 240 SX. I remember laughing, saying it was a piece of shit car that only a girl who didn’t know any better would want to drive. She calmly stepped back, crossed her arms over her chest, glared at me for several seconds and then proceeded to list about a hundred reasons why me and all of my opinions on cars were a crock of shit, ending with since it was a proven fact that girls are smarter than boys, she was obviously right and I was just crazy and would eventually learn the error of my ways, probably when I’d been dumb enough to bet slips with someone running a 240 SX and lost. Anytime I tried to talk to her for the rest of that afternoon, all I got was that silent glare. I think that’s when I actually started to respect Letty and not just think of her as an annoying little brat, even though I made sure not to let her know that. And after that day, anytime anyone even mentioned the word Nissan around the two of us, let alone a 240 SX, I wouldn’t be able to keep the smile off of my face, especially when I turned to her to catch a glimpse of the look I knew she would be giving me. The same look on the face of the girl I’d just spent the past five minutes checking out.

I just sat there in shock for almost a minute, thinking to myself over and over, “Oh, shit. Oh my fucking God, that’s Letty.” After all the trouble I’d had finding Leon’s place, she’d come right to me. Still to this day, I swear it must’ve been fate. I might’ve sat there on that bench for the rest of the afternoon, in complete shock that this chick I’d been mentally undressing was Letty, little Letty, who used to practically live at my house. Damn, she was just a kid! Or, she was the last time I saw her. She definitely wasn’t just a kid anymore.

“Leave me the fuck alone, Sly,” I heard her yell, and suddenly, without even thinking about what I was doing, I was off the bench and across the ten feet that separated us.

I walked up behind the guy, grabbed him in a chokehold. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? Didn’t you hear her, she wants to be left alone.”

“Hey man,” Sly drawled calmly, even as he was gasping for air, “this ain’t none of your concern. She ain’t for sale yet, but come back to me in a week or two if you’re interested. I guarantee she’ll be available by then, we just have some issues we need to work out.”

Keeping him in the chokehold, I picked Sly off the ground. “Oh, you sure about that? ‘Cause, I don’t think this girl is ever going to be for sale. I think she’s already mine. And, I don’t think you want to fuck with what’s mine. The last guy who did that, well, he’s blind in one eye now, face all scarred. Can’t even drive, has to take the fucking bus to work. I don’t think you want to end up like him. Of course, this girl is very special to me. I probably wouldn’t be content to let you live if you hurt her. Actually, I think you’ve already hurt her. So this is your warning. From now on, you might want to steer clear of me and my people. And we might be anywhere, so you probably want to leave the city completely, maybe even the state. I don’t think you’d want to try me. Do you?”

I put him back on the ground, lessened the grip on his neck a bit so he could reply. “N-no,” he stuttered in a whisper, shaking in my grasp.

Sly turned around and scurried away, glancing over his shoulder every so often to see if I was going to follow. I never saw him again myself, but I heard he moved to New York, made himself known as Silent Sly. He never spoke normally again, and no one ever took him seriously.

With Sly out of the way, I turned to Letty.

“You didn’t have to do that. I can take care of myself, you know,” she snapped at me, still giving me that Letty glare.

“Oh yeah, it really looked like you were taking care of him,” I sneered at her. “He looked like he was terrified of you.”

She made that pfft-ing noise that Mia always did so well, turned and started walking away from me. I didn’t have any choice but to follow her.

“Come on, Letty,” I pleaded, reaching out to grab her shoulder. “Is that any way to greet an old friend, especially after he saves your ass?”

She stopped, looked at me for a second, cocked her head to the side, then took a step back.

“Dom,” she squealed, in the highest pitched tone I have ever heard her use in my entire life, “you fucking son of a bitch! When the fuck did they let you out?”

Almost before I realized what she was doing, Letty had thrown herself at me, reached up to wrap her arms around my neck and was hugging me as hard as she could. I just stood there for a second, but it felt good to be pressed up against a woman, against her. One of my hands naturally settled around her waist, the other rested in the middle of her back, confirming that she wasn’t wearing a bra. As if I needed a reminder. As close as we were standing, her shirt was so thin it was practically see-through. Finally I let myself relax into the moment, hugged her back. Damn, but her body felt good against mine.

“So I’m yours, huh?” she asked, hitting my arm playfully.

“Looks that way,” I replied, smiling at her. “So, you gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…if you’re lucky!”

“Looks like you’ve grown up a bit, little girl,” I said, a little surprised at the husky desire in my voice. She didn’t seem to notice, though.

“Yeah,” she laughed, leaning back a bit and smiling up at me before reaching up to hug me harder. “I haven’t been a little girl for a long time, Dom.”

“No, not a little girl anymore at all,” I thought to myself, leaning down to pull her closer to me. I tightened my grip on her, one hand moving to cup her shoulder blade as the other slid further up her back, somehow ending up underneath her shirt, rubbing small circles into her skin. As she sank even more into me, until our entire bodies were touching, my hand moved around to her side to keep her steady. “So soft,” I remember thinking. I might have said that aloud, even, but I doubt she heard me since my face was buried in her neck by that point. Her scent was intoxicating; she just smelled clean, but I hadn’t been around anything clean for so long I couldn’t get enough of it. I pressed my face closer to her and she sighed, her breath lightly tickling my neck. Suddenly I realized that I’d still been rubbing circles into her skin, but since my hand had moved, I’d been massaging the side of her tit.

Realizing that I was starting to get a massive hard-on, I pulled back from her slightly, and as I turned my face to get some air, saw an older woman glaring at us. “Hey, why don’t you two just go and get yourselves a room?” she asked, scowling. “The Mar-Ray Motel’s right down the street you know, and they only charge 10 an hour. There are little kids around here, you know.”

Little kids. The words slammed into me, and suddenly all I could think of were all the times I had complained to my dad about Letty hanging around, saying I didn’t want a little kid following me all over the place. Forget about the little kids at the park seeing us, Letty was still a little kid herself.

I pulled away from her quickly, not even responding to her shy, questioning smile. I didn’t say a word to her, just grabbed her hand and started walking back to the old garage, pulling her along with me.

“Damn you, Dom,” I thought to myself. “This is Letty. Letty, who’s like your little sister. Letty, who’s only fifteen years old, no matter how good she looks. And you promised Leon you’d protect her, not spend all your free time trying to figure out how to fuck her as soon as possible. You are not going to take advantage of her. She is not going to need protection from you. So just…stop thinking about her like that!”

Over the next few months, it turned out to be harder than I thought it would to keep myself from wanting Letty. Actually, it was impossible.

Nice.

Ana, I love that banner in your sig!

Ch. 7 - Effect on Me

**

"You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

The first time Dom asked me if I was gonna stick by him it was a joke, and so was my answer.

He’d just saved me from Sly. Not that I really needed saving, I could have handled Sly fine by myself, just like I’d been doing for months. But Dom had somehow shown up at the park one afternoon when Sly decided he had nothing better to do than stalk me.

At first, I was just pissed off. I mean, who the hell did this guy think he was, getting all involved in my business? He had no call to do that…none whatsoever. It was pretty fun, though, watching him go off on Sly. From the look on Sly’s face when this guy picked him up by the neck…I figured he was gonna piss himself or something.

After Sly left, I got a little bit worried. Better to face the evil you know than the one you don’t know, right? And I had no clue who this new guy was, none at all. From the looks of him, though, I wouldn’t have minded getting to know him. He was tall, over six feet. Shaved head, with just a little bit of fuzz. Eyes so dark they were almost black, lips that looked like they could kiss a girl for hours, and a body to die for. He wasn’t really handsome, but there was just something about him that attracted attention, something that made my stomach drop out and my body start screaming, “I want that one!” I wasn’t used to feeling like that about any guy, and I wasn’t sure if I liked some complete stranger having such an effect on me.

Then, he said my name. I stepped back a bit to look at him, really look at him, and I suddenly realized. It was Dom! I was surprised as hell to see him, thought he was supposed to be in jail for a few more years. I didn’t stop to think about what he was doing there in the park for very long, though. I was so excited to see him, I just launched myself into his arms, squealing like a little girl.

For a few seconds, it was just me doing the hugging. But then, he wrapped his arms around me and hugged me back. I teased him a little, falling back into the easy banter I’d always used to try to get his attention. It had never worked before, but this time… This time, I thought he almost might be flirting with me. So I leaned into him more, he leaned back, and somehow his hand ended up under my tank top, rubbing my back. It was like every fantasy I’d ever had about Dom was suddenly coming true. I kept trying to get closer to him, until my entire body was pressed up against him. I thought he would step back, move away from me, but he didn’t. Instead, his hand moved from my back around to my side, so he was rubbing the side of my tit. I couldn’t believe how good Dom’s hand felt against my bare skin. He’d touched me before, but it just wasn’t the same. His hand was strong, rough, callused, warm…I felt like my skin was burning up, but chills starting running down my back. I wondered if he even realized what he was doing.

Probably not, I decided after a minute. I mean, what were the chances that, after being in love with this guy for practically five years, he would get out of jail, see me, and just decide that I was everything he wanted in a chick? Still, I wasn’t going to complain. I was a little annoyed though, that just that one encounter with him had managed to burn down all of the little rationalizations I’d used to try to convince myself I was over him.

We stood there hugging, or groping, for at least five minutes. I even thought, maybe, that he was starting to get a hard-on. I don’t know for sure, though, ‘cause all of a sudden he just backed away from me. Didn’t give an explanation or anything. He just grabbed my hand, and practically dragged me down the street to his dad’s old garage. We’d just barely gotten through the door when Leon showed up. From how they were talking, I guess Dom had been looking for Leon when he ran into me. Which I didn’t really get, ‘cause I could have sworn they didn’t know each other. I asked Leon about it later, but he never answered, just changed the subject.

Dom went back to Leon’s garage with us, and the rest of that afternoon I kept feeling him look at me. I’d turn around and see his head moving, as though he’d looked away just half a second before. It threw me off, made me think that maybe he was trying to check me out and not get caught doing it, that maybe he didn’t see me as just a little girl anymore. But it also annoyed the hell out of me. I kept trying to think of ways to ask him about what had happened in the park, to see if it was a one-time thing or what, but he never let me. Any time I said anything even vaguely directed at him, he avoided replying. Dom came over to the garage just about every day, but he didn’t talk to me at all for nearly a week. It got to the point where I started wondering if I’d imagined the whole thing in the park.

Eventually, we all settled into a routine. Dom wanted to get back into racing as soon as possible, so he started working on this ’93 Mazda RX-7. He’d gotten it from some salvage yard, so it was cheap, but I still had no idea where he’d gotten the cash to pay for it. Didn’t really think I wanted to know, either. He parked it at Leon’s garage, was over all the time working on it. Really, Dom would be at the garage when I went over there in the morning, and he’d still be there when I left at night. Leon had met this girl, Amber, and they started hanging out together some nights, and Leon didn’t want me to be home by myself, so I was at the garage even more than before. It was only natural for me to start helping Dom with his car, and it was almost like old times. Almost, but not quite. Dom seemed removed, somehow, like there was a barrier between us that had never been there before. He barely ever spoke to me, only when he wanted me to hand him something. When I tried to talk to him, he’d just look over at me briefly and then turn away without saying anything. It got to the point where I purposely started trying to provoke him. One day, I even said he should have gotten a 240 SX to race. Normally, he would’ve started laughing at me, remembering our constant arguments over that car. But this time, nothing. It was like I wasn’t even there, and that pissed me off.

I’d been happy with my life before Dom came back. I mean, it’s not like it was the greatest in the world, but it was mine. And I got to hang out at a garage and work on cars whenever I wanted, which made all the other shit I had to deal with at school and from Sly seem meaningless. But with Dom back, I didn’t know what the hell was going on with my life. I used to be able to work on cars all day and not even notice the time passing. Suddenly, every minute I was in the garage seemed like an eternity. I wasn’t happy with just the cars, anymore. I wanted something else, but I wasn’t even sure what that something else was.

Once people started hearing that Sly had left town, business at the garage picked up again. Eventually, Dom started helping out with the other cars, not just fixing up his own, and that helped business too. At first, maybe people brought their cars in just because they wanted to help Dom out a little. True, he had nearly killed a man, but most people I’d heard talking about it said they could understand how it happened, and didn’t really blame him for it. Soon enough, word got out that Dom was just as good with cars as his dad had been, and the garage filled up even more. We still took in the normal, everyday jobs, but with three of us working Leon finally had time to do what he really loved - restoration and customizing. Pretty soon, he was out of the garage at least once or twice a week hunting for cars that could be bought cheap, fixed up, and sold for a huge profit. So on those days, it would just be Dom and me at the garage, alone with all the cars.

Ch. 8 - Loosened Up a Bit

Dom finally loosened up a bit with me. Or maybe we were just too busy for him to spend so much time trying to avoid me. It still wasn’t quite the same as before, but it was enough, and my world slowly shifted back to normal. Except for those times when I’d pass Dom something and his hand would linger against mine just a few seconds longer than normal and I’d start analyzing his every single movement again. Did he mean to touch me for that long, did he feel anything in those few extra seconds before we would pull away from each other? Did he think to himself, if I brush my thumb across that spot on the inside of her wrist, her pulse will race and she won’t be able to think of anything but me? Or, did he just wonder why this idiot little girl kept staring at him all the time? Dom could throw me off-balance in half a second or less, and it pissed me off. He was the only thing in my life that I didn’t have any control over. So I decided to take some back by trying to get under his skin, shake him up a little bit.

I remember one day in particular, I was hanging out at the garage not really doing anything, just watching Dom work on this old El Camino that needed new brake pads. For some reason, I didn’t feel like doing much that day. Well, okay, for once it was better to just watch Dom instead of working on the cars myself.

It seemed like he’d forgotten I was even there, which was kind of nice. Because, you know, I could watch him without having to worry about him catching me at it. Normally I didn’t get the chance to really look at Dom, had to be happy with just quick glances here and there. I might’ve been lusting after him, and I was definitely trying to get his attention, but I sure as hell didn’t want him to think that. Not when he’d just stopped acting all weird with me and gone back to semi-normal. So I made sure all of my flirtation could be played off as just teasing, like it always had been. I was sure he’d go back to avoiding me if he knew how I really felt.

I could have just sat there and watched Dom forever. The way his body moved as he slid the hubcaps and tires off of the car, the tightening and flexing of his muscles…the warm caramel color of his skin… I remember thinking to myself how pathetic I was, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. Dom has always been able to make my body like…stop working, just by being in the same room with me. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always checked to see if he’s there the second I get someplace that he might be. If he is, I don’t want him to leave. And if he’s not, I can’t wait for him to show up. But somehow, in the two years Dom’d been gone, I’d almost forgotten what it was like being around him.

This is going to sound dumb, I know. Shit, I’ve been thinking about it half my life if not longer, and it still sounds dumb to me. But when Dom walks into a room, it’s like he just draws everything to him, the light and the air, even. He’s inescapable, you know? I’ve seen it a million times, over the years. Dom shows up somewhere, walks in with his swagger that just announces, “I own this place,” and no one ever even thinks to argue. Actually, they fall all over themselves trying to suck his dick or do whatever else they think will make him happy for even a second. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to have that much control over other people.

Dom changed, though, after he got out of jail. He swaggered more, put on that fake smile that I could always see right through. He didn’t show as much of himself to the world. Maybe that’s a survival tactic left over from prison, maybe it’s just what happens as you get older, I don’t know. But there’s a wall there, just under the swagger, a limit to what he’s willing to show most people. They don’t even realize they’re not getting all of him. I don’t know if anyone besides me even sees the difference.

Sometimes I wonder why the hell I ever thought that maybe I could be Dom’s, he could be mine. Shit, I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s ever wondered why we’re together. Seems like most of the bitches at the races wonder that every single day of their lives. I’m not quite sure what people see when they look at me. I’ve been called a little girl who grew up too fast, a dyke, a bitch, a slut, a whore, and once even a hussy; I’ve been looked at with pity, with anger, with jealousy… After a while I stopped paying attention, you know? Who the fuck cares what the world thinks about me. But sometimes I can’t help but care, can’t help but question what Dom could ever see in me. Sometimes I can’t help but think that maybe I’m really still back in the garage at almost-sixteen years old, watching Dom, and that all the rest of my life since then has just been a fantasy. And then Dom will look at me and I remember how we are, and I can’t help but wonder what the fuck is wrong with me for caring what anyone else thinks.

There are two things that make me feel special, like I’m worth something. The first is, I know cars. Anything that’s wrong with a car, I can fix it. Any way you want me to drive one, I can do it. The second thing is the way Dom looks at me, the way he’s looked at me ever since he got out of Lompoc. Even in the middle of a crowded street, filled with people waiting to race, when Dom looks at me I know exactly what’s going on inside his head. He knows how I’m feeling by just the tone of my voice. Sometimes I think we know each other better than we know ourselves. And when Dom looks at me, I see his swagger fall away, the walls come down, and suddenly I feel like the center of the universe, like if I weren’t there everything else in his life would just fall to pieces.

It’s taken me a lifetime to try to figure all of this shit out, and I’m still not even close. I don’t always know how to keep it all together, how to deal with Dom’s audience. I get jealous sometimes, I get frustrated and bitchy…I want to beat the shit out of any girl who even looks at him. Want to beat the shit out of Dom, too, when he doesn’t realize that he’s playing right into their little sex fantasies. When Dom flirts with girls, he’s just being nice…trying to make them feel important or special. He’s the kind of guy that, no matter how big of a crowd is around him, he’ll pay attention to everyone there, at least for a little bit. The problem is, most girls see that attention as an invitation to fuck him, think it means he’s trying to figure out how to get in their pants without me finding out. It used to bother me a lot, how all the skanks of the racing world crowd around Dom, practically throw themselves at his dick. Even now, sometimes one of them will piss me off to the point where I’ll kick her ass if she gives me any excuse to do it.

I can put up with a lot of shit from the skanks, I know there’s a lot of shit talking that goes on behind my back. Story of my life, right? But I will not stand for people disrespecting me right in front of my face. You want to flirt with Dom? Fine, go right ahead. But you’d better not do it anyplace where I can see you. Any of those bitches give Dom a “fuck me now” look while I’m standing right there, I figure they deserve whatever they get. Most of the time, now, they just back down when I call them on their shit, walk away leaving Dom standing there looking at me like he’s wondering what the hell just happened and why I look like I just might beat his ass if he’s not careful. You’d think he’d figure it out by now, but he hasn’t. Or maybe he just likes the idea of me trying to kick his ass…

I kind of miss the old days, actually. A little scrapping every once in a while is good for your spirit, you know? Especially when you’re the one who walks away from it without even a broken nail. But mostly I just feel sorry for those girls. They’re fucking pathetic, and they don’t even realize it. They’re so busy trying to hit on Dom, and none of them even notice that he isn’t really quite paying attention to them. None of them seem to notice that he never looks them straight in the eye, his gaze always lands a little high and to the right. Or maybe they just don’t care, maybe they think even a tiny bit of his attention is enough.

Okay, so maybe I was like that too, when I was younger. But, not exactly. The racer skanks want to be with Dom just because of his image, because he has a cool car, wins races, is popular, has an incredible body... They want him for the things they think he can do for them. I wanted to be with Dom just because he was Dom, because I couldn’t imagine my life without him in it. That day in the garage, watching him work, I realized how lucky I was to be able to see the real him. And I decided that I didn’t really need to be with Dom romantically, as long as I always got to see behind that wall of his. Of course I still wanted to be with him…

I remember thinking of things I wanted Dom to do with me as I watched him work on that El Camino, wondering if all those sex tips Angel and the rest of her girls had talked about worked half as well as they said they did. And then Dom stopped, lifted up his tank top to wipe the sweat off of his face, revealing his bare chest, and I couldn’t think at all. Almost forgot how to breathe. I must have sighed or something, though, because he suddenly looked up like he’d heard something and whirled around till he was looking right at me.

“Damn, girl,” he laughed. “You trying to give me a heart attack? How long you been here, anyway?”

“Oh, a while,” I replied, stretching my legs a bit.

“Oh really, huh? You think I’m putting on a show or something? Now, why don’t get off your ass and come help me bleed these brakes?”

“Well,” I sighed. “I guess I could.”

“Yeah,” he laughed, “not like you’ve been doing much of anything else today. I mean, really, Letty…you think you can just lay around here and watch me sweat while you do nothing? You should know better than that. You have to pay to play.”

“Oh, do I?” I asked as I finally stood up, stretching more. I wasn’t even trying to do anything to get Dom’s attention, but he must’ve seen something he liked, ‘cause he nearly dropped the lug wrench on his foot. “You haven’t even finished clipping the brake pads on yet. Come on, Dom…I thought you were the big strong man around here, able to do anything. You don’t really need a helpless little girl to show you how to do this job right, do you?” I teased.

“Letty,” he growled in warning, “you most definitely are not a helpless little girl. Never have been. Now come on, stop fucking around with me and just come help.”

“Fucking around with you? Is that what I’m doing? ‘Cause, you know, somehow I always thought it was supposed to feel better… Or maybe I just need more practice at it, huh? What do you think, Dom? You willing to teach me? Or maybe you’re the one who needs practice…”

He just stood there staring at me.

“Got ya,” I teased as I walked over to the car.

The rest of the summer was filled with days like that one in the garage, me seeing how far I could push Dom, how much he’d let me get away with. Have to say, I left him speechless on more than one occasion. Just enough times for me to think that maybe he really did see me as more than just a kid sister and I wasn’t just imagining things. Dom still had the advantage, though. He could leave me speechless just by looking at me. And if he actually touched me…forget about it, any rational thought was just gone.

Like, I remember one day towards the end of August, Dom was underneath a car fixing an oil leak, put down the socket wrench he was using and then couldn’t find it again. He asked me to look for it, and when I went to hand it to him, his hand brushed against my leg. Completely unintentional, accidental, innocent touch. But I just stood there, imagining what it would be like if his hand kept traveling up my calf until his hand was caressing the back of my thigh. Dom had to ask me twice if I’d found the wrench yet. And then he ended up having to actually come out from underneath the car and get it himself. I was so caught up in my fantasy world I hadn’t even heard him. And when he asked me what the hell was wrong with me, all I could do was stammer out, “Uhhh…headache?” like I didn’t even know what was going on. See? Pathetic. Dom looked at me like I was crazy, but he didn’t say anything else. I can’t even tell you how many times I did shit like that… Dom never called me on it, though, never pushed me to tell him exactly what I was thinking about when I flaked out. Unfortunately.

Ah, girl I love you! Lol

Glad you decided to post it here!

:)

Vxn

Ch. 9 - Fell Apart Again

When school started, my life fell apart again. Instead of being at the garage, doing what I loved, hanging out with Dom and Leon all the time, I was back in the middle of hell. Somehow everyone at school had heard about Sly, so the latest rumor going around was that my boyfriend had gotten out of jail, and killed Sly for harassing me. Which yeah, would have been nice, if it were true. But it wasn’t, so hearing all this speculation about my ‘life of sin’ with Dom just completely sucked.

High school rumors can be very complicated, you know? There were a million rumors about me out there, all of them different. Some people insisted I was fucking Leon. Most likely they came up with that because it was just the two of us living together at the house. And we don’t really look anything alike…I guess most people would be surprised to find out we’re cousins. Other people thought I was a dyke, since I hung out with boys and cars all the time. Or they said I’d been working for Sly since I was twelve, that he beat me and I got off on it, begged him to hurt me, that I’d do anything he told me to. Some of the guys at school, thinking they were all tough and shit, started really harassing me after that rumor started, trying to get me to fuck them ‘cause they thought I was easy and submissive. How anyone ever got the idea I was submissive, I have no clue. But that stopped soon enough, after I beat the shit out of a few of them. That, plus the newest rumor that my boyfriend, Dom, was out of jail and possessive as hell and would kill anyone who touched me - okay, this is like the one rumor I ever actually encouraged - meant that no one ever really came close to me.

Mia had started taking business classes at the community college, and pretty soon Leon and Dom talked her into getting some practical experience by helping out with the accounting and stuff for the garage. I’d never really spent a lot of time with her before, but it was nice having her around. As busy as we were at the garage, though, we never really had much time to talk. Not until I fucked up my knee.

One day at school, towards the middle of October, we were doing track and field in gym. We were learning how to do the hurdles, and we were just to the point where we were supposed to know how to do it. Everyone had to take turns running the hurdles. And well, when I was jumping over the second to last hurdle, my body decided to stop cooperating. Somehow, my foot got caught in the top part of the hurdle, and I fell, twisting to the side before I hit the ground. So, my foot stopped moving, because it was stuck in the hurdle, but the rest of me didn’t stop until I was turned halfway around and my knee was in complete agony.

The school nurse checked me over, said my knee had probably just gotten twisted and it should be fine as long as I rested it for a while. She said I shouldn’t be walking around, so I should call home and have someone come get me. My knee didn’t really hurt all that much, but I wasn’t about to turn down a chance to get out of school.

I called the garage and Dom answered the phone. He sounded surprised to hear from me in the middle of the day, immediately asked what was wrong.

“Oh, uhm, I kind of hurt my knee, and they don’t want me walking around on it so they’re sending me home,” I explained. “Is Leon around? I need him to come get me.”

“Nah, Leon ain’t here. Remember, he had to go make that delivery down to San Diego today. He probably won’t be back till seven or eight. And he mentioned something about going to see Amber tonight, so he might not come home at all…if they finally decide to accept the inevitable and move past being ‘just friends’.”

“Oh,” I said, disappointed. Being hurt and getting out of classes wasn’t going to be half as much fun if I had to spend all day in the office until my aunt got off work and could come pick me up. They’d probably make me do homework or help them out in the library or some shit like that.

Then, I got an idea. “Hey, you think Mia could come get me? She won’t have to be away from the garage for too long. I’m sure you can deal with anyone who calls or drops by. You can handle the place alone for an hour or so, right?”

“Well yeah, I could,” Dom laughed. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, by the way. It’s touching, really. But there’s a problem.”

“What?” I asked, not really wanting to know the answer.

“Mia has classes today, all day. Remember, she rearranged her class schedule last week so she could work at the garage more?”

“Oh, yeah,” I replied, disappointed again. “Well, okay then. I guess I’ll just call my aunt and have her come get me when she gets off work. Maybe she can leave early or take a long lunch break or something, so I won’t have to hang around here too long.”

“Oh, that hurts, Letty. You really know how to wound a guy, you know that?”

“What?” I asked, wondering what the hell Dom was talking about.

“I’m not good enough to come get you? It would ruin your rep to be picked up from school by a hardened criminal like me?”

All I could say at first was, “Huh?” Then, I finally managed to get my mouth working again. Well, kind of. “But…you’re…the garage? Close it? Really? You’d do that?” I remember thinking I sounded like a complete idiot, but I just couldn’t stop myself.

“Yes, really. No, wait, on second thought, maybe I’ll just leave you to rot there for the rest of eternity, since you have so much faith in me. I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Be ready.” And with that, he hung up.

I couldn’t even move, just sat there with the phone in my hand, staring at the wall until the nurse came in to ask if I’d gotten a hold of anyone. Even then, I could only nod my head. I’d never even thought to ask Dom to come get me. I just couldn’t imagine him willingly leaving the garage in the middle of the day.

Ever since Dom started talking about getting into racing again, he’d been constantly complaining about how much money it took. He already a car, the RX-7. Personally, I always wondered why Dom didn’t race the Charger, but I never found a good time to ask him. Besides, I figured it probably reminded him of his dad, and that’s why he didn’t want to race her. Or, maybe he didn’t want to risk something happening to the car. It was just about the only thing left from his dad, besides the house and the garage. Everything else had been sold. Anyways, even though Dom had a car he still wasn’t ready to race. He needed to rebuild the engine; add a supercharger, intercooler and new exhaust system; replace the clutch… The list was practically endless, and all of those things took money. Dom needed to put at least ten thousand dollars into that car to make sure he wouldn’t go out and look like a complete fool when he started racing again. And most of the money left from Mr. Toretto was gone, used to pay for the funeral, to make payments on the house and garage, to buy stuff for Mia. So Dom needed money, quick. That’s why we took in so many jobs at the garage, why Dom worked there almost eighty hours a week. And nearly all the money he made went into that RX-7. An investment, he called it. So I was amazed that he was willing to take a break to come get me from school. He’d practically insisted, even seemed insulted that I hadn’t thought of asking him to come. “Hell, maybe he cares about me a little after all,” I said quietly to myself.

Even though he’d said twenty minutes, Dom was at the school in fifteen. Didn’t really surprise me. First, the garage wasn’t all that far away. I usually walked there every day after I got out of hell. Er…I mean out of school. And secondly, Dom always did drive fast. Not crazy, but fast.

I saw him walk up towards the secretary’s desk and tried getting up to go meet him, but my knee just wasn’t cooperating. My whole leg had somehow stiffened up, and I could barely move.

“Hi, I’m here to pick up Letty. I mean Leticia. Gonzalez. She got hurt today?” I heard him say, talking to the secretary. I was kind of shocked; I hadn’t realized Dom even knew my full name.

“Oh yes, Leticia,” she replied. “And you are?”

“Dominic Toretto. I should be on her emergency card, her aunt added me to it at the beginning of school.”

Hmm. I hadn’t known that, either. Smart thing to do though, I guess, once Dom started spending so much time at the garage. He and Leon were practically partners by then, practically family even though they’d only known each other a few weeks. They probably wouldn’t have let Dom take me out of school without his name being on some official form. Schools are like that, full of rules and shit. Weird that no one had told me about it, though. And I didn’t think my aunt had ever even met Dom. I wondered for a second if she actually knew, or if Leon had somehow managed to scam the school. Then I realized I didn’t really care, as long as they let me leave with Dom.

“Right. Here you are, Mr. Toretto. I just need you to fill out this permit to leave campus. Does Leticia need to stop by her locker for anything, do you know?”

“I’m not sure,” Dom replied, and I could almost see the confused look on his face, the same one he wore on the rare occasions when he didn’t quite know what was wrong with a car.

“Well, let me know if she does. She’s probably feeling pretty stiff by now. You need to have her lie down somewhere and elevate her leg when you get home, put a heating pad on it for about twenty minutes or so. If she’s up to it, you can help her go and get her things from her locker, but you’ll need a visitor’s badge. Or, I can send one of the administrators over to get Leticia’s things for her.”

Dom was quiet for a few seconds, apparently thinking over his options. “Well,” he finally replied, “I don’t think she’d want anyone looking through her stuff. Why don’t you give me the visitor’s badge now, just in case.”

“Holy shit,” I thought to myself, “is Dom actually going to wear one of those dorky badges?”

Sure enough, when he came into the nurse’s office a minute later, the badge was plastered to his shirt. He looked pretty dumb, with the huge sticker with the word ‘visitor’ in bold against a red apple on the strap of his tank top. The shirt itself was yet another surprise. It actually looked clean, not a smudge of oil or grease anywhere on it. Either he hadn’t been working on any cars yet today, which didn’t seem likely with the way he smelled, or he’d taken the time to change before coming over to the school. Dom just wasn’t stopping with the surprises that day.

“So, are you ready to go, Leticia?” he asked, enunciating my name with a smirk on his face, one eyebrow raised. He was so going to pay for that later. I hate my full name. Way too girly. Joy and fucking gladness. Doesn’t fit me at all. Still, it’s the only thing that ever made me think that once upon a time my mom might have given a damn about me.

“But of course, Mister Toretto,” I shot right back at him.

I tried to stand up again, but it hurt to put any weight at all on my knee, and I had to sit down again on the cot, grimacing.

“Uhm…Dom…” I started, feeling completely embarrassed and like a total sissy. “I don’t think I can walk.”

“Damn, Letty, what the hell happened?” he asked, his brows furrowing. “Did someone do this to you?”

“Hmm?” I asked, startled. “Oh, no, Dom, it was just an accident. No one’s fault. The nurse said I’ll be fine, I just need to relax and elevate my leg. It’ll be good as new in a couple of weeks, if not sooner.”

“I don’t know, Letty…you can’t even walk… Maybe we should stop by the clinic on the way home, have you checked out by a doctor, get some x-rays taken. You could’ve done something serious…torn a ligament or some shit like that…”

“Dom, that will take hours!” I protested. “You know how busy the clinic gets. I’d be completely healed by the time I finally saw a doctor. I’m fine, really. My knee must have just stiffened up while I was sitting here waiting. Can we just go home, please?”

His concern was touching, really. But I just wanted to get out of the hellhole before the lunch bell rang. I didn’t want the whole school to see me all weak.

“Fine, we’ll go home,” he finally gave in. And before I could even congratulate myself on convincing him, Dom had picked me up and was carrying me out of the nurse’s office.

As much as I wanted to leave right away, I did need to go by my locker. I had a history test coming up, and I had to get a decent grade on it or I’d be failing the class when progress reports were sent out, and my aunt would probably insist on me going back to live with her. Which wouldn’t have been so bad, my aunt was great to live with. But Leon’s place was home for me by then.

Dom carried me through that entire school to my locker, and then back out to the parking lot in front. I could feel everyone’s eyes on us, staring through open classroom doorways. I wanted to disappear, but I settled for just hiding my face in Dom’s shoulder. I couldn’t even imagine the rumors I’d hear when I got back.

Ch. 10 - Scared Me to Death

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

I can’t believe how many times Letty has scared me to death over the years, thinking something terrible had happened to her. First, there was the whole thing with Sly. Which, yeah, we both act like that was no big deal, but he could have really hurt her that day, if I hadn’t been there. She always tells me that she’s a big girl, she can take care of herself. But I still worry. Ever since we lost touch when I was in jail, I’ve been worrying about Letty.

So when she called the garage from school, looking for Leon, I immediately knew something was wrong. She acted like it was no big deal, but they don’t just send you home from school for nothing. And she said she hurt her knee? How the hell do you hurt your knee at school? Unless someone did something to her…

I had to go get her. Forget about closing the garage, that wasn’t important. What mattered was making sure Letty was okay. Even if Leon or Mia had been around, I would have gone myself. Letty had somehow become the most important thing in my life, and she didn’t even know. She didn’t even think of asking me to come pick her up; I could tell how surprised she was when I offered. I tried to play it off, but it hurt that she didn’t even think to ask me for help. I wanted her to trust me. I wanted her to depend on me, so I wouldn’t have to worry about her leaving me.

“Yeah, you’re a real big fucking man, Toretto,” I muttered to myself as I ran out of the garage, stopping only to put on a clean shirt. “Can’t even tell a girl you love her, can’t even admit it to yourself.”

I stopped dead in my tracks at that thought. Love? Did I just say I loved Letty? What the hell was I thinking?

“Fifteen, Dom…she’s only fifteen,” I muttered over and over to myself on the drive to the school. “Only fifteen, and her life’s already been fucked up enough. She deserves something better than ending up with an ex-con who’s never going to be able to do anything with his life other than race cars on the street and work in some rinky-dink garage as a mechanic. She deserves to find some nice kid her own age, fall in love, go to football games and prom, all that normal shit. So just…get over her. Protect her, but stay the hell away from her. All you’d ever do is hurt her, and you know it. You’ve already managed to fuck up your own life, and you are not going to drag her down with you.”

I’d almost managed to calm myself down by the time I got to the high school, but then I recognized one of the cars in the parking lot. A yellow Wrangler. Two guys had just brought it in to the garage to get the shocks changed about a month ago, right after Letty started back to school. She’d just left the garage to walk to school when they got there, actually. Leon had gone to pick up some parts from our supplier, and Mia was off doing some orientation thing for college, so I was alone in the garage. I’d been underneath a car when they walked in, and neither one saw me at first. They were the type of guys I never liked, looked like they’d never worked on a car a day in their lives. I just didn’t trust guys like that, still don’t. In my experience, the pretty boys always have some scam they’re trying to run. I was about to get up and go see what they needed when I heard them talking about Letty. I decided to stay put for a while and listen to them.

“Hey, doesn’t that girl go to our school?” the first asked. From under the car, all I could see of him was his shoes, some expensive hiking boots that looked like they were brand new. His friend was wearing combat boots. They looked brand new too. Fucking rich kids. Just what I needed to start the day out with.

“Yeah,” the second one laughed. “I think she lives here or something. Fucks the owner for room and board, I heard.”

“Hey, sounds like a pretty good deal for him if it’s true. I wouldn’t mind getting a piece of that ass myself,” hiking boots replied, laughing as well.

“Yeah, she looks pretty tough, but I bet she’s all show. She’d probably do anything you wanted her to. Or she would soon enough. Girls like that just need a man to smack them around a bit, get them into line.”

“Probably do anything to get away from this place. I can’t believe anyone actually lives in this neighborhood. I’m sure she’d suck and fuck the first guy who showed any interest and looked like he wasn’t going to spend the rest of his life in this hellhole.”

Suddenly, I wanted nothing more than to hurt them. Badly.

“Oh yeah,” I said, startling them as I slid out from underneath my car. “Girls like that are a great fuck. You’d think they were all over the place around here, wouldn’t you? The problem, though, is that most of those girls already have very protective men in their lives by the time you all come across them. ‘Cause, you know, the ones that are worth anything, the men in the neighborhood notice. Take me, for instance. There’s this one girl, I’ve had my eye on her for a long time now. She comes across pretty tough; her life’s been pretty fucked up. She probably would’ve done just about anything to get a different life, to get away from here. I tried to protect her as best as I could, but then I got sent up for assault. Not much you can do from prison. And you know, when I got out, I came home to find some guy harassing her. I didn’t like that too much. Then, he tried to convince me that she’d been the one making the moves, coming on to him. I liked that even less, ‘cause I absolutely cannot stand a liar. And I know there’s no way in hell that my girl ever would have wanted him. Nothing in this world has ever turned her on but me, and a Nissan 240 SX going at least 120 miles an hour. Nothing else ever even came close. So, of course, I had to demonstrate to this guy what a mistake in judgment he’d made, picking my girl to go after. You know, they say he’ll never talk again. I probably should have killed him altogether, but I don’t really like spilling blood in front of my girl. It bothers her. Hopefully just maiming the guy will be enough of a message to the rest of the world. ‘Cause I still have to worry about her, you know? She’s beautiful; any guy would want her. Some are stupid enough to just try and take her. Most of them, she can handle herself, but there are some real determined fuckers out there, you know? Just can’t take the hint that a girl’s not interested, have to keep pushing her. And with her being so young and all, I’ve still got a while before I can really let the world know she’s mine, unless I want to get sent up again by some well-intentioned mother fucker of a social worker. So I’ve got to make sure no one tries to mess with her without paying a huge price. Say, you guys probably know her, you look about the right age. She’s a sophomore, over at the high school. Her name’s Letty. Well, only to the people that matter. You’d prolly know her as Leticia. Hell, you might even have seen her walking to school when you drove up, she left just a few minutes before you got here. She’s an amazing girl…sexy as hell, and I never have seen another chick get so turned on by cars. Kind of strange, that she likes the Nissan so much, isn’t it? I keep trying to tell her that there are better cars out there, but she just won’t listen. Oh well, what can you do, right, but give your woman what she wants. You know how it is, I’m sure. Well, actually, maybe you don’t...”

“So, now,” I continued after a minute, thinking to myself that the expressions on their faces as they realized exactly who I was talking about would provide me with entertainment for months to come, “what was it you needed done to this Wrangler, again?”

They just stared at me for a few minutes, before combat boots guy managed to stammer out, “Just need to have the shocks checked, man.”

“Sure,” I replied, smiling. “It’ll be done by Friday.”

I must have sat there in the school parking lot for a good five minutes, thinking about those guys. I wondered if they’d gotten the hint, or if they’d been stupid enough to try to approach Letty. If anyone had hurt her…I was going to have to kill them, jail or not.

I found my way to the office easily enough. After all, I’d gone to that fucking school four years myself. The second I walked in, I started looking for Letty. I finally saw her through a doorway. They had her in the nurse’s office, resting. She still had her gym clothes on, shorts and a little t-shirt thing, and they had her knee wrapped up in an ice pack or something. She looked like she was okay, so I finally relaxed a little bit. Enough to talk to the secretary and get everything taken care of so I could get out of there, at least. Played the concerned friend of the family role off to the hilt. I swear, they should give me an Emmy or something. ‘Cause when I saw that Letty couldn’t even walk…I wanted to tear the place apart. What kind of fucking place lets a girl sit there with just minor medical attention until she gets to the point where she can’t even walk? They should have called an ambulance in first thing, taken her to the hospital, to see a real doctor.

I wanted to take her to the clinic to get checked out, but she kept arguing with me, saying it would take too long. Finally, I gave in. I knew that look in her eyes, the one that meant she wasn’t going to back down. I figured I could talk some sense into her once I got her home, take her to the doctor later that afternoon. So I just grabbed her up in my arms and got her the hell out of that place. Well, after a minor detour to her locker. She must have been hurting more than she was willing to tell me, ‘cause after a while she just kind of tucked her head into my shoulder.

Carrying her around that school was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Not because she was heavy, far from it. Maybe if she’d been wearing something besides those shorts I would have been all right. But, how I was holding her, my hand was right where the shorts ended and her bare leg started, and as I walked her body kept shifting so that I was basically rubbing her ass. And the fabric kept moving around so that every few steps I would get a handful of her bare skin. Plus, when she turned her face into my shoulder, she also pressed her tits right into my chest. Made it pretty hard to pay attention to just getting her out to the car, when what I really wanted to do was just take her into an empty classroom and rip all of her clothes off.

When we finally did get out to the car, I noticed one of the guys who belonged to the yellow Wrangler watching us, like he was trying to figure out if I’d been telling the truth that day in the garage or just bullshitting him. It was hiking boots, I think. Couldn’t be sure, though, ‘cause he was wearing different shoes. I nodded to him, after I got Letty all settled in the car, gave him a little smirk. He just looked away, but I was sure that by the time Letty got back to school, everyone would think she was mine, if they didn’t all ready. Maybe then I wouldn’t have to worry about her so much. Yeah, right.

Ch. 11 - Acting Weird

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

After I hurt my knee, Dom started acting weird. Weirder than he had been, I mean. After we got home that first day, he acted like he was all concerned about me and shit. Got me set up on the couch, covered me with blankets till I felt like I was in a fucking oven, propped my leg up on some pillows, got me the remote, the phone, a soda and a handful of Tylenol, asked me if I was okay until I thought I was going to have to smack him just to get him to shut up. He didn’t say a word about needing to go back to the garage, though, just sat there on the floor and watched me, rubbing my arm until I was practically asleep. The last thing I remember from that afternoon is the feel of him leaning over me, almost but not quite touching me, his lips brushing across my forehead.

And after that, Dom was like, overly protective of me, like he thought I was gonna break or something. He insisted that I just stay at home and lie on the couch, got mad whenever he saw me up and walking around. It was nice at first, being pampered and getting to stay home from school. But after a few days it was boring as hell. There’s only so much to watch on daytime television, you know. So, when I got to the point where I could walk around okay, as long as I went slow, I headed over to the garage.

The first day, Dom was the only one there when I showed up. I was still a little shaky on my feet, and I’d walked the few blocks to the garage. Probably not the best idea I’ve ever had, but I didn’t have any other way to get there.

“Letty, what the fuck are you doing here?” Dom yelled as soon as he saw me. “You’re supposed to be home, resting, with your ass on that couch.”

“It’s no big deal, Dom,” I replied, sighing. “I just got bored at home. There’s nothing to do there, no one to talk to. It was driving me crazy.”

“You should have called me if you needed something,” he said, suddenly calmer, walking up to me.

“Yeah, sure Dom,” I replied, sarcastically. “And you would have run over to the house to entertain me, leaving all this work here still needing to be done and your customers calling to ask why the hell their cars aren’t ready when you said they would be.”

“You’re more important than these cars are, Letty, don’t you know that?” Dom said, so softly that I could barely hear him.

He reached his hand up to my face and stroked my cheek and I don’t know if it was his words or his touch or just general exhaustion, prolly a mix of all three, but suddenly it was all I could do just to stand up. Dom must have noticed, ‘cause he picked me up and carried me over to the office, made me sit down. He lingered over me, brushed a strand of hair away from my face, and I thought he might kiss me, but Leon drove up right then, yelling for Dom to come help him unload the latest supply shipment from the van. I love Leon, but I swear to God, I could have fucking killed him right then and there without one regret.

After that, Dom still wouldn’t let me around the cars, saying he didn’t want me to hurt myself even more, but he didn’t protest as much when I showed up at the garage. So I just hung out in the office with Mia all the time. Sometimes Leon’s friend Amber would come over and hang out with us too, waiting for Leon to finish up in the garage so they could go out. There was this old couch in the office, so I could sit down and prop my leg up when my knee got to hurting. We would blast the radio, sing along at the top of our lungs to Salt-n-Pepa, En Vogue, TLC, 69 Boyz, Montell Jordan, Hootie and the Blowfish, and dance around the office until Dom or Leon would come in and threaten to break the damn thing if we kept listening to what they called ‘that fucking shit’. Those two never have appreciated good music...

It was actually fun, hanging out with Mia and Amber. I could be goofy around them without having to worry about looking dumb, and weak. And I could talk to them about guys and stuff - even though Amber always insisted that she wasn’t the one to ask for advice on men, unless I wanted to know the kind I should stay as far away from as I could. But I mostly asked about one guy in particular.

“Mia, what the fuck is up with your brother?” I asked her one afternoon when it was just the two of us and I was especially frustrated with Dom, making sure to close the door to the office so he and Leon wouldn’t hear us talking.

“What do you mean?”

“Like…okay, sometimes it’ll seem like he’s flirting with me, and then he’ll like…do stuff…”

“Do stuff? Like what?” she asked.

“Well…like he’ll touch me, and it’ll be for just a second or two longer than normal. Or he’ll just like…stand really close to me…look at me weird. And sometimes he leans in close to me until I could swear he’s about to kiss me, but then all of a sudden he just pulls back for no reason. And then I’m not sure if he really was going to kiss me, or if I’m just reading way too much into it and imagining everything and just driving myself crazy for no reason,” I blurted out. “I mean, it’s not even like he’s really flirting. There’s just something in his eyes…I can’t explain it, but it’s not how regular people look at me.”

“I think he’s in love, Letty,” Mia said softly, smiling at me.

“Oh, that’s great, just perfect. Someone up there must really, really hate me, to put me through all of this shit,” I thought to myself. “I do not think I can handle seeing him all lovey-dovey with some chick. It was bad enough when he was fucking every skank at the races when he was in high school, but I never thought he really cared about any of them. And what kind of guy practically kisses one girl when he’s in love with someone else? I could’ve sworn Dom wasn’t like that. He’d better not turn into your typical male asshole, ‘cause then I’ll have to beat the shit out of him…”

“So, who’s the slut?” I asked Mia, after a minute or two had passed and I’d gotten my thoughts under control a little.

She just laughed. “Letty, it’s you!”

“What? Mia, you smoking crack or something? You’re crazy, girl! Me? You’re saying Dom’s in love with me? No way…no fucking way…”

“I’m serious!” she insisted. “I hear him talking to himself about you, when he thinks I’m not around. He’s completely sprung.”

“Yeah? Then why doesn’t he do anything about it? I mean, yeah, he flirts with me sometimes. Or, I’m pretty sure it’s flirting. Maybe I’m just imagining it. But then, it’s like he gets to a point where I think he’s finally going to make a move and he just backs off, completely shuts down. Why would he do that if he were sprung on me?”

Mia nodded her head in understanding. “I think Dom’s afraid he’s going to hurt you.”

I could only stare at her. “What? Hurt me? That’s crazy. You know, forget what I said earlier. I think Dom’s the one smoking crack, not you. Or maybe both of you are…”

“Yeah,” Mia laughed. “Well, Dom’s a guy. And when have you ever known a man to be rational, especially when it comes to dealing with women?”

“You do have a point there,” I had to agree.

“And, you know,” she continued, “ever since Dom got out of jail, there are times when I get home and he’s completely off in his own little world, doesn’t even notice I’m around. Sometimes when he gets like that, I’ll hear him muttering to himself, over and over, ‘She’s only fifteen; stay away from her; don’t you dare screw her life up; she deserves better than you,’ like he’s trying to talk himself out of something.”

“So, wait. You’re telling me that Dom is in love with me, but he won’t let himself do anything about it because he thinks I’m too young or too good for him or he’ll ruin my life or some shit like that? Have I mentioned yet that your brother is like, completely insane?”

Mia laughed. “Well, you won’t get any argument from me about that.” She was silent for a few minutes before continuing. “So…I take it you kind of like Dom, too?”

“Kind of?” I asked, embarrassed. I could feel myself blushing, and I hate that. “You mean it isn’t completely obvious? Well, that’s a relief, I guess. At least I haven’t been looking like a lovesick little girl to anyone but myself. I’ve liked…no, I’ve loved Dom since almost before I can remember.”

“So,” Mia said a few minutes later, a scheming look on her face. “You’ve been in love with Dom since like, forever, but he never paid any attention to you. And now, he’s in love with you, but won’t let himself do anything about it…”

“Exactly,” I sighed. “You know, my aunt always says that God never gives you anything too big for you to handle. But I swear, I’m starting to think He’s a sadist.”

“Oh, God, Letty,” Mia laughed. “Just don’t let Father Manuel hear you say anything like that. He’ll have you reciting the Hail Mary for the rest of your life as punishment!”

Just then the phone rang, and I sat there thinking about what Mia had said while she talked to whoever it was, trying to explain that their car wouldn’t be ready until the next week unless they wanted to pay for us to overnight parts from Japan.

“I can’t live like this, Mia,” I complained when she finally got off the phone. “I can’t keep putting up with Dom and all his bullshit. He needs to hurry the fuck up and make up his mind what he wants. What the hell am I supposed to do?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll come up with something,” Mia assured me.

What she came up with was a plan I liked to call Operation: Get Dom to Stop Acting Like a Complete Fucking Idiot. Which didn’t really shorten itself well, but it made Mia and me laugh like crazy.

Mia explained it like this: “First, you need to come on to him. Strongly. He is a guy, you know, and they tend to be completely clueless even when you lay it all out for them. Touch him a lot, squeeze past him, ask him to rub your back for you. Tell him he smells good, if you can manage to figure out a way to make him believe that oil and grease and sweat smell good. You don’t want to tease him, though…just make sure he notices you. We have to get that control of his to break down.”

“Are you sure this will work, girl? I don’t want to end up looking like a fool,” I sighed to her. The plan actually sounded kind of dumb, to me. But it wasn’t like I had any other brilliant ideas.

“Yes, of course it will work!” Mia exclaimed. “Trust me. Oh, and you should like…start changing in front of him…out of your coveralls and into your school clothes, or something.”

“Mia! Are you trying to make me look like a total slut or something?”

“Oh, come on, it’s no big deal. Well, I mean, it will be, since it’ll be you changing and Dom watching. But if you two were really just friends, it wouldn’t be a big deal at all. I swear,” she replied.

Operation: Get Dom to Stop Acting Like a Complete Fucking Idiot

Lol.

Ch. 12 - Handcuffs

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

After she hurt her knee, Letty started spending a lot of time with Mia and Amber. At first I hadn’t wanted Letty anywhere near the garage at all, thought she should be at home resting. But after a few days, she showed up and refused to leave. I couldn’t get her to stay away from the garage, but I could keep her from working on the cars so she wouldn’t hurt herself more. I didn’t protest too much about her not staying at home and resting, though. I figured I could keep a better eye on Letty if she were close by. Plus, I’d kind of missed having her around. So I pretended to reluctantly agree that she could help Mia out. And Amber was there all the time, waiting for Leon to finish up whatever he was working on so they could go hang out. She got to be pretty good friends with Mia, actually, so sometimes it turned out that Leon was the one waiting for her to be ready to leave.

It was nice to hear the three of them laughing in the office, talking about whatever girls talk about. Nice, but also a little disturbing. It was just weird to see Letty acting like a girl. I mean, of course I knew she was a girl. How could I not, with her body? But I’d never really seen her around other girls before. Mia and her, they act…different, when they’re together. Silly, and shit. It was nice to see Letty relax a little bit, have some fun. And I liked Amber, thought she and Leon were good for each other, thought they ought to just get things over with, realize they were more than just friends and hook up already. But I missed having Letty out with me, missed talking to her or just working on cars together. The garage felt empty without her being right there next to me. Not that I would admit it though, especially since it was my own idea to keep her away from the cars.

Letty hanging out with Mia and Amber turned out to be torture in more ways than one. Not only did I miss having Letty to myself, but the things those girls talked about… They didn’t seem to realize that I could hear everything they said unless they closed the office door - which they practically never did. I swear, they almost gave me heart attacks more than once. I remember one day in particular, the three of them were in the office talking with the door open just a little bit. I’d almost forgotten they were there - for once they didn’t have the radio blasting some lame ass excuse for music. But then…

“Velvet-lined handcuffs??” Letty shrieked, giggling. “These people have to be insane…”

I looked up, wondering what the hell she was talking about, thinking to myself, “Handcuffs? Velvet? What the fuck??”

“Oh come on, just think about the possibilities,” Mia laughed. “You could like…handcuff him to a car or something and do whatever you wanted to him… And you know, with the velvet, you wouldn’t have to worry about chafing, leaving marks…”

Normally I don’t pay all that much attention to Mia when she starts talking about guys. I don’t really want to hear about my sister’s love life, you know? As long as she’s happy, I stay out of it. But I had to find out who Letty was interested in. So I casually moved closer to the office, trying to act like I was just getting a part for the car I was working on.

“Sure, Mia,” Letty replied. “Like I’d really be able to handcuff Dom to anything if he didn’t want me to. He’d kick my ass!”

“What??” I remember thinking to myself, a smirk spreading across my face. “She’s thinking about putting handcuffs on me?? This could get…interesting…”

“Hmm…” Mia trailed off. “Well…maybe if you got him really drunk? Or, I don’t know…slipped a Valium into his coffee or something? Although, I have no idea where you’d find one…and Dom doesn’t really drink coffee… Maybe a roofie would work…but I don’t know where you’d get one of those, either…”

“Well…” Amber laughed. “I’m sure I could find some shit that’d be guaranteed to knock Dom out till next Sunday…the question is, would you be able to move him after he was unconscious… He’s pretty big...”

“Oh, I know!” Mia cried. “Do it while he’s asleep! That’d be perfect. Just handcuff him to the bed. And he sleeps on his back, so you wouldn’t even have to worry about flipping him over.”

“Mia thinking up ways to get me in handcuffs… This is just so wrong, in so many ways,” I remember thinking to myself. But I was curious. Well, okay, more than curious. Letty and I had always kind of flirted, back and forth, especially after she started helping me out with the cars at the garage. I knew I wanted her…and I thought she wanted me, but this was the first time I’d ever heard her actually say so.

“Yeah,” Letty laughed. “The question is, after he wakes up…then what?”

“Okay, this is my brother, remember,” Mia shrieked. “After he wakes up…you’re on your own! I don’t even want to think about it…”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure I could come up with something. I’m not this innocent little girl who has no idea what sex is, you know…Angel told me quite a few things! But I meant…you don’t think he’d like…get mad about it? I mean…wouldn’t it remind him of Lompoc too much?”

“Hmm…you might have a point there,” Mia trailed off. “But there’s where the velvet comes in! Somehow I doubt he’s ever seen a pair of velvet-lined handcuffs before… And think of it this way…you’d be creating good memories to replace the bad ones! Pretty soon, I’m sure anytime he even thought of handcuffs he’d think about you instead of Lompoc… And that would be good, right? He’d have to thank you for doing it, even.”

“That could get interesting,” Letty laughed.

They stopped talking about handcuffs then and moved on to making fun of the latest fall fashions or some boring shit like that, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what they’d said. Just knowing that Letty was not only thinking about sex…with me…but also talking about ways to actually do it, even if she was just joking around… It’s the first time I remember thinking that maybe, just maybe, I could be with Letty without ruining her life. If I wanted her, and she wanted me… How could it possibly be bad for us to be together?

The handcuffs are going to show up again in the new updates, btw. But I don't think I'll be able to post that chapter here! :lol:

Lmao.
Loved that.
No I don't think you will. Hehe.

i am absolutely in luv with this fic!!! :P gr8 read catalinay!! can't wait for more dottyness! :D

no you definitely won't be able to post that particular chapter here!

yeah, i'd know, wouldn't i? LOL!

good luck with your softball game!

Well yeah...it's on Mimi to provide the inspiration for that part! :lol:

hmmm....i DOUBT that's gonna be a problem!

Ch. 13 - Not a Morning Person

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

I was supposed to put Mia’s plan into action the next weekend, but as things worked out, I never got the chance to. Fate or something took over, and everything ended up happening all by itself. The day after my big talk with Mia, Leon got sick. Really sick, to the point where he was puking all day and could barely drag his ass out of bed. We were pretty busy at the garage, with more than Dom could handle by himself. So, suddenly, the two of them decided that my knee was healed up enough that I could start working on the cars again. They also decided that I could help out at the garage before school until Leon got better. I don’t know how the hell they thought either one of those decisions were up to them, and I almost threw a fit when Dom told me about it over dinner that night. But Mia kicked me underneath the table, glared at me every time I even looked like I was going to open my mouth to say something. So I stayed quiet.

The next morning, I woke up early to go help Dom out at the garage. I almost literally fell out of bed at five a.m. and got dressed, wearing just a bra and underwear under my coveralls. I was going straight to school from the garage, so I had all my clothes and shit in my backpack.

Dom was already at the garage when I got there, changing the oil on an old Buick, one of the cars that had been dropped off at the garage overnight. He looked all happy and shit, whistling away as he leaned under the hood of the car. I just glared at him. I am so not a morning person. He and Leon were going to owe me big for this, I’d just decided.

“Hey, Letty, how you doing this morning?” Dom asked when he noticed me.

“Ugh,” was my only reply, as I stifled a yawn. “Dom, it is way, way, way too early for conversation and shit. Just tell me which car to start working on and let me be miserable in silence.”

“Okay, okay,” he laughed. “Fine. You can start replacing the clutch on that truck over there while I get through these oil changes. Let me know if you need any help. So what’s your problem today? You get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning or something? PMS maybe? You’re not catching whatever Leon has, are you?”

“No,” I replied, exasperated. “No, I didn’t get up on the wrong side of the bed, and no, I don’t have PMS, and no, I’m not catching whatever Leon has. And, my only problem is that it’s five-thirty in the fucking morning and instead of being in bed, where I should be, I’m in this freezing cold garage with some asshole who doesn’t know when to just shut the fuck up!”

I guess Dom got the point, ‘cause he didn’t say anything after that. I got completely absorbed in replacing the clutch. It had been a few months since I’d done one all by myself, but I definitely wasn’t going to ask Dom for help and let him think I didn’t know what I was doing. When I finally finished, I stepped out from underneath the lift and looked over at the clock to check how long I had left before I had to leave for school.

I don’t know if it had taken me longer to finish with the clutch than it should have, or if Dom hadn’t meant for me to do the whole thing that morning or what, but it was about a quarter to eight. In other words, I had fifteen minutes to walk the eleven blocks to school and get there in time for the test I had first period. Maybe I could make it, if I left right that second and ran the whole way. Yeah, and that was so not going to happen.

“Dom!” I screeched, just as he stepped out of the office. “What the hell is wrong with you? Why didn’t you tell me what time it was?”

“What are you still doing here, Letty?” he said, at nearly the same time. “I thought you left nearly an hour ago!”

“You thought I left? You’ve kept track of where I’ve been for practically every single fucking second of every single fucking day for the past three weeks if not the past three months, and here you thought I just left without saying goodbye or anything, and you didn’t go rushing after me to make sure I was okay? Oh, that’s just rich.”

“Well, you seemed like you didn’t want to be bothered…I thought maybe you were mad at me or something…” he said, sheepishly. It would have been cute, if I hadn’t been so pissed.

“Uggh!” I growled. “Well, I was fine before, but I’m not too happy now! Okay. So, now that I have like fifteen minutes to get to school, here’s what’s going to happen,” I said, as I started walking towards the entrance of the garage, where Dom always parked. “Are you coming? I swear, Dom, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll be right behind me in ten seconds or less. Oh, and make sure you have your keys.” I unzipped my coveralls as I walked the rest of the way to the car, shrugging out of them before I slid into the passenger seat.

“Letty, what are you doing?” Dom asked, pausing outside the car.

“What the fuck do you think I’m doing, Dom?” I replied angrily. “I’m changing! What, you want me to go to school in dirty coveralls? I don’t think so! And, since I now have twelve minutes to get there, I don’t have time to change anywhere else but in the car. So will you get the fuck in, all ready? ‘Cause, if you don’t hurry the fuck up, I’ll completely miss my science test, which there are no make-ups for, since Mr. Wilson is the biggest dick in the entire school. And then, I’ll most likely end up failing the class this quarter, since I have a C in there right now. And then, my aunt would want to kick my ass. Except, given my strong survival instinct, I would have to tell her whose fault it was that I missed the test. And then, she would want to kick your ass. And she would, without hesitation. Probably Leon’s too, just for good measure. And after that, s