Roots and Wings (City Limits #1)
M. Mabie
Dedicated to my
Pike, Adams and Craighead county girls.
Tough women who take care of business and family alike.
Beautiful humans who will do anything for anyone at any time.
No questions asked—with a smile.
I’m proud to call you mine.
Few things were certain around O’Fallon’s Service and Tire. Kenny didn’t really work there, but he was there enough. Be careful what you eat in the break room. The week before I’d found some leftover cake, and, sure enough, it was harder than a wedding night dick. And last, when we did the fifteen-minute oil changes for fifteen bucks, that garage would be asshole to elbow all day.
Dad had done that promotion once a year for twenty years, which happened to be every year he’d owned the place.
It was our family business. That was, if two people could make up a whole family. I guessed families were all different shapes and sizes, and since Grandpa passed away, it had only been Dad and me.
Oh, and Dean.
He wasn’t really family, but he’d worked there since we were in high school. And, honestly, who the hell wasn’t family somewhere down the line around Wynne?
Dad and Dean worked the shop and I ran the desk—unless they needed the help, but most of the time it was pretty slow and easy to manage.
Not that day.
There was a line out the door and cars parked along the road, waiting. All there to get their oil changed for fifteen bucks.
I wadded my thick, long brown hair up into a knot on the top of my head as I heard my dad exclaim from the garage.
“Twenty, Mutt! We’re on a roll today, kid. Make sure they all keep pulling in.”
Oh, yeah. My name’s Mutt. Not my given name, but, ask anyone who Darrell O’Fallon’s daughter is—ten to one—they’ll say Mutt. My grandpa—God rest his bastard soul—called me that from the day I was born.
Sometimes it drove me nuts growing up. I’m used to it now; I don’t think my mom liked that very much, but she didn’t stick around long enough to do anything about it either. She left when I was two months old.
No Dear John letter.
No phone calls.
Just gone.
My grandpa called me Mutt because apparently my mom was the town bike. Every town had one, and she was theirs.
Among everyone else who had a go at her, my dad ended up getting the longest ride.
He loved her. To tell you the truth, I thought he still did.
This one time I asked my grandpa about my name and he told me flat-out: “Your mom was a whore, Mutt. You could be anybody’s kid. You could be made up with anybody.” I never forgot that, and thought about it a lot more whenever I’d consider dating someone.
First, what if we were related? Ew. No.
Second, who would want to bring a Mutt home to Sunday dinner? Not many.
So most of the time, I decided, better not.
That was the only time I saw my dad raise a fist. He knocked out three of Grandpa’s teeth that morning. Then he made me scrambled eggs and told me to not pay him any attention.
Don’t worry. They were false anyway, so I guess there was no real harm done.
It wasn’t like Grandpa had a lot of room to talk. His last wife had run off with some guy she met at a casino. That’s why he was stuck there living with us.
Most people would say I was kind of a tomboy, growing up with only a dad and an asshole grandpa to show me the ropes. I didn’t really give a shit. In my experience, people said whatever the hell they wanted to anyway. My name was the perfect example of that.
Anyway, I’m not done yet, despite how hungry I was on fifteen-minute oil change day, I was having a pretty damn good Saturday.
Wynne was a small town on the river and we had a great lake nearby, too. Sure there was no mall or movie theaters, but if you wanted to catch wall-mount worthy trout or a largemouth bass, you were in the right spot.
Dad’s oil change promo was going great, but what was shocking me was how many spinners and lures I’d sold.
I’d made them all myself and was about to sell my last one.
“Mutt, honey, those sumbitches bit on every cast. I’m taking the rest you’ve got here,” said Mr. Walton to me from the other side of the counter, slapping a twenty down on the linoleum top.
I should have been charging more.
A few days back, I’d set up the little display with the fifty or so I had on hand, and at five bucks each, I sold out too easily.
I wasn’t complaining. I loved making them.
But Mr. Walton was right.
Those sumbitches did work.
The past Thursday evening, I’d caught a two-pound bass off my dock in only about ten minutes. That’s called working right there.
“I’m glad you liked them. Which one did you use?”
“The blue and yellow one. You got any more of those?”
“No, but I can make a few up for you.”
“I’ll take ‘em, by God. Make me ten of ‘em.”