Wheels of Steel, Book 1

by Pepper Pace

  “Why are you hiding your leg braces from your mother?”

  “Because she doesn’t want me to walk.” He sat down carefully in his chair as Robin silently watched. Then she quickly gathered his book bag and computer bag and followed him back to his apartment. Once inside he moved down the same hall where the bathroom was located but instead of turning right he turned left into a neat bedroom. There was just a bed, a dresser with a lamp and nothing else but artwork on the walls.

  Robin hesitated before entering. “Come in.” He said. He reached down and unlaced his shoes then he locked the wheelchair and struggled to stand. Robin quickly moved into the position that he had taught her; directly in front of him. He placed his hands on her shoulders and she placed hers around his waist and using her legs, helped him to stand. Again she was amazed that he towered over her. He wobbled for a brief second and then moved one leg and then the other towards the bed.

  She followed him, as he was still holding on to her shoulder. When he reached the bed he began undoing the button on his jeans.

  “Uh…what are you doing?”

  “Leg braces? I can’t give them to you any other way.” She wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or honest. Once his jeans were undone he pulled down the pants. He was wearing boxers and his legs seemed a bit scrawny in them, especially since the rest of his body was pretty muscular and toned. She supposed it was a wheelchair thing, but his upper body was impressive and his arms popped with muscles. He flopped down on the neatly made bed and began pulling the pants down his legs and past the braces.

  Robin knelt down and helped him, hoping he wouldn’t get pissed and say something childish about being able to do it himself. But the only thing he said was for her not to take them off completely. Then he quickly unstrapped the braces. They left angry red welts above and below his knees.

  “How did you hide them before I came around?”

  “At school.” Which he hated doing because then he’d have to go the entire weekend without them. “Or sometimes with Link and he’d bring them to me after she left.” Once he’d had to leave them out back and he was a nervous wreck that someone would steal them.

  Robin was watching him in confusion. But, he thought, at least she was back to speaking to him.

  “Why doesn’t your Mom want you to walk?” That seemed insane to her. Walking would give him so much more freedom.

  He reached up and pushed back his hair. There were several scars along his forehead and hair line.

  “I have more on my chin, but you can’t see because of my beard.” There were more scars on his chest and shoulders.

  “What happened?” Jason noted that the concerned look had returned to her sleep deprived eyes. He liked looking into her eyes, especially when she wore that expression of concern--at the same time that he hated how the dark circles there were evidence of her exhaustion.

  “I fell into a glass table. It broke…and so did I.”

  “Oh…god.” She murmured still staring at him. He hid his surprise at her reaction. Most people just said, ‘damn that’s fucked up’ and then went on. He was beginning to realize that she wasn’t most people.

  “Then I fell again. Not as bad, just a concussion, but my Mom was like, ‘No more.’” He made a face.

  “But,” Her brow was still furrowed. “If you walk more and your legs become stronger, won’t you fall less?” Then her face instantly warmed at how personal she was getting.

  “But I’ll always have seizures. And the alternative is to wear a helmet…which I’m not doing.”

  “So…you sneak and walk?”

  “I guess.”

  Wow. She helped him back to his chair; he mostly pulled himself into it. She wondered how he did other things, like getting in and out of bed, in and out of the tub, onto the toilet. No wonder his arms were so impressive. He probably had to drag himself whenever he needed in and out of the chair. She was beginning to wonder a lot about him.

  “I better go.” Somehow it seemed wrong to leave him without the braces, and it seemed rather sad that he had to sneak and walk. And she felt worse about falling asleep and then becoming pissed at him for yelling at her. She once again remembered that this was just a job to her, but to him this was his life. With a sigh she headed to the door.

  “See you tomorrow.” He wheeled to the door with her. “Get some rest.”

  She looked back at him, pausing momentarily. “I’m sorry about falling asleep. I won’t do that again. When I’m here…I want you to know that you can trust me.” Then she turned and disappeared into her car. Jason sat there for a moment and then he smiled. He kinda liked her.

  Like an addict, Jason went straight to his computer, doing his usual; listening to music, checking the numbers. But his mind was elsewhere and didn’t get the same satisfaction from it that he always had before. He began playing around with a new beat, thinking about the party last night—not the music, but the girl in the bathroom.

  Replaying it all in his mind he felt a desire that caused him to harden rapidly. It wasn’t necessarily the desire for sex—more a need to be one with someone. He replayed the events in his mind, the sensations, the sounds she had made; earthy, guttural; the sounds of pleasure.

  Jason pulled up X-tube and listened to the female sounds of pleasure until he found one that reminded him of her; the watcher. Then he created a beat that reflected his mood and he chopped the vocal moans into it, slowing it down or speeding it up, almost making it sound as if she was climaxing to the beat. He liked it. He had translated his thoughts and desires into music so he called it Jason’s mind and after listening to it several times, he posted it to YouTube under his own name and not the name Wheels of Steel.

  Chapter 12

  Robin went home, climbed into bed and slept until three in the morning. She never heard the phone ringing, she hadn’t even pulled off her shoes before flopping down onto her bed. But at just after three a.m. her eyes popped open and she reached for the alarm clock in a panic. Uh no! She’d completely missed her entire shift at the restaurant!

  She had never missed work before. She had never even called in sick. Robin was a person that was so afraid of disappointing people that she would work while having a case of the flu or she’d cover someone else’s hours even if it was an inconvenience to her. Realizing what she had done was almost more than her nerves could bear.

  She hurried to the living room and played back her messages. There were three; all from the restaurant. She cursed to herself as she listened. The first one was filled with concern, ‘Hey Robin, you’re never late, wondering if everything is ok?’ Then the second an hour later; probably right at dinner rush. ‘Robin where are you? We’re pretty backed up…Give me a call when you get this.’ And then the final message. ‘Well I hope everything is ok, because when you didn’t show up it really left us in a lurch. Look, we know you have a second job. And lately you’ve been coming in doing less than acceptable work; mixing up orders, slowness. You’re going to have to make a decision on which job you want to keep because this isn’t working for us.’ And then a dead line. Wow.

  She slowly slumped into her armchair and covered her face in shame. She wasn’t doing a good job in either position. And yes, her boss was right; it was time to make a decision. She’d just slept 12 hours straight, of course she couldn’t keep going like this!

  With a sigh she stood. Pinnacle sucked as employers and were a pack of liars, but she already knew that she couldn’t make ends meet at the restaurant. Maybe she could do better if she got extra hours as an aid. They needed more people and she needed more hours. But not now, for now she needed to rest.

  With that settled she felt marginally better—not that she could ever show her face back at the restaurant, not even to pick up her last check and certainly not to give two weeks notice. Maybe she could call and quit over the phone and then have them mail her final check. She didn’t relish doing that but it was for the best; for her and for the restaurant.

  Feeling a litt
le better now that she’d made a decision, Robin prepared for work. She hadn’t done much to make herself look presentable over the last week so she dressed in nice grey slacks, a red chemise with a nice white sweater. And because she had no food in the house as she had gotten behind on her own personal chores, Robin drove to The Waffle House and had a huge breakfast, reading her book and not feeling rushed for the first time in days, maybe weeks. The stress of working two jobs was finally behind her.

  Back at her car, Robin dug into her purse for the C.D that link had given her the day before. She slipped it into her car’s disc player as she headed for Jason’s. More Love began to flow from her speakers and Robin was surprised to hear that the back beat was Moments in Love by The Art of Noise. It was one of her all-time favorite songs. She turned up the volume as she drove. The mellow groove surprised her. It was one thing to mix hip hop beats because it was popular and what people danced to. But to make something this cool was not what she had expected from the angry young man.

  She arrived at Jason’s before the entire song had time to play out and reluctantly she returned it to her purse. No wonder it had gotten so many hits; the song was really good!

  She climbed out of the car and thought…damn, wasn’t I just here?! She still had ten minutes but Jason would probably love that she was early instead of late. She rang the bell prepared to start the day on a good note and to be pleasant despite the fact that Jason would fight her tooth and nail.

  It wasn’t Jason that answered the door, but a tall thin woman with graying red hair and cold green eyes. It couldn’t be anyone other than Jason’s mother.

  ***

  Jason’s mother looked her up and down before turning away. She didn’t even say hi, bye or kiss my ass. Robin stepped inside assuming that since the woman hadn’t shut it in her face that she was welcome to come in.

  “Okay, so the contractor doesn’t even look up in the attic.” She said as she headed for the kitchen. So that’s where Jason got it from; his rudeness. Robin followed at a slight distance. “He’s going to give me an estimate when he doesn’t even know what’s going on up there?”

  Jason was sitting at the table. His eyes flitted to hers briefly before returning to his mother. He was sitting at the table drinking coffee and eating scrambled eggs and bacon. Oh so he could eat something other than Cheerios at breakfast. She noted that his normally untamed red curls were neatly combed and brushed into flowing, silky tendrils that reached his shoulders.

  Even though she was shy about such things she decided to speak up. “Good morning Jason. Is there…anything I can do for you right now?”

  “No.” He said, voice uncharacteristally pleasant. “My Mom already helped me this morning. I guess I could have had you come later.” She wondered what she would do for the next hour. Jason’s mother leaned against the counter, drinking her coffee and watching Robin curiously.

  “You’re the new assistant.” She stated. “Have you ever worked with anyone with CP before?”

  “No ma’ame.”

  “I see. You seem awfully young. How long have you been doing this type of work?”

  “Not very long.” She admitted.

  “How long is ‘not very long’?”

  “Mom…” Jason spoke. He picked up his plate of half eaten breakfast and scraped the remainder into the trash. “Robin is pretty good. And she’s taking a seizure emergency class.” He turned to her suddenly. “Can you load up my book bag and laptop?”

  “Sure.” She was happy to leave the room and sensed that Jason had created a task for her just to get her out of the line of fire. They still had a long time before they would have to leave for school so after putting his bags into the backseat, she decided to linger in her car and listen to the c.d., but then got nervous that they might want her for something so after twenty minutes or so she returned to the apartment not bothering to knock. They were no longer in the kitchen so she went down the hall. Jason was sitting at the mirror with a towel across his shoulders and his mother had slathered shaving cream over his face and was in the process of shaving him.

  “You can’t let it get this thick.” She was saying as she concentrated on the task at hand. “It’s so much harder if you let it grow out. I know you don’t like shaving but you have a daytime assistant now.” His mother glanced at her.

  “You know how to do this, right?” Robin had shaved her dad once when she was little…not that she could gage how good of a job she had done since she had only been six. But really, how hard could it be? Jason’s mother was using a safety razor, not one of the ones her dad used, where you had to place a blade into it. Thinking about her dad made her feel momentarily lost. She looked at what the mother was doing and the way she scraped down instead of up.

  “Yes, Ma’ame.”

  “Come here and take over. I want to start the laundry.” She waited for her to leave since three people would be a crowd in the small bathroom, then she sat down on the lowered toilet lid where the mother had been sitting and looked at the area of Jason’s face that was now free of hair. She lightly touched his chin indicating that he should look up and then using a downward stroke of the razor blade began shaving him. The hair was definitely catching in the blade so she had to dip it into the sink of water pretty often. He flinched a lot.

  “My Dad had the other type of razor.”

  He was staring at her eyes. “The other type of razor? A straight edge?”

  “No, the kind that you have to put a razor blade into.”

  “Oh, well I’ve never used that kind. I think my mom was afraid that I’d cut off my fingertips trying to replace the blade.”

  She wasn’t sure if he was joking so she didn’t crack a smile.

  Jason couldn’t stop staring into her eyes as she shaved him. Where did those eyes come from? Was there some Irish guy lurking in her history? She was a dark nutty brown so he didn’t guess her for multiracial. And her hair was an unprocessed wild thing that she tamed only by pulling it back. He thought that she looked nice dressed like a preppy girl. Was she trying to impress his mother by dressing like that, or maybe trying to fit in at college? None of the girls he knew dressed in nice slacks and blouses, they just wore jeans and jean skirts or shorts. Maybe she wanted to look nice for him. It didn’t matter why, he liked it.

  “Okay, I think I’m done.” She wiped his face with the towel and he looked at the mirror. He smiled.

  “Good job.” Robin watched him. He should smile more often. He had an amazing smile. It lit up his entire face and transformed him. He rubbed his cheek and Robin glanced at his freshly brushed hair. His Mom had certainly done that.

  Jason sighed and gave her a reluctant look. He didn’t want to do this…but it was her own fault for having come back. He would not have predicted that she would be one to stick with the job considering their rocky start. “You can help me go to the bathroom, I guess.”

  “Oh?” She said in surprise. “Your Mom didn’t help you with that?”

  “No. She was going to do that after I shaved. Help me stand, Robin.” He leaned forward in the chair and she got into position, hands around his waist. “This is going to be harder since I don’t have the braces.” He whispered into her ear, presumably so that his mother wouldn’t hear. Robin shivered slightly as the soft wisps of his breath tickled her ear and neck.

  “Okay. Are…you standing up or sitting down?” Translation: peeing or pooping?

  “Standing is fine.”

  “Um…when do you…”

  “Take a crap?”

  She blushed. “Yeah.”

  He gave her a bemused smile as she got him standing. “I can control it so that it’s only once a day. Mostly in the evenings I evacuate everything I’ve eaten for that day.” He gestured to the toilet with his head as his arms went firmly around her shoulders. He wobbled a lot. “Robin…how strong are you?”