Who: Travis and Marta.
What: NA meeting buddies cruise around town.
Where: Repose here and there.
When: Current-ish.
Warnings: Probably mentions of passing bad things like drugs. Will update as necessary.
[The local junkyard didn't have much to offer as far as fully functional motor vehicles went. It was really just the place where people disposed of their rust bucket clunkers and their dead relatives' long-forgotten mechanical projects of one type or another. The place that Travis was beginning to think of as
home despite himself was a desolate graveyard of bombed out engine guts and damaged steel frames. Fucking junk in every sense of the word, but he'd managed to salvage a few gems out of the wreckage. He'd fixed up a bike or two, and most recently an old Chevelle that was in need of a lot things, most obviously a single-hued paint job. But the heat worked, and he'd gotten it to shift smoothly into every gear, which were the only criteria on a quiet winter evening like this one.
The old muscle car that pulled up in front of Marta's must have been a real gem in it's day, but the only thing that could be said for it now was that it at least ran in the cold weather after the wrench-work that Travis had put into it. It really wasn't the kind of car that any guy wanted to be picking up a girl in. It needed a fresh coat of paint badly because the body was mostly rust-licked black but the passenger door was a mismatch of robin's egg blue. The old 8-track stereo had been ripped out and was bleeding little red and yellow wires up on the dash. The seats had one been pretty black leather, but were now so sutured with duct tape that they might as well have been gray. The engine was loud and the muffler was clunky. The car probably should have been an embarrassment and not any source of pride, but Travis had gotten it out of the grave and back to life again. He couldn't help but to feel just a little proud of it. The list of his accomplishments was really fucking short, and even the minor victories felt golden.
After texting Marta that he was out front, Travis fussed with the portable stereo that he'd shoved into the middle of the bench seat. The only CDs that he'd found back at the trailer he'd inherited only consisted of old 1970's country music, it seemed. There was some of it playing now, but the volume was real, real low. He had on blue jeans and a gray cotton shirt with long sleeves. Some dark gloves that he'd gotten for Christmas were on his hands, both of which clutched the steering wheel, waiting.]