I Hated You First by Rachel John
Clay
Sun Valley Heavy Equipment Rental was as much a second home to me as the Harwoods’ house. Thanks to Parker and his dad’s freaky ability to fix just about anything, we’d made a name for ourselves not only as a rental shop, but as the place to sell off finicky equipment. Our side business of buying, trading, and selling had become more and more important as the competition from the big box stores closed in. Everyone was in the equipment rental business these days.
I don’t think there was a moment our boss, John Harwood, ever stopped worrying. It wouldn’t matter if we had a billion-dollar nest egg. The sky could fall tomorrow and it would all be gone. Day after day, he carried around the responsibility of thirty people who relied on him for their livelihoods. Oh, the joys of owning a small business.
I was inspecting a scissor lift we’d just acquired when Lauren walked in and headed to her desk in the corner to wake up her computer. My Lauren radar always seemed to sense the moment she arrived, and today was no different. Her Sun Valley polo shirt was navy blue today and she was wearing my favorite of her jeans, the ones that had lace on the back pockets.
Idiot brain. It was a good thing no one could read my mind, especially her dad.
If John had his way, his daughter’s desk wouldn’t be anywhere near the warehouse. She'd be in the front office greeting customers and manning the phone. But Lauren wouldn’t stand for it. She was as familiar with the equipment as any of us, maybe more so, because it was her job to track all of it.
Parker came to stand next to me, giving one of the back tires a nudge. “What do you think?” He ran his hands through his dark blond hair, which was several weeks past needing a haircut.
“I’ll know more after we change the batteries.” Luckily, the scissor lift took the same kind of six-volt batteries as any typical golf cart, including the two we kept on site.
“We bought it without good batteries in it? Without trying it out?” Lauren came over to have a look. “The hydraulics could be all messed up. It could fall over and kill us all.” She was slightly taller than Parker, which I knew secretly ticked him off, especially when she leaned over him during an argument like the one they were about to start.
“Good morning to you, too, Lauren.” Parker turned to his sister and puffed out his chest. He’d been the one to buy the lift, and his body language showed it was a decision he’d defend with his last breath.
He patted the machine like an old friend. “Everybody wants these, working or not. It was in a storage unit, and they were doing me a favor by calling me first.”
“Doing you a favor.” She laughed. “More like, they know any time they have a piece of incredibly heavy junk on their hands, you’ll be happy to haul it off, and pay them to boot. How much was it?”
“I don’t have to tell you. You’re not my boss.”
“Oh, that’s mature.”
I stepped between them, knowing things would only get less mature from there if I didn’t put a stop to it. I’d been playing the role of peacemaker since we were kids, and while they were a lot more respectful to each other now, it didn’t stop these constant work battles. “Let me finish my inspection. Then you can yell at each other with better ammunition.”
Lauren sighed. “Okay, sorry. But I’m talking to John about this when he gets back.”
“Never doubted that for a minute,” Parker called over his back. He was retreating to his workstation, but didn’t look happy about it. John would likely side with Lauren on this one, which never helped their sibling rivalry. Parker and Lauren both called him John and not Dad in the shop, but family issues were family issues, no matter the setting.
Now that Parker had backed away, Lauren and I were left standing close together for no particular reason. Her arm brushed mine, leaving a trail of warmth. Moments like this were happening too often. For a long time I’d convinced myself it was totally one-sided, that it was wishful thinking on my part to ever assume she did it on purpose. But my gut said she felt something too, a magnetic connection between us that would only lead to trouble.
Not acknowledging it, letting it be this delicious mystery between us, was not good. And yet, I wasn’t about to say something. She’d deny it and make me feel like a jerk. I knew that as well as I knew she’d been wearing those same Converse shoes for three years, and only changed out the laces occasionally.
But if we couldn’t talk about it, and couldn’t do anything about it, then it was definitely time to make her go away.
“Don’t you have more evidence to gather, proving you’re better than Parker?”
She slowly shook her head at me. “I don’t get you, Clay. Sometimes you’re almost nice.”
“And that’s almost a compliment.”
“Hate you,” she muttered under her breath.
“I hated you first,” I whispered back.
She stalked off, and I went back to changing out the batteries. These short fixes for our long-term problem were not healthy. I knew it, and yet I didn’t know what else to do. It was second nature by now to be the prickly middleman.
The scissor lift performed beautifully, but I didn’t put an actual person on it until I’d tried every test I could think of first. Then I made Parker the guinea pig. He was happy to wave at Lauren from twenty feet up in the air.
She ignored him and stared at her computer. He’d won this battle. I would have been happier about it if I thought it would make any difference in their relationship. I sort of understood Parker’s inferiority complex. His mom left when he was an infant. Shortly thereafter, Lauren’s mom came along and made his dad joyously happy, and then there was a new baby. He was sandwiched in the middle between his over-achieving older brother and the sister he never wanted.
So much of it was in his head. His whole family loved him; well, as much as he’d let them. Lauren had followed us around like an eager puppy when we were kids, hoping Parker would love her half as much as she loved him. She still loved him now, it was just a lot more hidden these days.
He just couldn’t appreciate what he had, no matter what they did, and if I picked Lauren over him, it might push him over the edge. I hated that I had to choose at all.
The scissor lift hadn’t come with any paperwork, so I jotted down the specs for Lauren.
Evan’s cheery whistle echoed through the warehouse, along with the signature jingling of the keys he kept on his belt. “Morning, everyone. Lauren, good to see you again.”
Lauren’s head shot up, and she pasted on a smile sprinkled with a good helping of anxiety. “Morning, Evan. Don’t forget to log your hours on the Komatsu fork lift.”
“Will do. Will do.” He whistled a tune, something Lauren obviously recognized, based on the way she began fidgeting.
I looked between the two of them, trying to figure out what was going on. Knowing Evan, I wouldn’t have to wait long. The guy never shut up.
He set down his coffee cup and rubbed his hands together, looking around. “I saw Lauren at Rooster’s last night. She’s got a new boy toy,” he announced to the group at large.
Herbert smiled before going out for a cigarette break. The man loved gossip, but he loved his nicotine more. John made him smoke on the driveway at the back entrance. Half the time he ate his lunch out there too.
“Congratulations.” I approached Lauren’s desk and opened up the laptop where we logged repairs.
She could have skewered me with a thousand lasers with the glare she gave me in return. It was a come-hither look as far as my hormones were concerned, but I was used to ignoring those.
She gritted her teeth. “Don’t start, Clay.”
I held my hands up in surrender. “I’m sure this guy’s the one. There’s no reason to get all defensive about it.”
I couldn’t even say it with a straight face. She had every reason to keep her boyfriends a secret from me. I had become an expert over the years in picking them apart, piece by tiny, annoying piece. Not that I could take all the credit. I didn’t choose the guys, and I certainly didn’t make her break up with them. That was on her. All I did was open up a window of doubt, and she did the rest.
It kept her single, and it kept her hating me. Win-win. Or lose-lose. Sometimes I really despised this game we played.
“Has John met him yet?” I asked.
“Nope.” She practically ripped a paper out of the printer and held it out to me half crumpled. “We have someone interested in the Caterpillar 420. They’re coming in a half-hour. Make sure it’s clean and that Herbert didn’t leave any sunflower seed shells in it from when he was working on it, and make sure the hours match what’s on here, and take the keys up front.” She must have realized how bossy she sounded because she put on what sort of could be considered a smile and added, “Please?”
“As you wish.” The words were out of my mouth before I could rethink them.
Lauren’s face froze for a second, and then she raised an eyebrow. “Don’t try to butter me up, Clay.”
I grinned, taking the paper from her. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
She reached out and gripped my forearm before I could walk away. “You won’t say anything to John, will you?”
“About the boy toy?” I concentrated on keeping my voice even. The last thing I needed was my voice to crack, or worse, get all breathy with excitement over her touching me.
“I know he’ll hear about it anyway, but just…” She released my arm, muttering to herself. “It’s hopeless. Evan will tell him the second he sees him.”
“I won’t say anything to your dad.” It was all I could promise her. I couldn’t get in the middle of every fight in the Harwood household, especially the ones that involved my boss.
She waved me off, and I went to get the equipment ready, putting my focus on the job where it belonged.
Evan was too busy doing maintenance tasks on our truck fleet to say a word to anybody about anything, and I was relieved. Until John came over and hovered while I replaced the worn out track pads on a mini excavator.
John was never one for idle chitchat. Whatever he had to say, he always came out and said it point-blank. But I still almost drilled one of the bolts into my hand when he opened with, “I want you to break up Lauren and this new boyfriend of hers if things start to get serious.”
“And why would you think I’m qualified to do that?” I concentrated on keeping my response casual. This felt like a kick in the pants from Karma, one I should have seen coming.
I tightened the last bolt, and John picked up the worn-out pad I’d taken off, turning it over in his hands. “You’ve always been like a protective older brother to her. It’s no secret Lauren listens when you make fun of whoever she’s dating. And you and I both know she’s too young to date anyone seriously. Not anyone good enough for her, anyway.”
Lauren had just turned twenty-three. How was I, at twenty-five, so much more mature and wise? John never asked who I dated or why. When would Lauren be old enough in his eyes to have a serious relationship? When she was thirty? Forty-five? After he wasn’t around to see it? John was a helicopter parent, but this was taking it to a whole new level.
“I’m going to have Lauren bring him to lunch Sunday at our house. Make sure you’re there, too, so you can meet him.”
I considered declining, but John would insist, even if I had an excuse ready, which I didn’t. So, I nodded, focused on my work, and reasoned I could untangle myself from this trap later. But even after John left, I couldn’t relax. The more I thought about it, the worse I felt.
John was an observer. Somewhere along the line, he’d caught wind of what I did to Lauren’s boyfriends, and now he wanted to mold my gift for his own purposes. I felt exposed. My messed-up relationship with Lauren was a private battle I waged in my head and my heart where no one could see it. Or so I’d thought. Now it belonged to my boss. This wouldn’t end with her current boy toy. That much I knew.