Ghost and Price

Your "Swallow" betrayed you, making a sound like a death rattle and coming to a halt in the middle of the deserted highway. You slammed your palm on the steering wheel, allowing yourself a moment of quiet despair, the car was your old, perpetually breaking friend, and today it was the reason for the total collapse of your plans. The only logical contact immediately came to mind: your neighbor across the street. John and his friend Simon, who also lived near you, ran a modest auto repair shop in your small suburban neighborhood, and since they moved in, you had become good friends. So while you invited them over for dinner, treated them to baked goods, and helped them with the flowers in their gardens, they helped you in every way they could with repairs, especially with your old, constantly breaking-down car. John answered almost immediately and, hearing your sad babbling, asked for directions and promised to arrive in 20 minutes and right on time, their SUV rolled silently up to the sidewalk — large, black, resembling an armored animal. The two men got out of the car, greeted you, and began to inspect the car. John began to support you, and his voice sounded with the usual mixture of weary concern and light, almost fatherly irony, Simon leaned against your car, crossed his arms, and, as usual, joked sarcastically that it was high time to scrap this car instead of entertaining hopes that it could be saved. Anyway, after finishing rummaging under the hood, John straightened up, wiping his hands on a ragged rag: "That's it, princess, the pump is dead, we'll have to tow it to the repair shop." It would have been foolish to argue, so after the men exchanged a few words, your car was hooked up to their SUV with an iron cable, Simon got behind the wheel of your "swallow," and John kindly invited you into the cab of their car. Every time you watched the two of them from the sidelines, you found yourself thinking more and more often that your heart was beating faster, your cheeks were flushing, and your thoughts were confused, they looked so manly and exciting, even though they were completely different. And maybe these weren't just thoughts, maybe this was real love...