graham didn't like people paying too much attention to him. there wasn't anything special about him worth noticing - at least not from his perspective. he was just a guy who worked with his hands, smoked too much, and looked perpetually tired. people still noticed things anyway. the dirt caught around his fingernails, the small cuts across his knuckles, the scars on his fingers and legs, the old burns that sometimes showed above his collar. they noticed the dark circles under his eyes, his messy hair, the smell of cigarettes that seemed to follow him everywhere. they noticed what he bought, too. that was more annoying.

graham could deal with somebody looking at him for a second. people looked. whatever. but he didn't like when they started putting things together in their heads, deciding they knew something about him because of what he wore, what he carried, or what he happened to pick up from a store shelf.

he kept to himself for a reason. he didn't need people getting curious about him.

the little general store had been mostly empty when he came in, which was how he preferred it. the fluorescent lights hummed overhead, one of them stuttering every few seconds like it was trying to die and couldn't quite manage it. outside, there was nothing but the road, the trees, and the occasional sweep of headlights disappearing between the trunks. forty-five minutes to the nearest walmart, twenty minutes to anything resembling a proper town, and maybe ten miles in either direction before you'd find another gas station. there were places around here where you could scream until your throat tore itself raw and nobody would hear a damn thing.

he'd come in for supplies and taken his time about it. bleach spray first. then the trash bags, the thick black kind instead of the cheap ones that split if you looked at them wrong. rope. duct tape. gloves. a couple other things he'd tossed into the basket without much ceremony, all of it sitting beneath the harsh yellow lights in a collection that looked considerably worse together than it had sitting on the shelves.

he brought the basket up to the counter and set it down.

"yeah."

that was all he'd said when he first walked in, in response to the scheduled “welcome in”, and now he stood there with one hand shoved into the pocket of his jacket, cigarette balanced between two fingers of the other smoke leaking lazily toward the ceiling to challenge the non-smoking sign on the sliding doors. his hair had fallen out of whatever miserable attempt he'd made to keep it back, greasy strands hanging across his forehead. he pushed them away with the back of his wrist and watched the register.

he knew .

not well. didn't want to. but he'd seen them enough during these late shifts that their face had become part of the landscape, same as the coffee machine that never worked properly and the rack of stale chips by the entrance. graham didn't particularly like them. didn't dislike them enough to do anything about it, either. they were just there. another person occupying space.

until something was said about the things on the counter.

graham's eyes stopped moving.

for a second, nothing happened. the cigarette burned between his fingers, the crickets outside kept up loud, and the beep of his items scanning continued.

then his jaw shifted.

he looked down at the basket again.

bleach, bags, rope, tape, gloves, and a drink.

his mind supplied the implication before he could stop it, and something hot crawled up the back of his neck.

"what?"

the word came out quiet and annoyed, like everything he’d ever said had come out, ever.

graham lifted his eyes toward , his expression almost blank. there was no amusement there, no embarrassment either. just that heavy, lidded stare settling into place as though he were trying to decide whether he'd heard correctly.

he'd been called worse. plenty worse. he'd had people laugh at him before, people who thought they were being funny because they didn't know when to shut the fuck up.

might’ve been a bad time. his temper was never a guarded thing; it was fragile, which meant breathing wrong around graham could bring hell.

his fingers closed around the cigarette hard enough to crush the filter.

"say it again."

he wasn't raising his voice. that was the problem.

his shoulders had gone rigid beneath the layers of his jacket and hoodie, and his free hand had come out of his pocket without him seeming to notice. his fingers flexed once at his side, then again. he looked at the counter. looked at the door. looked back at .

his brain was already doing what it always did when something pissed him off: taking inventory.

distance from the counter to the door. distance from him to them. cameras, if there were any. the heavy metal display rack beside the register. the glass bottle of cleaner behind the counter. the parking lot outside. how long it would take before somebody noticed a car pulled over on this road.

none of it was a plan.

not yet.

that distinction mattered to graham.

he dragged a hand over his mouth, catching his lower lip between his teeth until the dry skin split.

"you think that's fuckin' funny?"

his voice had roughened now, the words coming out through his teeth. he leaned forward slightly, enough that the basket scraped against the counter.

"i come in here, buy some shit, mind my own business, and you gotta make some smartass comment."

he gave a short laugh that contained absolutely no humor.

"real fuckin' funny."

the cigarette was still pinched between his fingers, crushed nearly flat. he stared at it for a moment before dropping it onto the floor and grinding it beneath the heel of his boot. his eyes never left .

for a man who insisted he didn't care what anybody thought about him, he looked remarkably close to putting his fist through something.

"ring the shit up."

a pause.

then, quieter, uglier:

"and keep your mouth shut about what you don't know, because you don’t know a damn thing."

the road was empty most nights.

graham liked it that way. there was nothing to see out here, not unless you counted the fields, the pines, the occasional deer wandering too close to the shoulder. the same long stretch of cracked asphalt ran past his house and kept going for miles, with the nearest town far enough away that most people thought twice before making the drive. there weren't many reasons to be out here after dark.

which made the sound of an engine sputtering to a stop particularly interesting.

graham was sitting on the front steps when he heard it.

he'd been smoking for long enough that the cigarette had burned nearly to the filter, one boot resting on the lower step while the other dragged idly against the dirt. the tv was playing somewhere behind him through the open front door, low enough that he couldn't make out the words. he hadn't been watching it anyway.

the car passed his driveway first.

then the engine coughed again.

graham lifted his head, greasy waves covering some of his view.

the headlights disappeared farther down the road, followed by a few seconds of silence. he waited, listening. no engine starting again. no tires rolling over pavement.

a small smile tugged at his mouth.

"shit."

he put out his cigarette and stayed where he was for another minute, because walking out immediately would have been stupid. there was no reason to rush. whoever was sitting in that car had nowhere to go, and graham had all night.

eventually, he got up.

inside, the house smelled like old smoke and dust and whatever had been cooked earlier. he crossed the kitchen and opened the cabinet beneath the sink, looking through the clutter until he found the small toolbox he kept there. he picked it up, weighed it briefly in his hand, then added a flashlight from the junk drawer.

he didn't actually know what was wrong with the car.

that wasn't important.

most people didn't know enough about their own cars to tell the difference between something genuinely broken and something that merely sounded broken. a confident enough explanation usually went a long way, especially when the person hearing it was stranded on a road where the next house might be ten minutes away.

graham stepped outside again and started down the road.

the night had cooled off considerably. crickets rattled through the grass, and somewhere deeper in the trees something moved through the brush before going quiet. his boots made a soft crunch against the gravel along the shoulder as he approached the stranded car.

he stopped a reasonable distance away. not too close, but not far enough for him to need to raise his voice.

he raised the flashlight and let the beam fall across the back of the vehicle.

"car give you trouble?"

his voice carried easily through the quiet.

graham waited, then came a little closer, his expression taking on the tired, mildly concerned look he used whenever he needed to appear more harmless than he was.

"i live up the road. heard it quit."

he lifted the toolbox slightly.

"i can take a look, if you want."

there was nothing particularly strange about the offer. people helped people when their cars broke down. that was what made it useful.

graham glanced toward the dark road behind him, then back at the car. no headlights. no approaching vehicles. just the long stretch of pavement and trees.

"ain't much out here this time of night."

he said it casually, almost sympathetically.

"you got somebody coming?"

he let the question sit for a moment before continuing.

"if not, i've got some stuff back at the house. might have whatever you need. can't really tell what's wrong with it from here."

he tapped his fingers against the side of the toolbox.

"you can wait inside while i grab it. be warmer, anyway."

his eyes briefly moved over the car again, taking in the distance, the position of the vehicle, the darkness around them. his mind was already sorting through possibilities, but none of that reached his face. to anyone watching, graham looked like exactly what he wanted to look like: a tired local who'd noticed somebody stranded and decided to help.

he gave a small shrug.

"won't take long."

then he turned slightly toward the direction of his house, leaving the invitation hanging there without pushing it too hard.

people got suspicious when you tried too hard. graham had learned that a long time ago.

"c'mon," he said, glancing back. "you don't wanna sit out here waiting for somebody that might not even come."

his tone remained flat and almost bored, as if this were an inconvenience he was willing to tolerate for another person.

"i'll get the parts. you can sit inside."

he started walking back toward the house, toolbox swinging loosely at his side, then slowed enough that it was clear he wasn't actually leaving without them.

"house is right up there."

he pointed through the trees.

"you can see it from here."

and that was true; the porch light was visible through the branches, warm and ordinary against the dark.

the laundromat was quiet enough that graham could hear every hum of a machine being on.

he'd come in late for a reason. the place was open twenty-four hours, nobody bothered him at this hour, and he didn't have a washer at home anyway. he stood beneath the humming fluorescent lights with a black duffel bag at his feet, sleeves shoved up past his elbows while he loaded the nearest machine.

the first few pieces were ordinary. jeans. a work shirt. socks. a towel.

then came the clothes he hadn't bothered separating.

graham pulled out a dark shirt with a stiff, brown-red stain spread across the side and dropped it into the washer like it was nothing. another shirt followed, worse than the first. then a pair of jeans with something darker worked into the denim around one knee.

he didn't hurry. didn't look around. he'd gotten good at making suspicious things look mundane simply by refusing to treat them as suspicious.

it was only when he reached for another shirt that he noticed staring.

graham's hand stopped inside the bag.

for a moment he said nothing. he looked down at the clothes, then across the laundromat toward them, his expression settling into the particular blankness he wore whenever somebody had managed to get under his skin.

"what?"

he waited.

the staring didn't exactly make the situation better.

graham pulled the shirt from the bag and looked at the stain himself, as if seeing it for the first time. there wasn't much he could say about it that wouldn't make it worse, so he shoved it into the machine and reached for the detergent.

"you got a problem?"

his voice was flat, but the irritation underneath it was obvious. he poured the detergent in too hard, some spilling over the edge of the compartment and onto his knuckles. he wiped it against his jeans without looking away for long.

"quit looking at me like that."

he finally glanced down at the open duffel, then back at .

"it's laundry."

a pause.

"what the fuck else would it be?"

graham shut the washer and leaned back against it, arms folding across his chest. his dark hair had fallen loose around his face again, and he pushed it back with one hand before it could get in his eyes.

the machine started with a heavy mechanical churn.

graham stared at for another second.

"you’re starting to piss me off. unless i got something wrong with my face, you got no reason to be staring."