Trin by JM Snyder

Chapter 1-4

The evening sun slants into the garage, casting the chrome and steel in a golden glow. As Gerrick hefts a travel pack from the bed of his truck, he laughs at something one of the other gunners says. The crowd that followed the men through the outposts now jostles around the bay doors but Aissa won’t let them into the garage. They stand at the shadow’s edge and call out to the gunners, laugh, shriek, cry, anything to get the men’s attentions.

Each time someone shouts Gerrick’s name, Trin feels a tiny jolt in his chest that sends his blood racing. He wants to be lost in the people, obscured by anonymity, free to scream out for the gunner, too. Aissa’s voice rings through his mind, Don’t you think he knows? Trin doesn’t dare dwell on that.

Gerrick tosses the pack to the other gunner, then starts to unstrap the hides stretched over his truck. From where he stands, Trin watches the flow of muscle beneath Gerrick’s shirt, faded chambray bleached almost white in the sun. Each time he moves, sand trickles out from the folds of his jeans, and he shakes more from his hair, dusts dirt off the hides. When he looks up, his eyes fill with the dying sunlight and flash in a way that reminds Trin of a cougar’s cry. Over the sound of the bay doors sliding shut, the gunner asks, “Who’s the mech here?”

For a moment no one answers. Beyond the doors, the crowd is muted like the sough of sand blowing against shuttered windows, and Trin is all too aware of the quiet sounds inside the garage, the low talk between the gunners, the jingle of buckles as packs are shouldered, the click of boot heels on the concrete floor.

Gerrick’s gaze slides over Trin like he’s not even there, finding Aissa instead. “You the mech? I blew out my shocks on the last run, and I think the carb’s got a leak. You’ll take a look?”

“Trin will.” As she passes by where Trin stands, she snags his arm and drags him after her. When Gerrick looks at him, he almost forgets to keep walking. Those eyes are much lighter than he remembered. “He’s the mech here. You say the shocks are gone?”

Studying Trin, Gerrick says, “Damn thing rides like a wild bronc.” His lips curve into a slow, sly smile, and one eyebrow rises suggestively. “It’s hard to aim straight when the road’s bucking beneath you. That might be fine for the pallet but not out in the wastes. What’s your name again, boy? I didn’t catch it.”

“Trin,” Aissa replies. She leans back against Gerrick’s truck, props her elbows up on the rails of the bed behind her and gives Trin an amused smirk that he wants to smack from her face. “You just don’t know—”

Gerrick raises a hand to silence her. “So this is your garage, huh?” he asks Trin.

Aissa nods. “He’s the only mech here. His brother—”

Irritation flickers across Gerrick’s chiseled features and annoyance creeps into his voice. “Can’t he answer himself? He’s not mute, is he?”

Trin’s face flashes with bright heat. “I can talk just fine,” he says, sudden anger and embarrassment prompting him to speak.

Gerrick’s eyes soften as he smiles, turning away from Aissa to give Trin his full attention. When he lowers his head, a strand of sand-colored hair falls across his brow and he looks impossibly young. “So you’re the mech,” he drawls. His gaze trails down over Trin’s chest, his stomach, his crotch, as palpable as a hand caressing his skin. With a small grunt, he adds, “You want to take a look under my hood?”

Behind him, Aissa murmurs, “Do you even have to ask?”

Trin wants to disappear. Fall through the grate in the floor, evaporate in the heat, burst into flames, anything to get out from under Gerrick’s scrutiny. Don’t you think he knows, isn’t that what Aissa said? That Trin thinks about him. That he asks about him. That he’s dreamed about this moment, finally talking to him, finally meeting him, he’s gotten off on it before.

He’s imagined getting lost in Gerrick’s eyes, and stroking his fingers through that dusty hair, and feeling those lips on his body. He knows just how Gerrick’s moustache would tickle when they kissed. He knows what those hands would feel like holding his. Just standing here so close to the gunner has Trin flushed and hard as stone. And from the way Gerrick smiles faintly, his gaze straying from Trin’s face as if he stands naked before him, oh sweet Mary above, it’s so obvious he knows.