"Alex!"
Shit! What's he doing here? He's supposed to be in a meeting!
He grabs me by my collar and pulls me up, the brush in my hand dripping maroon paint onto the gravel driveway. "Just what do you think you're doing, young lady?"
I stare at the ground. What am I supposed to say? "Matt-I-mean-Dean, well, tomorrow's homecoming and we knew you were picking some people up at the airport and driving in the parade and we thought that your Jeep should show some school spirit..." Yeah, that would fly like a lead balloon.
"You what?"
"What?" Had I said that aloud? Damn!
Still holding my shirt, he steps back (dragging me with him) and surveys his Grand Cherokee. It's patriot blue, closely matching the navy mountains in Blue Ridge's crest and school colors. The body is untouched. I'd never harm the paint job. But the tires and wheels...
"It's water soluble paint!" Well, I had to say something!
The other part of the crest is a single dogwood flower, placed against the backdrop of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The Jeep matches the mountains, so we'd reasoned that the tires should look like dogwood blooms. That had been the theory, anyway. It sounded like a good idea at the time...
I'm not much of an artist, but the paint job wasn't half bad. The wheels were now white, along with the inside of the tires up to the whitewall. The lug nuts were a brilliant yellow, like the center of the dogwood flower. Outside of the whitewall was maroon, a little lighter than our school color, but we wanted it to show up. I was finishing the last tire when he arrived.
"Why you? And who is ‘we'?"
Uh oh. How do I explain? They bet me I wouldn't have the nerve to actually do it, and you know how I am on a dare. And there is no way I'm ratting out my friends! "Um..." Well, that was an intelligent answer.
He drags me over to the front stairs. Sitting on one step, he looks at me, then at my jeans. Taking the brush from my hand, he points to the ground.
Shit! I bet everyone is watching! I lower my jeans and panties and he pulls me across his lap, raising my t-shirt and settling me into position. Ironically, the tire I was working on is now two feet from my face.
"Water soluble, huh?"
"Yes, Sir."
I feel something cold and wet touch my lower back.
"Let's see if we can get a color match."
With maroon?
He sets down the brush and starts. No warmup today, his hand moves fast and furious. Tears quickly come to my eyes and I'm sobbing by the time he stops.
"Hrm, not quite."
He starts again as I kick and cry.
"Owww!!! No!!!!"
Again he stops. "Close enough, Slick." He stands me up and wipes my tears as I pull up my pants. Then he hands me the brush. "Finish up. I've got to get back to my meeting."