[closed: davin, dated for 5/16]

[doublethepain]

It's with a promise that he won't let anyone do any 'souping up' of the Jetta that Spencer manages to sneak a kiss to Joel's cheek before laughing his way out of Crossroads. His husband had balked at the idea that his car might need any sort of tuning he hasn't been able to do on his own in the years he's owned it, but Spencer had gently reminded him that Davin is the actual expert when it comes to cars so it's not as if their friend's offer to look it over could possibly hurt. Besides, it wouldn't do to find the car in need of some dire fix the day they're due to take the baby home, so to Oceanside he will go.

The car does, as Joel always says, run impressively smoothly for as old as it is, and Spencer arrives at the auto repair shop without so much as a squeaky window just before noon. He smiles through the windshield when Davin waves him into one of the carports, and he notes that there doesn't seem to be much activity going on for a Saturday afternoon as he steps out of the car with an awkward wave.

"Thank you again," he says, which possibly isn't best greeting he could have mustered up, but the words had been at the tip of his tongue all the same. He still hasn't been able to get past just how many people had shown up for the baby shower and left so many gifts. He knows that neither he nor Joel had expected such an extravagant outpouring of support at a party they'd been resistant to from the beginning but as it turns out, he'll be worrying about carpal tunnel very soon with all the thank you notes he'll be working on in the next few weeks preceding the baby's birth.

"Oh," he adds, rolling his eyes fondly, "my husband says the same and also that he doesn't want me to bring the car home with any fancy modification so if you could refrain from painting flames on the sides, it would be greatly appreciated."

Comments

[davin]

"Aw damn. I guess I'll put away the hella sick spoiler an' spinnin' rims I ordered," Davin replies sarcastically, rolling his eyes in fond exasperation. "It's just a tune up. He can unclench."

He wipes his hands on a clean rag and then nods at Jason and Auryn as they head out for the night. "I'm tryin' this new thing where we're by appointment only on Saturdays afternoons. Keeps things from gettin' too insane an' actually gives me time t'do shit on Saturday nights, so it's workin' out."

Davin is finally getting used to just how successfully the shop is running under his leadership. If there's one thing he's confident in, it's his abilities as a mechanic. He's the most popular and capable mechanic in the city, and there's nothing he's more proud of. It may not be much, but he worked hard for it, and it makes him happy.

"You're my last one for today," Davin tells him, reaching out to snag the keys to the Jetta. He leans in to start it and pops the hood, coming around to get a look at everything as it runs. "To Joel's credit, this beast is in great shape. I'll just give it a good inspection an' a thorough high mileage tune up an' it should be good t'go, unless I find anythin'. Do ya wanna hang out while I do it, or come back? I have a decent coffee maker in my office, if ya wanna grab a cup."

[just_another]

To his credit, Joel waits a significant amount of time before he panics. An hour after Spencer is supposed to be back, he calls his cell and when he gets no answer, he calls Davin's. There's no answer there either and so he forces himself to wait, he literally sits on his hands in their kitchen for another thirty minutes before he tries them both again.

When he goes upstairs and tries a locator spell using one of Spencer's shirts, he's relatively calm. It isn't at all like when Mark had taken Spencer because Joel is absolutely certain that such a thing couldn't happen again and he's only doing this because he worries. He cuts his palm with his pocket knife, draws a map on the shirt and then waits, but nothing happens. The familiar little spark doesn't glow, there's nothing to indicate Spencer is anywhere in Siren Cove and Joel's leaning over the shirt, trying to see what he's done wrong when the whole thing just sort of crumples. The blood he's painted on the shirt goes black and the material curves in on itself like its been burned, but there's been no flame. And that's when Joel knows something is really wrong. That's when he panics.

By the time he reaches Davin's garage, his heart is hammering in his chest and not because he'd run the entire way. He calls both cell phones again and it's standing outside the garage door that he realizes he can hear Davin's phone ringing inside and that doesn't make a damn bit of sense.

He doesn't think. He scoops up a sizable rock from nearby and drives it into the window beside the door. Somewhere in the back of his panicked mind, he realizes he's going to have to replace that window when it turns out everyone is fine -- because everyone has to be fine -- and he almost laughs out loud. He'll leave Davin a note, an IOU scrawled on a piece of paper so he doesn't have to stop looking for them.

The window shatters and he sticks his arm through the hole to unlock the door, scraping his hand against the shards of glass in the process. And inside it's empty. There's no one here. Joel searches the front room easily, then moves onto the garage and the second he sees his car he knows this is a crime scene, but that doesn't stop him from walking toward it. Toward what is clearly blood. For a second he feels like he's going to collapse, but he keeps going, moving until he finds Davin's cell phone and he scrolls through the contacts until he can find the number for James Thorton. They don't know each other at all, the only thing Joel knows about him is that he and Davin are together, but he doesn't hesitate to call him.

The call is brief, Joel tells him something to wrong, to get to the garage, people are missing, and then he ends the call and leans heavily against the wall and wills himself not to cry. To do something.

But there's nothing left for him to do.