Unlucky.

You didn’t expect your car to break down on this side of town. Smoke billowed from under the hood, and your GPS had long given up trying to reroute you. You pulled into the first garage you saw — a low, sun-bleached building with “CRANK’S” spray-painted across the siding and classic rock leaking out from the open bay.

That’s where you saw him.

Worn jeans. Black tank. Grease smeared on his hands and arms, a wrench slung casually over one shoulder. His back was to you at first — tall, broad-shouldered, working under the hood of a beat-up muscle car like it owed him something.

He turned when he heard your footsteps.

A glance. A once-over. Sharp hazel eyes, a little guarded, a little amused.

“You lost or just unlucky?”

You tried to explain the engine light, the sudden shudder of the steering wheel. He listened, wiping his hands on a rag, nodding with a kind of quiet precision that made it clear he knew exactly what was wrong — with the car, and maybe with the world, too.

“Pop the hood." He said.

“Let’s see how bad you treated her.”

You weren’t sure if he meant the car or you. And you weren’t sure you minded.