GB96 s2 - Stef Part 1

Stef isn’t the same. No one would be after the trauma of the arrest and a night in jail, only to learn that the reason no one came to pick her up is because her only family member is dead. You would have preferred her to become a wailing, tearful mess. Instead, you get a strangely flat zombie Stef that worries you. You don’t know how to handle Stef, let alone your own grief. Mr. Gibson was a well-liked man.

What happened before is in the past and not important. Stef isn’t any more interested in comfort from that blonde than she is from you. She just wants to be alone, but she can’t be. She’s an adult and she’s inheriting a business and at least a few small assets.

The funeral goes as well as it can. Stef doesn’t cry or say anything; your mom and one of Mr. Gibson’s close friends handle most of the grownup stuff. You say a few words about how great a boss he was and how he was always there for Stef. You cry quite a bit.

Ellen doesn’t attend.

Although it’s hardly at the top of your list of concerns, you absorb through the grapevine that Nadia won’t speak to Ellen. It makes sense. Nadia is a good girl who is going places; she can’t be hanging around people who are getting arrested. Her affair with Ellen is over. As you predicted, things were lopsided. Nadia liked a drama-free penis. Ellen was in love.

Ellen blames you and Stef. You haven’t seen her or spoken to her since that night. And you don’t care. She was your friend, but not your best friend.

However pissed you were at Stef, you aren’t anymore. You can’t be. Besides, you should only be angry with yourself. Getting romantically attached to her was stupid. Expecting her to be a mature adult was as well. You should’ve known better. Stef didn’t betray you. You set her up to fail.

Now she needs you, even if she doesn’t realize it. The thing with Jessica is forgotten.

You find Stef at the garage, which is temporarily closed. She hasn’t decided if she wants to try to keep running itself or sell the business. You and your mother think that she pretty much has to sell, but it’s not time to bring that up yet. Stef is a good mechanic for an eighteen-year-old, but she’s not the real thing. And even if your help, running this business… it’s not something that two high-school graduates can do. Besides, you don’t want to spend the next several years in this sweaty little shop.

The garage doors are all open. A radio plays.

Stef is inside, beside her motorcycle, sitting at a card table in a folding chair with an open beer. There’s a cloth spread on the table and some kind of kit as well as two boxes of bullets. Two handguns lie on the cloth. It looks like she’s been cleaning and oiling them.