Doyle Mathews feet hung out from beneath an old Firebird. It was the very car his dad drove once upon a time. There were still some old crushed Milwaukee's Best beer cans littering the worn back floorboard. Mitch Mathews had been a drunk. The careless and violent kind. The man had bit the big one a long time ago, and Doyle nor his mother couldn't muster up many tears at his loss. What they really lost was slamming doors, loud voices, and many, many punches. Some may say they were lucky he got shit-faced and fell in the river.

Doyle would never tell how he let him fall. It was his secret, and his alone. All they knew was that Mitch had forced Doyle on a fishing trip. They went out on the fishing boat, and Mitch had made Doyle drink. He had made fun when Doyle vomited over the side of the boat, into the water, then he'd beat him up for being a pansy and scaring away the fish, as he put it. When Mitch stood up, looming over Doyle and his bloody nose, Mitch lost his balance and toppled over.

He was too sloshed to swim. Doyle watched, afraid, as he struggled and sputtered. Then he sank into the water, with bits of Doyle's upchuck floating in a great circle around him.

That was a long time ago. Doyle was seventeen now, not eleven. He never went fishing again.

Underneath the Firebird, with number thirty one burning bright on his face, he banged and tinkered away. He wasn't very good with mechanics, but he didn't have the money to t it in a garage. Not if he and his mother wanted to eat that week. He'd spent days in there, trying to get that hunk of junk running. Marla Mathews had made a habit of bringing him snacks and drinks out there to tide him over. So he didn't think twice when he heard someone come in.

"Ma? Is that you?" he asked. "You're home early."

Hayden looked down at the bottom of his boots, with mud in the treads. She cocked her head at his words, but didn't bother saying anything. She was letting the uneasiness of not receiving an answer sink into him.

"Hey, hand me the socket wrench, would ya?" he said, unmoved.

Hayden peered into the tool kit near her cracked feet and selected one. It burned red-hot where she touched it. She gave it to the hand reaching out from beneath the black car.

"Th-ouch!" It clanked to the concrete garage floor. The noise vibrated and filled the room. "What the? That burned!"

"It did?" said Hayden. Her voice overlapped, like a whole choir had spoken at once.

Doyle froze. "Who's there?" he demanded.

"Nobody." "Everyone." "Dad." The voices all said at once. "Hi, Doy-boy. Good to see you working on the Bird."

"Cut it out, it's not funny!" Doyle said angrily, but he didn't come out.

"She'll fly when you get her running, just wait and see." Hayden said in the mechanical voice of Doyle's father.

"I said stop!"

Doyle laid under the car, shivering violently. Could his dad really be here? Impossible. He watched! Stayed there until the drunk had stopped splashing and laid still in the water. There was no way that man could be in here now.

"You getting uppity with me, son?" the voice said angrily, the echoed voice rising.

Doyle's black boot was thumping against the floor as his nerves took over completely. Could he be here? They never found a body. Couldn't Mitch have managed to swim away under the water and make it to some shore? No. Impossible. He wouldn't wait six years to come after Doyle for leaving him to die.

"Shit," Doyle muttered. "Shit, I'm hearing things."

"Get out here and face your father!"

A hot hand snatched his ankle and pulled with the force of a crane. Doyle screamed and latched onto the drive shaft underneath the car. His hands were greasy; he slipped. Out he came. Mitch was staring him right in the face. Doyle felt a ball of fear in his throat. He couldn't swallow or speak around it.

Mitch was dripping, soaked through with the water that he died in. His clothes were the same ones Doyle remembered him wearing that night. An old AC/DC shirt and a pair of bleached jeans with a hole in the knee. They were molded with damp age, and a crab was coming out of the hole in the jeans, hanging onto the fabric with its claw. Mitch's skin had holes ate out by fish, and what wasn't open to expose bone was spotted with some blackish mold. He opened his mouth and water spewed out as he spoke.

"You've grown up," he said. "You're about the age I was when I met your lazy, good-for-nothing mother. How about you? Had any dates lately, Doy-boy?"

Doyle mouth moved, but nothing came out. He looked like the painting by Edvard Munch, The Scream, with his mouth in a giant O and his eyes terror-wide.

"I haven't. I've been dead!" shouted Mitch.

Doyle felt something warm seep into his jeans. It was such a shock to see Mitch that Doyle had almost shut down and blacked out. The sensation made him suddenly aware of his body. Mitch was blocking the exit. Doyle instinctively crawled back under the car for cover.

Roaring laughter filled the room. Mitch's laughter, Hayden's laughter, and laughter from who knows where.

"Time to learn a lesson," Hayden said, using Mitch's voice, because it seemed to scare Doyle the worst. Scaring Doyle had got her magma veins flowing like wild, an exhilarating sensation. She placed a hand on the hood and pushed. The tires groaned and then popped. Doyle screamed as the car came down on him, crushing him.

Hayden breathed in deep. When she breathed out, it came in a cloud of smoke. Another one down. Blood seeped out from under the broken car and made a trail into her feet, where she absorbed it just like she did before.

They'd find him later, and wonder what had fallen on the hood to make it dent so deeply. Something heavy enough to bust all the tires. It was his guilt. Hayden felt a small sense of justice as she disappeared. On to her next lesson.