Dark!Laundry!fic!! Continued
Part 1 is here.
Part 2 is here.
The background is here.
The poll at the end of Part 2 wasn't close at all!
Part 3
positive signs
Now, don’t get me wrong. I like doin’ stuff for people. I’ve been doin’ that kinda thing for as long as I can remember, and I wouldn’t keep it up if I didn’t like it. I like the fact that I can do it. Usually it’s satisfying, sometimes it’s fun, and for the last several years it’s been pretty good as a lifestyle. The hours aren’t bad and the perks can be great.
What is not fun is bein’ asked to do stuff that just plain won’t work. I’m not big on hopeless causes. Or crazy schemes, either - although, yeah, some people might claim that most of my own ideas are crazy, and maybe they’d be right, in a way, except I’ve got a pretty good track record of getting crazy schemes to work. That oughta count for something. It’s the reason I’m still alive, after all.
And I really don’t like bein’ whined at when I’ve already said no. I suppose that if Jack ever listened to people saying ‘no’, he’d never get anywhere . . . but he hasn’t exactly gotten anywhere so far anyway.
MacGyver’s mood improved as he drove. He knew LA well enough to find enough back and side streets that he could mostly avoid the worst of the traffic, especially on days like today, when he didn’t have to go anywhere in particular. The sun was warm but not fierce, and with the top down on the Jeep, the wind blowing through his hair seemed to blow the crankiness away.
He thought he’d been driving at random, but somehow he wasn’t surprised when he found himself crossing Chavez Avenue. On both sides of the street, the signs on the shops were now all bright red and yellow splashes of Chinese characters, with smaller English text underneath, often misspelled. Mac wondered for an irreverent moment if any of the Chinese signs were also misspelled, and what they might accidently say if they were.
MacGyver loved Chinatown. He had a lot of friends here, and he seemed to pick up a few more with every visit. When you did favors for folks here, they remembered, and returned the favor when you needed it, often with interest. It was a good place to have friends.
It was also a good place to find a laundromat, since there seemed to be almost as many laundromats in Chinatown as there were lawyers’ offices in the corporate zone of LA or fly-by-night talent agencies on the fringes of Hollywood. Mac pulled up in front of one that had an especially cheerful sign, in both red and yellow, and an empty parking place out in front. Auspicious on all counts.
Inside, most of the customers and all of the staff were Chinese. At the counter, a pretty girl with a waterfall of dark hair changed his singles for a little paper cup of quarters, and gave him a radiant smile in the bargain when Mac thanked her in his execrable Mandarin. An old woman, her face seamed with deep furrows, popped out from an inner room, examined MacGyver with the critical eye of a professional horse-trader, and delivered a torrent of Chinese that made the girl blush. Mac found himself blushing as well, and retreated behind the first row of washing machines.
In the relative safety there, he dumped out his dufflebag and eyed the unpromising contents. He usually just shoved stuff into the machines at random, but the last time he’d done that, one of his flowered shirts had bled multicolored streaks onto every white T-shirt he owned, and he’d had to give them all away to a buddy who ran a tie-dye shirt stand on the beach. The funny thing was that the flowered shirt didn’t seem to be any less bright after all that, which meant it probably had more ammo in reserve.
Poll Yes, indeed! We have ticky boxes! Choose as many as you like.
ETA: Part 4 is FINALLY here.
Part 2 is here.
The background is here.
The poll at the end of Part 2 wasn't close at all!
Part 3
positive signs
Now, don’t get me wrong. I like doin’ stuff for people. I’ve been doin’ that kinda thing for as long as I can remember, and I wouldn’t keep it up if I didn’t like it. I like the fact that I can do it. Usually it’s satisfying, sometimes it’s fun, and for the last several years it’s been pretty good as a lifestyle. The hours aren’t bad and the perks can be great.
What is not fun is bein’ asked to do stuff that just plain won’t work. I’m not big on hopeless causes. Or crazy schemes, either - although, yeah, some people might claim that most of my own ideas are crazy, and maybe they’d be right, in a way, except I’ve got a pretty good track record of getting crazy schemes to work. That oughta count for something. It’s the reason I’m still alive, after all.
And I really don’t like bein’ whined at when I’ve already said no. I suppose that if Jack ever listened to people saying ‘no’, he’d never get anywhere . . . but he hasn’t exactly gotten anywhere so far anyway.
MacGyver’s mood improved as he drove. He knew LA well enough to find enough back and side streets that he could mostly avoid the worst of the traffic, especially on days like today, when he didn’t have to go anywhere in particular. The sun was warm but not fierce, and with the top down on the Jeep, the wind blowing through his hair seemed to blow the crankiness away.
He thought he’d been driving at random, but somehow he wasn’t surprised when he found himself crossing Chavez Avenue. On both sides of the street, the signs on the shops were now all bright red and yellow splashes of Chinese characters, with smaller English text underneath, often misspelled. Mac wondered for an irreverent moment if any of the Chinese signs were also misspelled, and what they might accidently say if they were.
MacGyver loved Chinatown. He had a lot of friends here, and he seemed to pick up a few more with every visit. When you did favors for folks here, they remembered, and returned the favor when you needed it, often with interest. It was a good place to have friends.
It was also a good place to find a laundromat, since there seemed to be almost as many laundromats in Chinatown as there were lawyers’ offices in the corporate zone of LA or fly-by-night talent agencies on the fringes of Hollywood. Mac pulled up in front of one that had an especially cheerful sign, in both red and yellow, and an empty parking place out in front. Auspicious on all counts.
Inside, most of the customers and all of the staff were Chinese. At the counter, a pretty girl with a waterfall of dark hair changed his singles for a little paper cup of quarters, and gave him a radiant smile in the bargain when Mac thanked her in his execrable Mandarin. An old woman, her face seamed with deep furrows, popped out from an inner room, examined MacGyver with the critical eye of a professional horse-trader, and delivered a torrent of Chinese that made the girl blush. Mac found himself blushing as well, and retreated behind the first row of washing machines.
In the relative safety there, he dumped out his dufflebag and eyed the unpromising contents. He usually just shoved stuff into the machines at random, but the last time he’d done that, one of his flowered shirts had bled multicolored streaks onto every white T-shirt he owned, and he’d had to give them all away to a buddy who ran a tie-dye shirt stand on the beach. The funny thing was that the flowered shirt didn’t seem to be any less bright after all that, which meant it probably had more ammo in reserve.
Poll Yes, indeed! We have ticky boxes! Choose as many as you like.
ETA: Part 4 is FINALLY here.