Penny was way too excited to be near the workshop. She should have felt some amount of remorse for crashing his car to the point that its engine gave up in a cloud of smoke, Dave thought as he observed her practically jumping off the walls. Was remorse a feeling that aliens could feel?
His partner was the one who had been studying her behaviour the most since they had found her hiding in their cupboard. He would have to ask his boyfriend when they got back, right before he started their daily debate on whether or not to send her packing from their home.
As they waited for the mechanic to finish with the car, Dave felt uneasy. He was perched on the edge of the curb outside, trying to remind himself to enjoy the blue skies and sunshine, whilst also peering over his shoulder into the garage to see if he could make out his car between the towers of diagnostic tools and equipment at the front.
He was in one of his current cycles of peering over his shoulder when Penny pressed something into his hand. It was a phone. He began to ask where she had gotten it when she cut him off.
“If I lure the auto electrician near me, walking distance close, like 10 metres… you have to take a photo of us together,” she gushed with a giant smile. “I need to add it to my log book of my time on Earth!”
Dave was too stunned to speak. He missed the days when everything was simple and straightforward in Milperra. Mechanics were a regular, annual visit and no one was asking him to take a stealthy photo of them. Those were the good old days.
“I am definitely not doing that,” he said as he pushed the phone back into her hands.
A smirk crossed her face, and she looked ten years older. “Do it, or I’ll have to make sure to come back here for another chance at a photo.”
Dave grimaced but accepted defeat all the same. He couldn’t afford any more repairs after this one.