Work Text:
That Monday morning, James Morgan McGill opened his brother’s front door and to a monstrous sight.
“Chuck--Chuck come look at this someone fucking tagged my car.”
In dark spray paint, the words “DOWN WITH CIS” were scrawled on the driver’s side of his Suzuki Esteem. Jimmy gave a small chuckle of amusement.
“Jimmy, you can’t go to work with that on your car.”
“Ah, c’mon Chuck, I’ll parade it around for a day and get it cleaned up in the shop in the afternoon.”
Jimmy scurried across the lawn, grabbed his phone from the mailbox, and zoomed off before Chuck could make another comment.
Three collisions were reported on the main highway to the Albuquerque courthouse. Police tracked the disturbance to one defaced Esteem.
By the early afternoon Jimmy had defended two clients charged with public indecency and one of suspected arson. Overall, not a noteworthy day.
When Jimmy pulled out of the parking garage, he purposefully kept his distance from Mike’s booth so he could get a first-class view of Jimmy’s upgraded ride. He had to get out of the car and walk over to Mike to hand in his ticket.
Mike gave his signature unimpressed stare. “You’re light on stickers.”
Jimmy ignored Mike and gestured toward his vandalized car.
“Down with Cis, eh?” he crowed. “Really something, isn’t it?”
“Either you pay the three dollars, or you go back inside and get an additional sticker,” Mike grunted, giving no acknowledgement of Jimmy’s car.
Jimmy swiped back his ticket and almost hit the car behind him as he swerved back to the courthouse.
He pulled up into the parking lot of the HHM firm, which was a fifteen minute drive from the courthouse. Straightening his tie, he got out of the vehicle. Normally he would dread this meeting, but something about the state of his car raised his esteem.
Jimmy cursed when he saw Howard jog in his direction. It was no use hiding; his car stuck out among the higher-end vehicles of the HHM employees.
“Jimmy, is that you?”
“Hey, Howard,” Jimmy grimaced.
“I almost forgot something in my car,” he explained. “Cheryl got Debbie an aloe for her birthday. You should come up. There’s still some cake.”
He took notice of the messaging on Jimmy’s car.
“Sayy… ‘Down with Cis’... You know, I've been doing my own research on gender normality and deviances. Normally I couldn’t be bothered to delve into a topic like this but one of Cheryl’s old classmates…”
At this point, Jimmy had long given up on asking about his job opportunity. He needed to get the hell out of there.
“...really fascinating, the transgender community. It really is brave of you to make such a daring stance like this, Jimmy, I have to applaud yo-”
“Shut up, Howard.”
And Howard was left in the dust on the sidewalk as Jimmy pulled out the lot.
.
.
.
“Jimmy, I thought you said you were going to get that filth cleaned off,” Chuck complained.
“They weren’t open today. Anyways I got you some more ice.”
The two recounted their day to each other. Jimmy told Chuck about his work at the courthouse, leaving out the parts Chuck didn’t need to know about, like the early morning accidents or his meeting with Howard. Chuck described his harrowing journey to retrieve a newspaper from the neighbor’s driveway. At this time there was a small knock on the door.
“Jimmy! I, ah, see you got a new paint job for the Esteem, "chirped Kim.
“Come on in, have a seat,” the man gestured, “Mi casa es su casa!
“Unless...you want a joyride in the ol’ beater,” he grinned.
The woman grinned back and the two flew off into the night.