The Man in the Bay Door

Four houses down, the pavement changed from pale grey concrete to asphalt stained black with thirty years of leaked motor oil. Maya dragged her sneakers along the curb, slowing her cardboard Softail to a walking pace.

Hank stood in the open bay door of his squat brick shop. He was broad and tall, wearing a black canvas vest over a plain grey t-shirt, his forearms covered in faded blue ink. Neighborhood mothers warned their kids to stay on the sidewalk when they walked past his place. Mrs. Gable down the block said he slept in the apartment upstairs with a shotgun by his bed and never spoke to anyone on purpose.

Maya didn’t care about Mrs. Gable. She kept her eyes on the garage doorway every afternoon at four-thirty.

Her rear wheel hit a rough seam in the road. The cereal-box chain guard snapped its yellowed tape and dropped onto the asphalt with a soft, dry flap.

Maya stopped, balancing the heavy bicycle frame between her sneakers. She reached for the roll of duct tape hanging from her left handlebar, her thumb searching for the sticky edge.

A heavy boot struck the street. Hank walked out into the sunlight, his leather vest creaking as he moved. He stopped three feet away, thumbs hooked in his belt loops, squinting down at her machine.

He crouched until his knees made a dry popping sound. His thick fingers reached out, touching the edge of a Campbell’s soup can tied to her rear axle with bailing wire.

“What year?” he asked. His voice was rough, like gravel shifting in a plastic bucket.

“Ninety-eight,” Maya said.

“Model?”

“Heritage Softail Classic,” she said. She didn’t flinch or look away. “Eighty-eight cubic inch Twin Cam.”

Hank pointed a grease-stained thumb at the delivery box sitting where the fuel tank belonged. “Carb or fuel injection?”

“Mikuni forty-two millimeter carburetor,” Maya said. “Side draft. Page forty-two of the July magazine.”

Hank picked up the fallen piece of cardboard from the road. He turned it over in his large hands, checking the ragged edge where the cheap craft glue had failed under the heat of the afternoon sun.

“This guard is off an FXR frame,” he said.

“FXR guard gives more clearance,” Maya said. “The Softail cover pinched the pedal crank when I went downhill.”

The corner of Hank’s mouth twitched under his thick grey beard. It was not a smile, but the hard lines around his eyes relaxed. He handed the piece of box back to her.

“Run it,” he said.

Maya gripped her handlebars, wrapped in black electrical tape. She twisted her right wrist inward, leaned low over the cardboard fuel tank, and made her sound.

“Vrr-aah-aah-aah-aah.” She dropped her chin for the shift. “Vrrrrr.”

Hank stood up, his tall shadow falling over her handlebars and her pink helmet. He nodded twice, slow and deliberate.

“Timing’s right,” he said. “Idle’s a little high.”

He turned and walked back into his shop, his boots crunching on the loose grit near the door.

Maya taped the guard back into place with three tight wraps of silver duct tape. Her chest felt hot and full all the way back up the street.