Dave heads home around five, and shortly after, I close up the front part of the shop and head back to the garage to say goodbyeto John, who’s still working. The garage is so packed full of cars right now, I can’t even see where he’s at.
“I’m heading out,” I call, in the direction of the clanging.
His head pops up from behind a dark blue car in the corner. “Oh yeah?”
“I’ve got a hot date with a ninety-six-year-old,” I say. “Try to not be too jealous.”
He laughs. “I’ll try.”
I hesitate. “I’d come kiss you goodbye, but there are about five million cars in the way.”
“It’s good, right?” he says, looking around at them. “I told all the local racers they could bring their cars here for stuff instead of going into the city. Fred is pissed.”
“Why would he be pissed? Isn’t this a lot more business?”
John rolls his eyes. “He’s worried I’m bringing in a ‘bad crowd.’ I think everything he knows about racing comes from watching ten minutes of one of theFast and the Furiousmovies on a plane.”
I step carefully over some huge car part on the floor and start to pick my way toward him. “You like this sort of stuff more, yeah? Race car... stuff?”
He laughs. “Yeah. I’d like to do some dyno tuning and bolt-ons and stuff like that, but you know.” He shrugs. “Fred.”
“Which car is yours?”
“This one.” He thumps the side of the dark blue car he’s working on, then reaches out to help me balance as I shimmy around a hulking piece of machinery.
“It’s... nice,” I say uncertainly, peering at it. He raises an amused eyebrow. “Well, the color is nice,” I amend. “Is it fast?”
He chuckles. “Not right now. The whole engine’s shot. Overheated at the last race.”
“Bummer.”
“Eh, it happens. I’m kind of looking forward to fixing it.”
“Er... why? No, I’m serious,” I add, laughing, as he gives me a dry look. “I want to understand.”
He shrugs. “I don’t know, it’s just fun. Like, you found it really satisfying watching all those annoying kids having fun with your exhibit at the museum, right?” I nod. “Well, it’s the same thing. This engine is totally shot, but I’m going to figure out why, fix it, and get it up and running again.”
I lean forward to look under the hood. I suppose it is kind of interesting, thinking about how all those pieces work together. “How are you going to sort out what’s wrong?”
I listen as he describes something called a compression test, pointing to different bits of the engine, and walking me through what each of them does. It’s strange, because I’ve heard him talk about cars a million times before, but for the first time, I can hear the quiet passion in his words. He really does love this work—and it seems like he’s really good at it.
“How’d you learn all of this?” I ask.
He chuckles. “Some of it at school, but most of it from just messing around. When Kiara and I were in high school, our dad bought us an old 2003 Jag to drive to school. He doesn’t know much about cars,” he adds ruefully. “I think he just thought it looked flashy. Anyway, Mom was pissed. She always said we were never going to get a car, because she didn’t want us to become pretentious brats.”
I laugh. “Your mom’s awesome.”
“Yeah. She’s also an evil genius, because when she saw Dad roll up with one of the world’s most unreliable cars, she said that we could keep it, so long as Kiara and I took care of any issues by ourselves. She made us learn how to change the oil and the tires and everything, and then just waited patiently for it to break down—which it did, like, a week after we got it.” He grins. “It took me a year to get it running again. I basically had to rebuild the whole engine.”
“And you were hooked,” I say.
“Something like that.”
“Do you still have the car?”
John snorts. “Hell, no. I sold it the day after I got it running again. Kiara and I split the money. I bought a cheaper, less shitty car, and she got a tattoo.”
“Man.” I shake my head. “She’s so cool.”
