Jim entered alone.
Rusty looked annoyed.
“You said Friday.”
“I was nearby.”
“No, you weren't.”
Jim ignored him.
“How's she look?”
Rusty hesitated.
“Better.”
“Running?”
“No.”
Jim looked at Leo.
The boy shook his head.
“Not yet.”
Jim nodded.
No pressure.
No threat.
Just disappointment contained behind patience.
He walked closer to the bike.
Then noticed the wooden chest on the bench.
“What is that?”
“Arty's.”
Jim stopped.
Leo opened it.
Jim saw the labels.
His face changed.
He touched one yellowing strip of masking tape.
“His handwriting.”
Leo nodded.
Jim read another note.
He smiled.
“Twenty-eight years ago, your father told me never to touch anything in this box.”
“Why?”
“Because I borrowed tools and didn't return them.”
Leo thought about that.
“Did you?”
“Constantly.”
“That would have annoyed him.”
“It did.”
Jim spent nearly twenty minutes looking through the chest.
Not touching much.
Remembering.
Then he reached the bottom.
A photograph rested beneath several folded shop towels.
Leo had never seen it.
He picked it up.
Arthur Hayes looked young.
Maybe thirty.
Thin beard.
Ugly brown cap.
Beside him stood Dutch Sullivan with black hair, both arms greasy to the elbows.
Between them was the FXR.
Not old.
Not scarred.
Freshly rebuilt after Reno.
On the back, someone had written:
PROFESSOR + MADMAN.
WIDOWMAKER LIVES AGAIN.
1992.
Leo stared.
“My dad never showed me this.”
Jim's voice became quiet.
“He probably forgot it existed.”
Leo touched Arthur's face in the photograph.
Jim looked away.
For several seconds, the garage became something other than a repair shop.
It became a room holding two dead men.
Then Jim put one hand on Leo's shoulder.
“Your dad saved Dutch's ass more times than Dutch ever admitted.”
Leo smiled faintly.
“He talked about him a lot.”
“Good things?”
Leo considered the safest answer.
“Mostly funny things.”
Jim laughed.
“That's better.”
Before leaving, Jim told Rusty, “Whatever happens Friday, forget the money.”
Rusty stared.
“What?”
“I shouldn't have put that on you.”
Jim glanced at the photograph.
“Grief makes men stupid.”
“Sometimes.”
“I wanted the bike so bad I started treating everybody like the machine owed me something.”
Rusty folded his arms.
“That sounds almost like an apology.”
“Don't spread it around.”
Jim left.
Rusty watched him ride away.
Then looked at Leo.
“You did that.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Thursday night stretched into Friday morning.
The pushrods went in.
Valve geometry was checked.
The altered timing relationship was set according to the actual engine rather than the service manual.