Frank stepped forward. "He's eight, Jim. That doesn't mean he can rebuild an engine. He saw one wire. That's not a miracle."
"I didn't call it a miracle," Jim answered. His voice stayed quiet, but Frank recognized the warning beneath it. "I called it paying attention. What'd you call it?"
Frank looked at Leon and hesitated. The boy was staring at the CT70 with the same serious concentration he had given the Shovelhead's underside. There was no swagger in his expression. He looked intimidated and fascinated in equal measure, which was exactly how Frank remembered feeling when his father had first let him open a motor.
Jim reached into his pocket and pulled out an old combination wrench. It was pitted around the edges, heavy for its size, and stamped with the name Snap-on. He handed it to Leon, not tossing it this time. The child accepted it with both hands and ran one thumb across the worn lettering.
"Here's the deal," Jim said. "If you can get the little engine freed up and show me you've understood what stopped it, the Honda is yours. If you can't, nobody's going to laugh. It goes back to being scrap, and you've learned something."
Leon looked up. "Mine?"
"Yours. But fixing an engine is different from making it safe to ride. Frank decides what you can do, and somebody who knows motorcycles checks every part before those wheels go anywhere near a road. You don't ride it until you're older and you've got the right place to learn. Understood?"
"Yes, sir."
Jim's mouth tilted into a small smile. "I've got another hundred that says you can't free that motor by Friday."
Frank threw up one hand. "You're betting an eight-year-old on a junk motor now?"
"I'm betting he'll want to prove me wrong."
Wilson chuckled from the doorway. "And here I thought the old man came back for coffee."
Jim ignored him. He extended one large hand. Leon looked at it and then at Frank. The mechanic sighed and gave a reluctant nod. The boy shook Jim's hand, his own disappearing inside it, and felt as though he had signed an agreement with the world itself.
When the pickup left, the small Honda remained in the center of the bay. Leon walked around it carefully, counting its visible problems. Frank watched from the workbench, folding a rag until it was too small to fold again. After several minutes he said, "You've got an awful lot of work ahead of you."
Leon touched the end of the seat frame. "I know."
"No, you don't. Not yet."
The boy considered that. "Then I want to find out."
Frank looked at him and had to turn away before Leon noticed the expression crossing his face. It was something dangerously close to affection. He was still learning how to handle that feeling without disguising it as irritation.
They started with an inspection. Frank made Leon write down every obvious problem on the back of a clean invoice, using a pencil that barely had an eraser left. Missing seat. Bad tires.