“What?”
“Because it isn’t charity.”
“What is it?”
“A loan.”
Leo narrowed his eyes.
“Terms?”
“You pay it back when somebody younger than you needs tools, training, or a chance.”
Leo looked at him.
“That’s not a real loan.”
Sully shrugged.
“Collections department is flexible.”
Leo accepted.
He graduated near the top of his technical class.
By twenty-one, he worked full-time at Desert Iron.
By twenty-three, customers began asking for him specifically.
Not because they knew about the desert.
Most did not.
Because Leo listened.
A rider would say:
“It vibrates.”
Leo asked:
“When?”
“Highway speed.”
“Accelerating or coasting?”
“Accelerating.”
“Cold or warm?”
“Warm.”
“Started suddenly?”
“Gradually.”
Every answer narrowed the problem.
Patrick Gallagher had taught him that machines talked.
Leo eventually realized customers did too.
You simply had to ask questions without assuming you already understood them.
At twenty-five, Mack offered Leo partial ownership.
Leo laughed.
“I don’t have that kind of money.”
“I didn’t ask whether you had money.”
“What are you asking?”
“If you want responsibility.”
“That sounds worse.”
“It is.”
Leo accepted six months later.
Desert Iron expanded.
Not dramatically.
One bay became two new bays.
The machine room improved.
The office finally received air conditioning that worked.
Leo preserved one old workbench.
Above it hung Patrick’s photograph.
Beside it hung a strange piece of metal from Sully’s Road King.
Years earlier, when Mack had replaced Leo’s desert patch properly, Sully saved part of the temporary repair.
He eventually mounted it on a small wooden board.
Below it, a brass tag read:
TEMPORARY REPAIR.