"No, ma'am. That was Mr. Keller's choice, not yours."
"Even so, I'm sorry."
Tyler moved aside to make room on the concrete wall. He checked that the surface wasn't too hot, then offered Margaret his folded jacket as a cushion. Hank found an unused chair near the service doorway and set it beneath the awning. Nobody called it a customer lounge, but Margaret sat gratefully, and for the first time that morning somebody asked whether she had eaten.
"I've got peanut butter and jelly," Tyler said, opening his lunch bag. "It's nothing fancy, but I can cut it in half."
She looked at the sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. "I couldn't take your lunch, dear."
"I made two pieces of bread's worth. It's meant to be shared if someone needs it."
Hank gave a small smile. "He's not going to let you win this one, ma'am."
Margaret accepted half. She ate slowly beneath the awning while Tyler drank water from a bottle that had been refilled so often its label was nearly white. Beyond the fence, buses stopped and started, carrying people to jobs, appointments, grocery stores, and homes far from the neat landscaping of Crestline Motors.
She had intended to discover whether the staff recognized people without money. She had not expected to find someone who was giving away part of his lunch after losing an hour's wages. Yet that was the kind of discovery that made the morning bearable. The company had not entirely forgotten Walter's promise. One young man, almost invisible to management, had been living it without knowing where it came from.
Tyler spoke about himself reluctantly. Margaret could tell he did not like explanations that sounded like requests for sympathy. He answered direct questions honestly, but he kept trying to turn the conversation back to the cars because talking about machines was easier than talking about money. Eventually she asked how long he had worked at Crestline and why he had chosen the wash bay instead of a repair shop.
"Almost two years," he said. "I'm saving for certification classes. I go to the technical college at night. Their program is good, but I can't take as many courses as I want while I'm working full-time."
"You could become a mechanic here. There must be a path from detailing into the service department."
He gave an embarrassed shrug. "There is one on paper. I've applied for the apprentice intake twice. First time they said I needed the evening classes started. Second time they said I needed a supervisor recommendation."
"Did Brad recommend you?"
"Mr. Keller isn't really my direct manager. He makes the schedule when the service director's busy, though, and his note goes on the form." Tyler picked at the wrapper around his half of the sandwich. "He says I should learn to be professional first."
Margaret looked at the faded work shirt, the clean fingernails beneath traces of machine oil, and the young man's careful way of leaving the space around her comfortable. "What does he think professional means?"