Cody shook his head. "How many people do we do that to?"
The question had no easy answer.
That was why it mattered.
Cole did not try to solve it with a speech. He simply looked around the shop and said, "Start by not doing it again."
The next Monday, Emily's promotion became official.
Cole called everyone into the main bay before opening. He did not give her advance warning because he knew she would have found a reason to make it smaller.
Above the central workbench hung a new sign.
HEAD MECHANIC
EMILY CARTER
U.S. ARMY VETERAN - 18 YEARS
LISTEN FIRST
Emily stood beneath it and stared.
Her eyes moved immediately to the third line.
"You didn't have to put that."
Cole folded his arms. "Correct."
"Then why did you?"
"Because you spent a year believing that standing behind the counter erased everything you had done before. It didn't."
Emily looked at the final line.
"Listen first?"
"That one is mine."
"It's corny."
"Sign stays."
The men laughed.
Emily shook her head, but she let it stay.
That mattered too.
She had spent years refusing to let her name occupy too much space. Now it was painted on a wall.
The first month as head mechanic was not simple.
Being the most technically capable person in a shop did not automatically make someone an effective leader. Emily discovered that within days.
Cody came to her with every question, including questions he should have answered himself. Reese, trying too hard to demonstrate respect, stopped challenging her diagnoses even when he had useful concerns. Marcus overcorrected so badly that he began treating every sentence she said like doctrine.
Emily hated all three behaviors.
On a Thursday morning, she called them together.
"We're doing this wrong."
Reese frowned. "Doing what?"
"This new arrangement."
Cody looked alarmed. "Am I fired?"
"No."
"Because I can fix the invoice from yesterday."
"Cody."
"Right. Sorry."
Emily leaned against the workbench, fully weight-bearing now but still careful when tired.
"Head mechanic doesn't mean I become the only person allowed to think. If I know something, I'll say it. If you disagree, you say that too. We look at evidence and the machine decides who was right."
She pointed at Marcus.
"You especially."
He blinked. "Me?"