“No family revelation?”
“No.”
“Disappointing.”
Leo replaced the module.
The engine started.
Same sound.
Older.
A little softer.
Still alive.
Jim stood beside him.
“Every time I hear that thing start, I think about your dad.”
Leo wiped his hands.
“Me too.”
Jim looked at the motorcycle.
“Dutch too.”
Leo nodded.
Then Jim said something unexpected.
“I’m done.”
Leo frowned.
“With what?”
“Riding the FXR.”
“Why?”
Jim lifted one shoulder.
“My knee hates it.”
Leo smiled.
“Finally admitted it?”
“Don’t tell anyone.”
Jim held out the key.
“Trust needs a regular rider.”
Leo stared.
“No.”
Jim laughed.
“Same family.”
“It isn’t mine.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
Jim put the key on the bench.
“Trust owns it.”
“You’re authorized.”
Leo stared.
Jim continued.
“You don’t have to.”
Those words mattered.
Still.
After all those years.
You don’t have to.
Leo picked up the key.
“What about the memorial ride?”
Jim smiled.
“You lead.”
The morning of the ride, Leo arrived early.
His mother came too.
Claire was nearly sixty now.
She stood beside the motorcycle and touched the fuel tank.
“Your dad would think this is hilarious.”
“What?”
“You riding Dutch’s bike.”
Leo smiled.
“He’d complain about the seat.”
“He did.”
Leo looked at her.
“Do you regret keeping the secret?”
Claire considered it.
“Yes.”
Leo had not expected honesty.
She continued.
“I regret that you had to learn because of a piece of metal inside an engine.”
“But I don’t regret honoring your father’s request while he was alive.”
“Both can be true.”
Leo nodded.
Life had taught him that repeatedly.
Two truths could exist without cancelling each other.
Dutch failed Arthur when Arthur was young.
Dutch later became someone Arthur loved.
Thomas Hayes was Arthur’s father.
Dutch Sullivan was also Arthur’s father.
Arthur loved Leo completely.
Arthur still made a mistake by waiting too long.
Jim was frightening to an eight-year-old.
Jim also protected his right to hear family truth from his mother.
Leo knew something adults did not.
Leo still had a lifetime left to learn.
At eight, he had believed engines were easier than people.
At thirty-two, he knew why.
Engines did not require you to hold contradictions gently.
People did.
Riders began arriving.
Not eight hundred.
About one hundred and twenty.
Enough.
Jim stood near the entrance.
Russell handed out coffee.
Claire sat beneath an awning.
Leo climbed onto Dutch’s FXR.
The motorcycle felt smaller than it had when he was eight.
Everything from childhood does.
He inserted the key.