Itchy Trigger Finger

Aptil 9, 2008

My hand is nearly healed from my trigger finger surgery, and I had the day free yesterday, so I stopped by the garage to check on my bike and take it out for a spin. It's amazing how much dust can accumulate in three weeks. I was brushing it off and crouching down to check the tightness of various nuts and bolts when a guy walked in with his biker-chick girlfriend. He was tall and thin with slick blonde hair and a pair of Wayfarers resting on his forehead. Everything he wore was emblazoned with a Harley logo. He held his girlfriend's hand with his left hand and a Harley shopping bag with his right. His girlfriend was dressed in a similar fashion. Leather jeans and a black tank top. Her hair was a wild, bleached mess. I wondered what was in the bag.

The guy nodded at me as he passed. "Where'd you find that thing?" he said.

I stopped what I was doing and stood up. "Where'd I find it?"

"You don't have to stop. What, you can't talk and do something else at the same time?" He let out a dumb laugh.

I looked at him to see if he was intending to be an asshole or not. His girlfriend dropped his hand and told him she was going to wait outside. She walked through the open gate and looked over several bikes that were lined up in front of the place. A few of them were for sale.

"Is that a new bike or an old bike?" the guy asked me.

"Old."

"Some of the new ones look old."

"Yeah, I know."

"It's really clean," he said. "It doesn't look old. Do you clean it a lot?"

"I dunno. I guess so. I try to keep on top of it."

"I need a rat bike," he said, giving my bike's throttle grip a slight twist. "Something dirty. I can't take all the cleaning. It drives me nuts."

"Where's your bike?" I said, expecting him to point to a greasy two-wheeled jalopy in need of a cleaning. Instead, he pointed to an immaculate chopper that was being polished by a young guy who works at the garage. It was a deep metalflake orange with subtle flames painted all over it. Its rear tire was at least twice as wide as any other tire in the garage, and its seat twice as low.

"What are you talking about? I said. "Your bike looks brand new."

"It is," he said. "I just bought it a couple of weeks ago."

"And you're already sick of cleaning it?"

"Yeah, man, every little smudge shows up. That's why I pay that guy. Like I said, I need a rat bike."

"Stop paying someone to clean it, and you’ll have one, eventually.”

“Huh?”

“If you really want one, they're easy to find."

"Yeah," he shrugged. "I dunno."

After a pause, he reached out his hand and told me his name. I didn't catch it. I told him mine, and I'm sure he didn't catch it either. We shook hands, and then he went to talk to the guy who was busy polishing his bike. His girlfriend was still outside, joined now by the young woman who runs the garage.

When I was done giving my bike the once-over, I rolled it outside and parked it next to a silver Ducati. The biker chick straddled the Ducati, twisted the throttle as far as it would go, and said, "I like this one."

"That's a lot of bike," the garage owner said, trying to steer the chick's interest toward a small Honda Rebel.

"I can handle this bike," the chick said, squeezing the brake lever. "I used to be a drummer."

"Maybe," the garage owner said, pretending to understand what one thing had to do with the other. "Come back when you have your license and we'll talk."

Although my bike needed a few more kicks than usual, once started, it ran as good as ever. I cruised up and down, in and around, trying to decide where to go. As usual, I rode along the waterfront and through the industrial back roads. I rode to where Kent Avenue passes under the BQE, past a BP gas station, and I decided to stop for gas.

In order to enter the gas station, I needed to turn around, but the traffic was too heavy for a U-turn, so I rode to the next light in order to loop around the block. When the light changed, I made a left turn and was suddenly faced by a Mack truck barreling toward me on the wrong side of the road, screaming past the backed-up traffic, bashing over the potholes, kicking up dust. For a second, I thought I'd gone the wrong way down a one-way street, but no, the truck driver was simply an anarchist, and an impatient one at that, not one to be held back by anything as fascist as a traffic light. I managed to cut in between two parked cars and narrowly escaped a pointless death. The truck steamrolled through the red light and disappeared around the corner. I traded expression of shock and awe with a few drivers who’d witnessed my near demise, and then continued on my merry way.

Content that my hand passed the test, I rode around a little longer, but the crush of rush hour traffic was only beginning, and I decided that maybe life was worth living after all.