Total pages in book: 18
Estimated words: 16461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 82(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 16461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 82(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
“Yes. It needs oil to run well.” Our first little invention prolongs the amount of time a vehicle can go without an oil change, but it still needs to be done sometimes.
We’ve made other little inventions here and there, like a similar application for windshield wiper fluid, some fuel efficiency advancements, but we’ve made enough money to be secure. And the two of us? Our first love was always repairing stuff. Being engineers and inventors is a side thing, something to keep us busy, and we’ve more than succeeded at that.
“So what we do when it’s like this is we refill it. We take this bottle. We take extra care, because if we get it all over us, we’ll smell like oil, and most people don’t like that smell.”
“It smells fine to me, Mommy.”
“That’s because you grew up around it, sweetheart. Most people aren’t us and don’t regularly crack open their cars.”
“They don’t? They must be weird.”
I shake my head, and guide her hand to refilling the oil. “We do this, then we put the stick back in, and make sure the cap is on tight.”
“Uh huh.”
“Then we close everything back up, and we’re all done.”
“That simple, huh?”
“That simple.” I help her down off the little stool I brought out for her. “Now you know how to do something that a whole lot of adults don’t know how to do themselves.”
“Is it all that easy?”
“No. That’s just basic maintenance. Even if you don’t do everything Mommy and Daddy do, knowing how to do that will help you down the line.”
“I see that class is in session,” Williams says as he comes out into the garage.
“She should at least know how to change the oil. Can we really call ourselves mechanics if our daughter doesn’t know how to do that herself?”
“She should know how to change a tire too. Just the basics if nothing else. We’ll teach you how to change a timing belt if you really want to, Winter.”
Winter felt like an appropriate name. She was born on the winter solstice, in the middle of a blizzard. She’s got my dark hair and her father’s steely eyes.
“Is the pizza here, Daddy?”
“Yes, that’s what I was coming out to tell you before I was distracted by how beautiful you two were.”
I just shake my head, forever charmed by him.
He kneels down to meet Winter at her level. “You need to wash your hands though. They’re covered with oil and grease. You don’t want that mixed in with your pizza.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
He hoists her up and carries her into the house and to the kitchen sink. He gets the water hot.
“When you deal with stuff like this, you want to wash your hands really good, because all the oil and gunk really sinks in. It’s hard to get out sometimes, so you gotta scrub, and scrub hard if you want to get the scent out. Trust me, you don’t want to taste this stuff. It’ll ruin your pizza.”
“This hard?”
“Gotta scrub harder. I’ll help you, my little bumpkin.”
He’s taken to fatherhood so well. I’m smitten just watching him interact with her. I was already deeply in love with Williams. I always have been. But as the years pass and we’ve become somehow even closer? I have to say I love him even more. It shouldn’t be possible, but he always seems to find a way to make me fall harder.
We have a fantastic little pizza night. He got me spicy hot wings, my favorite. Winter says they’re too hot for her, and says I can have them all to myself. How sweet of her. We gather for a movie afterwards, and enjoy all of it. It’s Tuesday, the one day of the week both Williams and I take off so all of us can come together as a family.
The two of us have taken over both Burly’s garage and my father’s auto parts store. With our profits from our oil applicator we bought out the garage. The owner, who had inherited it from his father, wasn’t all that broken up about it. He was doing it out of sheer obligation to family rather than a love of machines like Williams and I have.
So we’ve become Burly’s one-stop shop for all of its auto needs. We work on tractors, cars, semis that are passing through, and everything else. And we keep learning too. More and more cars are becoming electric, and we want to be on top of it, able to take care of anyone who comes to our garage asking for help.
I still get a kick when people come in for the first time and I come out to help them. I’ve never looked like what people think of when they think of a mechanic, but when their vehicle rolls back out right as rain? I make them a believer all the same.