I’m in the garage putting an old Triumph motorcycle back together. Fleegle comes in and gives it a sniff, then asks, “It smells like a car, but how come it only has two wheels instead of four and no seat for me?”
“It’s a motorcycle.”
“Like a bicycle with a motor?”
“Something like that.”
“So you figured out a way to make bicycles even more obnoxious?”
“I didn’t know bicycles annoyed you.”
“They have a tendency to fall over and attack the floor and anyone near them without provocation, and there’s no place for me to sit when you ride them. Now you’re making one that is the equivalent of riding a bicycle while blasting a gas powered leaf blower, and you know how I feel about leaf blowers.”
“The same as you do about lawn mowers.”
“Yes.” He puts his nose in the box holding a bunch of parts to the motorbike and comes out with a bolt in his mouth. “Is this part important?”
I took the bike apart years ago to paint the frame, so putting it back together from memory is like doing a jigsaw puzzle without the box cover to cheat from. All the bike parts are dingy and beat up, the bolt he holds is shiny and new and most likely left over from when I replaced the shocks on the car and tossed it in the nearest box.
“It’s very important,” I say. “It won’t run without it.”
“Good,” he says and heads out to the yard to bury it.
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Gnawing the Bone 