THE WORKSHOP is in a church, across the street from a basketball court, and there’s a colorful sign in the window that says “Use side entrance for North Philly Youth Alliance” with an arrow pointing me in the right direction. I’m a little early, so I wander in, hoping I’ll stumble across Rafe.
“Oh, good,” a gray-haired black woman says when she sees me. “I thought you weren’t coming until tomorrow.”
“Uh, excuse me?” I say, looking behind me.
“To fix the sink.”
“Oh, no, ma’am—”
“He’s with me, Ms. Lilly.” Rafe comes from somewhere to my right and puts his hand on my shoulder. “This is Colin. He’s doing a workshop with the kids.”
“Oh, hello, dear,” the woman says, but she looks disappointed that I’m not the plumber.
Rafe takes my arm and leads me to a large multipurpose room where I put down my stuff.
“How are you?” Rafe asks. He’s more animated than he was the other night.
“Kinda nervous. Just, I mean, I’ve never taught anyone anything.” I was thinking about Daniel on the drive over and how weird it is that this is what he does every day. But at least he went to school; I’m totally winging it.
“Don’t worry. The kids are going to be really into it. Just talk. Just explain. You’ll be fine.” Then his tone changes. “I’m excited about it too.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. The only thing I know about cars is how to hot-wire one. And I haven’t done that since about 1994.” He winks at me. “But don’t tell the kids.”
“Oi, Conan!” someone yells as the doors open and kids start coming in.
“Hey,” another kid says to Rafe, but he calls him something I can’t make out.
“What are they calling you?”
He snorts and rolls his eyes in the kids’ direction.
“Conan, like Conan the Barbarian, and Khal Drogo. They think I look like this actor who played those characters. I don’t know who he is, but they think it’s hilarious. I keep meaning to look it up online.”
“Uh, like Arnold Schwarzenegger?” Rafe looks confused. “Wait, who’s Khal Drogo?”
“Someone in that show Game of Thrones. I’ve never seen it.”
“Huh. I don’t know.”
After a few minutes, about a dozen kids have arrived, chatting, teasing, and hanging all over each other. A few of them look in their early teens and one or two look seventeen or eighteen, but the majority are fourteen or fifteen. At about five after eleven, Rafe addresses the group.
“Hi, folks. Welcome. Today we have a special guest who’s going to do a workshop on auto maintenance and cars. Maybe he’ll talk a little bit about what it’s like to work as a mechanic.” He looks to me and I nod. Hell, at least that’s something I know how to talk about. “So, this is Colin. Why don’t you introduce yourselves and then we’ll head out to the lot.”
The kids all look at each other in an attempt to avoid going first. Finally, the kid who called Rafe “Conan” speaks up. He’s one of the oldest ones there. He’s wearing a white wifebeater and has the arm muscles of someone who only lifts weights to look tough.
“I’m Carlos,” he says. He tips me a little head nod, like he’s giving me permission to hang out with him or something. Jesus, I feel like I’m back in high school again. I nod back.
“Ricky,” a skinny white girl says, pointing to herself. She doesn’t look older than fourteen, but she has a nose ring and a crude tattoo on her thin wrist. Her bleached-white bangs almost cover eyes ringed with black makeup. I smile at her and she looks away.
“Hey, sweetie. I’m Mikal, but you can call me anything you like,” says a pretty-boy black kid wearing denim overalls and a shiny purple shirt. Is this kid flirting with me? I expect the rest of the group to turn on him—Carlos looks like the type to react poorly to a gay kid—but most of them just smile.
“Uh, Mikal works for me,” I say, trying not to be a total asshole.
Most of the others say their names too quickly for me to retain. Among them are a tall blond guy wearing a plain white T-shirt and jeans like a Gap model who mutters his name like he wants me to forget it; a pair of brightly dressed girls who introduce each other, but do it so quickly I don’t catch either name; a beautiful girl who looks Latina—or, shit, is it Hispanic? I really need to ask Rafe about that—and says her name like she’s daring me to use it. One guy just waves at me, smiling sweetly. He looks about fourteen or fifteen and has bright blond hair, blue eyes, and pale skin that look otherworldly against his all-black clothes. The smallest one says his name is Stuart, but he says it so softly I can hardly hear him, and one of the older girls, who introduced herself as “Dorothy, but way smarter than that dumb-ass white girl in that Oz movie,” repeats it for me.