Shift
By Nickie Jamison
Raleigh replaced the cap on the Corolla’s radiator overflow tank. He took the tattered, faded-from-red-to-pink rag he kept handy in the back pocket of his blue work pants and wiped grease from his fingertips. He didn’t bother attempting to get any of the filth from beneath his fingernails. After a decade as a mechanic, Raleigh had grown accustomed to a perpetually tacky film of motor oil and dirt on everything. People in this podunk, backwoods, tiny Southern town seemed to expect a black man to be hard working and grimy. Raleigh blended into the background and he liked it that way; nobody bothered him.
The Corolla’s hood latched into place with a soft click. Raleigh tapped the cold blue fiberglass. New cars weren’t made like a car ought be; sure the bare bones of
