The Clutch She Finished on the Gravel

Bay two had a Chevy half-ton in it with the engine out, sitting on stands in the corner, waiting on a crankshaft from a machine shop in Springfield that would not be back for ten days. There was no moving that.

That left the gravel apron out front.

I went to the back and got the four six-ton jack stands Dean bought the year we opened, and the sheet of three-quarter plywood we kept for working on the gravel when the bays were full.

I cut the plywood into four squares on the table saw so the stands would not sink.

I pulled the Ford around so it sat level, nose toward the highway, and set the parking brake and chocked the back tires while I worked on the front.

I jacked the front end up with the big floor jack under the crossmember and set two stands under the frame rails.

Then I went to the back and did the same under the axle. When I was done, the truck sat high and level, all four wheels just off the ground.

I put my weight on the bumper and shoved it hard, side to side, the way Dean taught me.

It did not move. Then I got the red creeper out of the shop and laid down on my back on the plywood.

It was about one in the afternoon. The sun was out, the sky was clear, and the gravel was cold through my coveralls.

A pickup went by on 63 and slowed down, and I saw the man in it turn his head.

I started on the easy parts that afternoon. I went in the cab first and pulled the boot off the shifter, then unbolted the shift lever off the top of the transmission and set it on the seat on a rag.

Back under the truck, I put a paint mark on the driveshaft and the rear yoke so it would go back the way it came out.

Then I pulled the bolts, dropped the shaft, and slid it out the back.

I took the starter off. I unplugged the backup light switch and the speed sensor and tied the wires up out of the way. I put a drain pan under the transmission and loosened the inspection cover.

By four o’clock the light was going gold and long, and I had done what I could do alone without the parts.

I put the creeper away, washed my arms at the sink in the back, and called Toby Freel.

Toby was thirty-one. He had started running parts for Dean when he was nineteen, a skinny boy with a Pontiac that leaked oil, and Dean had taught him enough that he got a job at the parts store in Mountain Grove behind the counter.

He had been one of the pallbearers. He had cried harder than anyone at the graveside, and then he had come to the shop every Saturday since to sweep the floor and ask if I needed anything.

“Rhea,” he said when he answered. “I heard about Curtis. Somebody at the store saw the trailer go by.”

“That’s done,” I said. “I need a clutch kit for a ’95 F-150, the 4.9 with the five-speed. Disc, pressure plate, pilot bearing. And a slave cylinder, the one that bolts on the side of the bellhousing.”

He did not even ask why. “You want me to bring the line tool too? For the quick-connect?”