A Character Reference

Moira was halfway through stealing a commercial mixer when her phone rang.

The mixer had belonged to a bakery that still smelled of aniseed six months after closing. Its new owner would arrive at eight. Moira had thirty minutes, a borrowed van, and no Eli.

She answered because the number was local.

“Mrs Vale? This is Frank Hesketh, from Hesketh Repairs. Eli Mercer gave you as a reference.”

Moira straightened. One of the mixer’s feet remained bolted to the floor.

“Did he.”

“He’s applying for our trainee technician position.”

For three years, Eli had fetched tools, carried ovens and asked why certain removals happened without receipts. Lately he had begun refusing those jobs. Moira had treated each refusal as an opening offer.

Her last message to him said: Bakery. Seven sharp.

His said: I can’t do that one. Sorry.

She had read the apology and ignored the rest.

“What would you like to know?”

“Does he finish what he starts?”

Beyond the bakery window, a bus hissed to a stop. Eli could still get off it. She watched a woman emerge with a rolled carpet, then a man holding flowers by their stems.

“He can be difficult,” Moira said.

There. An honest answer. A useful one.

“What sort of difficult?”

On the mixer’s steel bowl lay a plastic bag containing four washers and a bolt. Eli had put them there yesterday, during what she had called the inspection. In his square handwriting, he had labelled the bag REAR BRACKET. He labelled everything. It irritated her until she needed something.

“If a cable’s damaged, he won’t plug the thing in to see whether it works.”

“Good,” Hesketh said.

Moira looked at the extension lead she had brought. Tape covered three places.

“He’ll spend twenty minutes finding the right fastener.”

“Also good.”

“And if you tell him something’s all right, he might want to know how you know.”

“That sounds like the lad we met.”

Through Hesketh’s receiver came the scrape of a chair.

“He’s there?”

“Waiting outside. He didn’t think you’d answer.”

The bus pulled away.

Moira crouched beside the last bolt. At her age, getting down was a decision; getting up required furniture.

“Can you recommend him?” Hesketh asked.

She fitted the socket, then removed it.

“Yes. Give him work he can put his name on.”

After the call, she sent Eli three words: You got it?

His answer arrived while she was tightening the rear bracket.

Yes.

The mixer would not fit through the door alone. She had known that before coming. For the first time that day, she allowed it to be true.

She put the washers back, tightened the bolts, and left with her own tools.