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She gives and gives and gives; that is her nature. She refused to be subservient to Abel at
home, but she did want him to succeed as a man. If she could make their marriage a true
marriage of equals, she was willing to pour herself into it completely, the same way she
poured herself into her children. At some point, Abel’s boss decided to sell Mighty Mechanics
and retire. My mom had some money saved, and she helped Abel buy it. They moved the
workshop from Yeoville to the industrial area of Wynberg, just west of Alex, and Mighty
Mechanics became the new family business.
When you first go into business there are so many things nobody tells you. That’s
especially true when you’re two young black people, a secretary and a mechanic, coming out
of a time when blacks had never been allowed to own businesses at all. One of the things
nobody tells you is that when you buy a business you buy its debt. After my mom and Abel
opened up the books on Mighty Mechanics and came to a full realization of what they’d
bought, they saw how much trouble the company was already in.
The garage gradually took over our lives. I’d get out of school and walk the five
kilometers from Maryvale to the workshop. I’d sit for hours and try to do my homework with
the machines and repairs going on around me. Inevitably Abel would get behind schedule on
a car, and since he was our ride, we’d have to wait for him to finish before we could go home.
It started out as “We’re running late. Go nap in a car, and we’ll tell you when we’re leaving.”
I’d crawl in the backseat of some sedan, they’d wake me up at midnight, and we’d drive all the
way back out to Eden Park and crash. Then pretty soon it was “We’re running late. Go sleep
in a car, and we’ll wake you for school in the morning.” We started sleeping at the garage. At
first it was one or two nights a week, then three or four. Then my mom sold the house and
put that money into the business as well. She went all in. She gave up everything for him.
From that point on we lived in the garage. It was a warehouse, basically, and not the
fancy, romantic sort of warehouse hipsters might one day turn into lofts. No, no. It was a
cold, empty space. Gray concrete floors stained with oil and grease, old junk cars and car parts
everywhere. Near the front, next to the roller door that opened onto the street, there was a
tiny office built out of drywall for doing paperwork and such. In the back was a kitchenette,
just a sink, a portable hot plate, and some cabinets. To bathe, there was only an open wash
basin, like a janitor’s sink, with a showerhead rigged up above.
Abel and my mom slept with Andrew in the office on a thin mattress they’d roll out on
the floor. I slept in the cars. I got really good at sleeping in cars. I know all the best cars to
sleep in. The worst were the cheap ones, Volkswagens, low-end Japanese sedans. The seats
barely reclined, no headrests, cheap fake-leather upholstery. I’d spend half the night trying
not to slide off the seat. I’d wake up with sore knees because I couldn’t stretch out and extend
my legs. German cars were wonderful, especially Mercedes. Big, plush leather seats, like
couches. They were cold when you first climbed in, but they were well insulated and warmed
up nicely. All I needed was my school blazer to curl up under, and I could get really cozy
inside a Mercedes. But the best, hands-down, were American cars. I used to pray for a
customer to come in with a big Buick with bench seats. If I saw one of those, I’d be like, Yes!
It was rare for American cars to come in, but when they did, boy, was I in heaven.
Since Mighty Mechanics was now a family business, and I was family, I also had to work.
There was no more time for play. There wasn’t even time for homework. I’d walk home, the
school uniform would come off, the overalls would go on, and I’d get under the hood of some