The Tram Mechanic – Part 1: Tram 28

"Don't touch the brake," said Inês.

"I wasn't touching it."

"You were going to."

Sofia withdrew her hand with a guilty smile. She was thirty-one, a new apprentice in the tram depot of Lisbon, in overalls too long in the legs and a pair of gloves too big for her hands. The vast shed was full of echoes: the clank of tools, the hum of a grinder, the smell of oil and hot metal. Rows of old yellow trams sat in the pits like sleeping animals.

Inês, the mechanic, was thirty-five, tall and strong, with dark hair under a scarf, a smudge of grease across her cheekbone and a voice as dry as a bone. She had worked in the depot for eleven years. She patted the flank of the tram in front of them as one might pat a horse. "This is Number Twenty-Eight. She is very old. She is very stubborn. She does not like to be rushed."

"Does she have a name?"

"She is called Dona Rosa. I called her that."

"You named a tram."

"I name everything I fix."

Sofia laughed. For the next hour, she held tools, passed bolts, learned the names of parts. Inês talked to the tram in a low murmur, slow, coaxing, as she worked under the carriage. A dim yellow lamp swung overhead. At noon they sat on upturned crates, drinking coffee from a flask and eating bread and cheese.

"Why do you do it?" asked Sofia. "The same tram for eleven years."

"She still needs me."

"Is that enough?"

"For a long time it was," said Inês, quietly. She turned the cup in her hands. "Lately, I am not sure."

Sofia looked at her. In the dim light, the mechanic's face was tired, handsome and a little lost.

"Can I ask you something?" said Sofia.

"Yes."

"What would make it more than enough?"

"Company," said Inês. "Someone who listens to the trams."

"Green?" said Sofia, a tram light.

"Green," said Inês, smiling for the first time. "Very green. Hand me the spanner."

Continue the story: Part 2 – The Hill Run.