Street Sleeper

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There is a garage in a railway arch. It is in darkness. In that darkness coils of hose hang like rubber intestines; stacks of tyres slouch like rolls of matt, black fat. The floor is stained a hundred shades of black and brown, each shade the colour of oil. Workbenches, floor and walls are jagged with body-panels, metal innards, girlie calendars and fast-food wrappers.

It’s not much but it’s home to Fat Les. A sign above the arch announces ‘Fat Les — the Vee-Dub King’. He works here. He lives here. He sleeps in a partitioned area that he calls his office. He is in his forties; fat (of course), unshaven, sweaty. His bed is a tartan sleeping-bag. He does cheap servicing, tuning and repairs of Volkswagen Beetles. He knows most of what there is to know about flat-four, air-cooled engines. He makes a living, more or less, and pumps any profits into his hobby which is playing around with flat-four, air-cooled, Volkswagen engines.

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