“We need a name for our group.” I wiped down my windshield and gave the dead bug collection another squirt of cleaner. The girls and I were doing beginner maintenance on our bikes in Lily’s garage.
Reba stood up after removing the oil filter on her bike. “We’re not a group. We’re a club.” She removed the oil pan from under her Road King and bent down to fasten the hose.
Opal giggled. “Or a gang.”
“Yeah, like Hell’s Angels.” Lily grinned.
“That’s not even funny, Lily.” I threw my dirty rag at her. “I told you what Norman said at the meeting. Besides, it needs to be a name I can live with.” I dug a clean rag out of my saddlebag and polished the chrome on my tank.
“Who cares what they think?” Reba stood with one hand on her hip and a wrench in the other. “It’s your life.”
“It’s not my life, Reba. It’s His life, and I’m a reflection of Him, remember?”
“Yeah, yeah,” she mumbled. “But it’s not those church folks’ life.” Ever since Reba’s mother got kicked out of the choir for getting a divorce, she refused to set foot into a church. “Truth be told, those churchy folks are all hypocrites anyway.” Reba’s deep, throaty voice made her sound tougher than she really was.
Lily didn’t look up from shining her mirrors. “You’re right, Reba. They’re hypocrites. That’s why they need to be in church.”
Reba scowled and went back to changing the oil.
Opal walked over to watch the process. “How about Harley’s Angels?” Opal handed Reba an old towel to wipe the oil off her fingers.
“Taken.” Reba wiped her hands, tossed the towel back to Opal, and reached for her new oil filter.
I leaned over as she tightened it.
“How about the Electric Eels since we live in Eel Falls.”
Opal shuddered. “Eels are kind of creepy.”
“Kind of like snakes.” Reba finished screwing the filter on. “I like it.”
“How about the pink ladies.” I pointed to my helmet.
“Forget that.” Reba waved me off. “I’m not joining any club with the word pink in it. I can barely tolerate looking at you wearing that sissy color.”
I smirked. “We could be the Old Saddle Bags.”
Opal punched my arm. “Hey, I don’t need that kind of help.”
“I like the eel idea.” Reba snapped shut the lid to her toolbox. My tools weren’t nearly as plentiful or fancy. I dropped them into the tool pouch hanging on the front of my handlebars.
“We could be Eels on Wheels.” I turned my palms up to Lily.
“I want a name that makes it clear we’re women—no guys allowed.” Lily stuffed rags into her saddlebag and buckled the clasp shut.
“Lady Eels, then?” I tugged on the saddlebag belt and made sure it was tight. “Although I don’t really relish being thought of as an eel.”
“I don’t mind.” Opal shrugged. “At least they’re skinny.”
“Yeah, it’s better than being hogs.” Lily helped Reba maneuver the Road King off the bike stand.
“Lady Eels on Wheels.” I repeated the phrase and looked up at the rafters trying to imagine how to draw one.
“Might be too much to go on a patch.” Reba grunted as she set the kickstand to her bike. “But I kinda like it.”
“A patch?” I turned toward Reba.
“If we’re a motorcycle club we need to pick colors and design a back patch.”
Opal pointed at me. “Kirstie’s the artist. She can design it.”
“Gee, thanks.” I wiped chrome polish off my hands onto my old jeans. “You’ve given me so much to work with here. I don’t relish being an eel. It’s not exactly feminine.”
“Who says we have to be feminine?” Reba cocked an eyebrow my direction.
“Well, no one. But I don’t see any reason to leave behind our womanly ways simply because we ride motorcycles. I like being a girl. I want to celebrate my femininity. And when people see us driving down the road, I want them to know we’re a girl club, not a guy club.”
“True,” Lily agreed. “Sounds good to me.”
“Kirstie, honey, with your curves, there’s no way someone is gonna mistake you for a guy.” Reba winked at me and lit a cigarette.
“You’re just jealous.” I grinned and struck a supermodel pose.
At five ten Reba was slender, flat-chested and statuesque. I was five three and as curvy as a Smoky Mountain switchback.
“Let’s talk about colors. What will our colors be?” Lily asked.
Everyone looked at Reba. We knew the colors would have to meet her standards since she wasn’t a girlie girl. She wouldn’t like anything we picked, anyway.
“Purple’s good.” Reba surprised us. “It’s kind of feminine but not prissy. And it goes with silver, as in chrome.”
“Ohhh, yeah, silver, that’s good.” I nodded and leaned on my bike. “What do y’all think?”
“I like it.” Opal nodded. “Matches my hair and silver goes great with my bike, too.”
“OK, then. We’re purple and silver biker ladies.” I looked at everyone for a consensus.
“You mean eels.” Lily groaned.
“Lady Eels on Wheels.” Opal sat with her hands on the throttle and clutch.
“Eels on Wheels,” Reba laughed. “The name’s horrible. But I kinda like the idea.”
“I’ll get busy on the patch.” I turned the key and started my bike.
“This I gotta see.” Reba shook her head. “There’s no way you can come up with anything I’ll approve of.”
I revved the engine and shouted over the pipes. “Never say never, my friend.”
****
Two days later we met at the KenapocoMocha coffeehouse after a two-hour practice in the church parking lot.
“You can’t just make a patch and stick it anywhere.” Reba sucked up the bottom of her raspberry tea, stood, and reached for a refill from the soda dispenser next to our table.
“Why not? It’s a free country.” I chewed on some ice.
“It’s a free country, but there are rules in the biker world.” Reba sat down across from me again. “If you want the other clubs to respect you, you have do it right.”
“I don’t know if I want to belong to a group with a bunch of rules.” Lily stirred her drink with a straw. “I have enough of those in real life. I’m doing this for fun, not so I have more stress.”
“Don’t worry, Lily,” I said. “It’ll be less painful than paying taxes.”
“Show us whatcha got.” Reba pointed to my sketchbook.
I opened the cover and pulled out different sketches of an eel sitting on a motorcycle wearing a little helmet. One of them was riding fast; others were striking poses like models in biker magazines. Another wore a leather jacket, and a couple sported tanks and chaps.
“It’s kind of hard to draw chaps on an Eel when he isn’t a biped.” I sighed.
“I like the one with the little tattoo on his fin.” Opal pointed to a sketch in front of her.
“Where?” Reba grabbed the sketch and held it to her face.
“She’s joking.” Lily laughed. “None of them have a tattoo.”
“Well, that’s the next thing we gotta do as a club, you know.” Reba looked at me.
“What?” I dreaded what Reba might have us do next.
“Tattoo. We all gotta go down and get a tattoo of an eel on our wrist. All at the same time. It’s how we bond as a club.” She made motions with her hands as if she was revving her bike.
“Uh, sorry.” I shook my head and held up my hand. “I’ll wear an eel on my jacket, I’ll go to motorcycle classes with you guys, and I’ll even participate in a bike naming ceremony—but I’m not going to tattoo one of those ugly slimy things on my body.”
Reba threw back her head and laughed so loud people at the ordering counter turned to look at her. She slapped her leg.
“What’s so funny?” I wasn’t amused.
“You. You were sure I was gonna drag you into the tattoo parlor and make you get a tattoo.”
“I wouldn’t put it past you,” I said.
“Now wouldn’t that chap the church ladies’ hides!” She laughed.
I didn’t. I rolled my eyes. “That’d go swell with preacher’s wife clothes.”
“Sure would,” Reba said. “God made eels.”
“God made belly buttons, too, but I don’t go around showing mine off in church.” I chewed on my straw.
“So which eel do you want on the patch?”
Reba picked up one of them and flicked it with her finger. “Put a jacket on that one, and she’ll be perfect.”
“Sure. And make the bike silver and the letters in black.”
“Everybody OK with that?” I looked around the table as everyone nodded.
“OK.” I took the picture from Reba and stacked it on top of the others. “Opal, are you still going to sew the patches on our jackets for us?”
“Yup. But you’re going to have to show me where they all go,” she said.
I nodded. “You got it. When you want to do this?”
Reba stood and picked up her helmet. “Order the patches, and we’ll get together after they come in. Until then, let’s ride.”
****
Two weeks later, we met at the parsonage with our jackets, vests, and patches.
Reba told us how to place them and what they meant.
“OK, on the front, you park the U.S. flag on the upper left hand part. And don’t ever attach any patch or pin above the flag.”
“Oh. Speaking of pins…” I pulled out a little stash of lapel pins with angels riding a motorcycle and gave each of the girls one.
“Awwww.” Lily held hers up to admire it. “That’s so sweet!”
Reba snorted a little, but she pinned it on her jacket. “Thanks,” she mumbled. She pulled out POW and MIA patches. “Here,” she said. “If you want you can sew these on the lower left side.”
“I feel like I’m in Girl Scouts again,” I giggled. “I had all the badges.”
“These aren’t badges. They’re patches,” Reba growled.
“Now, since we have our eel patches on the back…” Reba pointed at all of us. “Never wear them in the presence of another club or gang uninvited.”
“Why’s that?” Opal looked up from arranging her patches and wrinkled her brow at Reba. “It’s a free country.”
“It’s a free country, yeah, but if you’re on their turf it’s rude.”
I thought she was being ridiculous. “I highly doubt we’ll be on any other gang’s turf, Reba. Most of their turfs are bars and taverns.”
“You never know.” Reba looked me in the eye. “Funny things happen on the road. Whatever you do, never touch someone else’s patch, vest, jacket, or their bike. That’ll get you beat up, depending on the club.”
“Sounds a bit melodramatic to me.”
“It’s not. Especially if the patch has three pieces.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Nope. Those are outlaw clubs. Our patch is one piece. That means we’re just a nice little law-abiding riding club. There’s a difference between a hard-core motorcycle outlaw gang and a riding club.”
I let out a whistle. “I never knew there was such a culture to this.”
“Well, there is. And you need to heed the rules.”
We finished pinning our patches in place so Opal could sew them on.
Timmy’s chanting with the theme song of Cops drifted downstairs.
“I don’t know what I’d do without that TV program,” I said.
Reba grew restless because she already had her patches placed on her vest. She reached over to help with mine. “We need to plan our trip. I think it’s time to ride the Cherohala Skyway in the Smokies.”
The phone rang in the kitchen. I made my way around the maze of chairs in the dining room and finally answered on the third ring.
“Hello, this is Kirstie.” My hand flew to my mouth. “Oh no.” My stomach lurched. I bent over and held on to my middle. “Oh, I’m so sorry.” I could only whisper in reply to the horrific news. “Yes, I’m sure our ladies will want to help…of course…of course. Just let us know. Please give the family our condolences. Yes, Pastor Elliot. Good-bye.” I reached for a chair and sat down. I couldn’t see. My face felt hot, and the floor moved.
“What is it?” Opal rushed to my side, needle and thread forgotten.
“It’s the Schwartz family. Their son…Kevin…he was killed in Afghanistan early this morning.” I could barely choke out the words. I looked up at Lily. “He was in my Sunday school class when he was younger.”