That was all Clare Donovan had left to her name.
It wasn’t enough for next month’s rent or even for food, but it was all she had.
People in her neighborhood believed that the 1965 Harley-Davidson was only good for scrap, but she put everything she had into it.
The sound of the bike’s stiff chain and moaning wheels echoed the people that were making fun of her as she pushed it along the broken sidewalk.
People started laughing in the windows and on the terraces.
“Eight hundred for that pile.” She’s lost her mind! Mrs. Whitaker yelled from her second-floor balcony, curling her lip.
Teenagers pointed their phones toward her and recorded everything she did.
One of them chuckled and said, “Single mom, biker queen.” The words hit the street like rocks hitting a window.
Clare’s cheeks were burning, but she kept going.
As she held on to the handlebars, sweat ran down her back.
Ethan, her eleven-year-old son, frowned at the body that wasn’t moving and tugged on her sleeve.
He said regretfully, “Mom, it’s broken.”
She went down and used her unclean hands to get his hair out of the way.
“Sometimes things that are broken can shine again,” she stated in a quiet voice.
Lily, who was four years old, climbed onto the shredded leather seat behind them and bounced up and down, giggling as if the bike was already rumbling under her.
Clare’s shaking hands calmed down with that small measure of happiness.
She kept going.
It hurt to take each step. Her shoes were old and hurt her feet. She had pain in her shoulders. But she kept driving till she reached to the back lot of the old apartment complex where the three of them lived. The night took away the last bits of doubt and the final rays of brightness.
She crouched next to the Harley with a $3 flashlight, a rag from under the sink, and a strong sense of hope. She did her task without talking. There are no instructions. She didn’t have any tools other for what she could find in her neighbors’ trash. But she made up for her lack of skill with desire.
It took hours. Her hands were covered in blisters. Her knees got stiff. But after a while, something came up through the ground and lost years.
The letters HMC are engraved onto the tank, right over the engine.
She couldn’t get air.
She blinked and brought the flashlight closer.
HMC: The Chapter of Hell’s Mercy.
A name that bikers talk about in myths and legends. One of the first unlawful gangs to break away from the original Hell’s Angels in the late 1960s. People thought they had broken up for a long time. For decades, people hadn’t seen their insignia.
But there it was, weak but unmistakable. It wasn’t a copy. It wasn’t a tribute.
The first.
Clare lay back on her heels. It suddenly felt cooler outside in the heat. It wasn’t just a piece of rubbish I found.
This was a spirit.
And ghosts never stayed on the ground.
She didn’t sleep that night.
She sat by the window and watched the bike as if it may move by itself. Her kids were all cuddled together on the mattress in the living room corner. Her thoughts was racing, but not with fear; it was with interest.
What was the source of it?
Why did they sell it for parts?
And most importantly, what did it still mean?
She got her answer by morning.
At first, it was a hum. A deep, low rumble that made the glass panes shake. Then, the unmistakable sound of dozens of motors cutting through the dawn like battle drums.
Clare hurried outside without shoes on, her pulse thumping.
They appeared over the hill like something out of a dream or a nightmare.
There are 60 bikes. Everything is dark. The chrome shines in the morning sun. Jackets that have been worn and patched with the Hell’s Angels’ wings and skull.
In the front stood a tall man with a braided beard and eyes that looked like steel. He halted in front of her, knocked over the stand, and took off his helmet.
He stared at the Harley that was behind her. Then he looked at Clare.
“Where did you get that bicycle?”
Clare had trouble swallowing. She didn’t think her voice would sound so steady. “I bought it from a junk dealer near the train yard for $800.”
He looked at one of the others, who slowly nodded.
The man said, “That bike belongs to Reaper.” He assumed it was gone when Reaper disappeared in 1989.
Clare blinked her eyes. “I didn’t know.”
“You made it clean.”
“I tried,” she said. “I had nothing else.” I just needed anything, something that was still battling.
He was quiet for a long time. Then, to her surprise, he laughed—not in a harsh way, but like someone who saw something special.
“What is your name?”
“Clare Donovan.”
He glanced at the other riders.
“She has the heart of a Reaper.”
The others nodded and talked to one another. A few folks smiled. Some of them seemed like they were scared.
The man then grabbed a piece of folded paper out of his jacket. He handed it to her.
It was a check.
The cheque was scribbled using a pen.
Ten thousand dollars was the amount.
He said, “To begin.” “You gave that bike a new life.” Do you want to discover how to get her back? You ride with us. We will show you how to do it.
Clare stared at the check and then the Harley again.
She didn’t cry. Not yet. She smiled, the kind of smile that comes after months of bad weather.
The same neighbors who had laughed were now hiding behind their curtains, startled and bewildered.
The same kids who had made fun of her phones were now gazing down, forgetting about them.
Sixty Hell’s Angels had just drove into a parking lot that was about to close to meet a single mother who had spent her last dollar on something that no one else believed was real.
That thing turned out to be a legacy.
Not garbage.
It wasn’t an accident.
It felt like a new beginning instead.
Clare looked at the man and then at her kids.
“When are we going to ride?”
He smiled.
“Right now.”
As the engines began up, Clare climbed back on the Harley. She rode ahead into something fresh, where she wouldn’t be hurt or made fun of.
Not the end.
A beginning.
