Second degree
He was nineteen. Two years at the workshop, in by six forty-five without anyone asking him to, opening engines others left for Monday. The short circuit burned him from the thumb to the wrist. He didn't shout. He wrapped his hand with the black bandana he wore around his neck — the same one that identifies him on the dock today —, closed the electrical panel with his left hand, and walked to the hospital.
Six weeks without being able to work with his right hand. Six weeks going to the workshop anyway. He sat on the stool at the entrance and watched. He watched where the others lost time, which tools were in the wrong place, which shortcuts created more problems than they solved. When his hand healed, he reorganized the entire workshop without asking anyone. He moved the welding table next to the window, rearranged the tool panels by order of use rather than size, changed the shelving so the heavy material was at waist height. Nobody complained because everything worked better.
The workshop owner — sixty-eight, hands bigger than Alek's head, a voice that sounds like a diesel engine at idle — gave him a raise without a speech. He said: "I knew if you sat and watched, this would happen." That was enough.







