Chapter XXVIII: One Thing Leads to Another

Chapter Twenty-Eight: One Thing Leads to Another

“I know it's half yours, Ogden,” said Vance “That’s why you get first bid.”

“But,” I whined, “you never paid for my half after I went to Florida. I sent you my address but you never sent me the money.”

Vance picked his nose with his thumb.

“I must've forgotten. I'm real sorry about that, Ogden. But I did some work on the car so I deserve some credit. This windshield didn't get fixed by magic elves, you know.”

“Fixed?” I asked as I diverted the corridor of freezing gales coming through the gap between the window and the roof. “You call this fixed?”

“Your starting to sound like my father, man. Don't be a noid. I got a discount.”

“I hope so, man. The thing is two inches too short!”

Vance shrugged his shoulders.

“Hell,” he said, “I thought you were going to go to Kuwait and get rich. What difference would thirty five dollars make?”

“Vance, do you even know how many tacos thirty five dollars will buy at Taco Bell in Florida?”

“No.”

“Hundreds. I could have lived for two years on thirty five dollars.”

“Sorry.”

“I almost got a job, Vance. That's how bad it was. I was eating crumbs off the carpet because of you.”

“That's why I want to give you a good deal on the car, buddy.”

The parking lot was empty and covered with a thin layer of packed snow so Vance spun donuts until my ears buzzed.

“Why do I need the car?” I asked. “Why should I buy it from you?”

“How do I know? Drive to Mexico.”

“I was gonna walk if you couldn't drive me.”

“Walk? Don't be crazy. Why not go in style? Drive down. Take your time. See all those parks along the way. Get back in touch with the country. It's too cold to hitchhike and you don't want to take a bus.”

This was quite true. Even the thought of getting on a bus for twenty hours or more made me quiver.

“See, Ogden? This car is your only answer. Shit, America saved Kuwait's specifically so you could go on a road trip. You are entitled, Ogden. Maybe even obligated. “

He had a good point. I mulled this over as I asked, “Why is your license getting revoked?”

Vance fished between the seats and brought out a stack of pink slips.

“Tickets?”

“Yeah.”

“You got your license revoked because you didn’t put a couple of quarters in a meter? That's just sad.”

“A couple? Ogden, there are over two-thousand dollars worth of tickets, not including the stiff penalties for not paying them. And, just between you and me, I might owe Roddy and Moony a couple-two bucks.”

He said this in a tone that meant he owed serious coinage. For those who don't know, Roddy and Moony Monahan are two of the local bookies, handicapping sporting events and generally running the town from their velvet thrones.

“I got robbed like you wouldn't believe last Saturday. LSU screwed me again in the final ten seconds. Incredible.”

His failure gave me great satisfaction. Why did he deserve success? I smugly told Vance that it was tough luck.

“I'm starting to think that luck has nothing to do with it. No one has the luck I've got. I'm cursed. What ya think of that?”

“I think it means I’m in a good position to bargain,” I said. “Your half of the car was Thirty-five dollars, if I recall.”

“Yeah, but when you went to Florida I replaced the windshield, changed the oil and the sparkplugs plugged the holes in the exhaust. I even took that ugly roof cap off.”

“Alright, that brings it up to sixty dollars.”

“One hundred.”

“Sixty-five, Vance. The windshield doesn't even keep the snow out.”

“Ninety,” he said and turned a double donut in reverse, sliding the front end around sickeningly while I grabbed my seat.

“Seventy, you whore. Watch it.”

Vance steamed at full speed toward a snow bank. How fast he was actually going was impossible to tell since the speedometer spun like an old radio equalizer meter.

“Eighty!” he yelled. “I'll throw in a copy of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.”

“Seventy-one!”

“Eighty! Or I ram it.”

The snow bank grew bigger and bigger in the windshield. A raven flew off the peak with something lifeless in its mouth. My foot stomped on the ghost pedal.

“Eighty, or we die, Ogden!”

“Seventy-three fifty! I don’t care if we die!”

At the last possible second, Vance spun the wheel left and we slid sideways, wheels spinning engine whining, Vance’s neck muscles bulging out, cigarette hanging from his no-lipped mouth like a rigid tumor. My door window filled with a mountain of approaching snow and ice, but our slide stopped just in time. My door only kissed the edge of the snow bank and then the wheels caught and we sped off again, Vance hollering and whooping

“I want eighty, Ogden. I need it. The rent is killing me downtown. And the Georgia/Alabama game is this weekend. Huge. Thousand star lock of the year! I can't lose. Eighty makes me three fifty.”

“Seventy-four. I say again. Seventy-four and some change, tops.”

He broke off to avoid another snow bank, but reacted a little late. The car's rear end caught the snow hard. A metallic sound rang over the Jethro Tull tunes and the engine. We both looked back, me over my shoulder, Vance in the rear view mirror. A corner of the bumper was on the ground by the snow bank. A hub cap was spinning in the snow.

“That was worth five bucks right there,” I said.

“Alright. Seventy-five and I’ll throw in the harmonica key chain too.”

I'd always loved the miniature eight note harmonica key chair. It reminded me of my freshman year in high school when I played Harmonica at a Youthfire and had no idea everything was about to fall apart.

“Deal.”

Vance shook my hand and grinned. A sudden dropping of my belly reminded me of the time I gave Evan 15 dollars to invest in snake breeding. But it was too late to bail out. The bull was out of the gates and I was strapped on for the ride. I found a pen and pencil and signed away my soul:

“Vance Larsen sells this 1982 Datsun 200 SX car to Ogden Bleacher for $75 dollars, a used copy of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and a harmonica key chain.”

We both signed our initials and shook hands again.

“I can't believe I'm buying this car again,” I said. “I’ll give you cash at home.”

Vance drove out of the parking lot only a few miles an hour over the speed limit, a sure sign he was sad. At my house, I gathered some money from my father's sock drawer and wrote Vance a $68 dolla IOU to make up the difference. On the trip back to Vance's apartment on the Square, I nearly hit a tree on the corner of Pleasant Street and Lincoln Avenue.

Commented Vance, “The steering has a little play in it.”

I'd only driven the car once before and I had forgotten that the steering was loose. Vance's aggressive driving hadn't helped.

“No kidding? A battleship has more responsive steering than this piece of crap. I can't believe I paid seventy-five more dollars for it. It's already cost me over two hundred dollars and I haven't driven it more than three miles.”

“When god gives you lemons..,” said Vance sagely.

“...you ask for sugar,” I finished. “And god is pissing in my milk bowl. This turned out to be a real crappy deal, Vance. This car has done nothing but bust my shine box.”

“You'll get used to it,” said Vance as he stepped out, “By the way, the car still hasn’t been inspected. Have fun.”