ChapterXXIX: Take it on the Run
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Take it on the Run
The next day, as proof that I'm not totally irresponsible, I drove through gently falling snow to get the car inspected so I could get the inspection sticker and the registration stickers that would prevent the police from pulling me over. The same mechanic who had sold it to me in September jacked it up and tinkered with a few knobs. He shook his head as he wiped his hands.
“I'll let the E-brake slide, and the horn, and the turn signal, but brothah, you need to put new brake pads on it or you're going to go down a hill one day and end up in deep shit. A fahking Brillo pad has more grip than those brake pads. Why do you think it makes that sound whenever you hit the brakes? Run ya about a hundred bucks.”
Since I didn't have another hundred dollars to throw away on the car, I asked him if I could do it myself.
“Don't know. Can you?”
“I mean, is it hard?”
“Depends on the car.”
My patience was running thin.
“Then will it be hard for this car?”
“Depends if you want the car to stop every time you go down a hill. Think about it.”
That night we
Vance called for a ride in the morning.
“Can't do it,” I said. “I'm gonna fix this car today. It needs new brake pads. How hard can that be?”
“Not hard at all on a normal car.” he said. “But those calipers looked rusted as hell. I mean super-rusted. So is the piston housing. Why do you think I never changed them? You get used to the squeaking.”
“Calipers? Piston housing? What the hell is a caliper?”
I parked the car next to the Whiffle balls and deflated footballs in my garage and, propping the car on a set of tires, set up shop under it using work lights and lamps. The under-carriage was a mess of cables and rusted metal. After taking the tires off, I had no idea what the next step would be. I found a repair manual for my father's car, a 1987 Toyota Cressida, and examined the brake diagram. There were yokes, pistons, o-rings, springs, and other components that had no name. Did I have disk brakes or drum brakes? The picture looked nothing like what I saw on the Datsun, but I was determined. Finally, I located the caliper in a diagram, a metal case around the wheel rotor. None of the tools I used fit the nut heads, so I ended up using a clamp wrench that stripped the nut so smooth that I could see the agony on my monkey face in the reflection. I could have purchased the right tools and the right repair manual, but that was too easy. Besides, I knew it wouldn't matter; put a saddle on a cat and give it a number, and you still don't have a horse.
I hammered a couple of grooves in the nut so the wrench would bite and got it to come off along with a flap of skin on my knuckles when the wrench slipped. Could asbestos be absorbed into a flesh wound, I wondered? After all this I tugged and hammered the thin brake pads out and biked downtown to the auto part store in the snow, sliding back and forth in the slush and stopping to help people out of their driveways.
Said the mouthy auto parts guy when I asked him to match the brake pad, “Got yer money's worth out of them pads didn't ya?
The storm was a real nut buster, exactly why I should have stayed in Florida, and the snow collected in the street as I pedaled back down Richard's Avenue. The new pads I bought would not fit in the space in the calipers because the metal piston had been pushed out all the way to use the very last of the old pad. On this subject, the manual said only, “Depress piston and insert new pad.” Sure, and the Bible says, “Thou Shalt Not Kill.” It wasn't that easy.
I tried to depress the piston by kicking it, but nothing short of a nuclear blast could have moved it. The piston was rusted solidly to the cylinder body. I sweated and pushed and hammered on it even though the manual specifically said “DO NOT HAMMER PISTON.” Screw them, I thought. This thing had to be depressed or the new pads wouldn't fit. How could I even get the car to a garage without rear brakes?
Snow cascaded through the dark sky, passing through the light around each street lamp, a vision of singular beauty, and into the open garage port. I couldn't feel my legs from sitting on them for so long. The cut on my hand had finally stopped bleeding. Finally, I decided to detach the entire brake assembly, the caliper, piston, pads, muffler, everything, and bring it inside where it was warm. The problem with this plan was that the emergency brake cable nut would not come off. Jesus Christ could have come down off his cross with The Holy Monkey Wrench, forged by the Creator himself, and not budged the nut a fraction of an inch. It was frozen solidly to the frame and covered with two decades of ice and dirt and oil. The temperature had dropped to about 20 degrees in the open garage and snow was whipping around me so fast I had to wear ski goggles. Tears of anger were freezing on my cheek as I frantically beat the area around the brake housing with the end of a plastic bike pump. The metal of the nut had bonded permanently with the brake housing. I'd need a Trident missile to loosen it and all I had was a pair of pliers that couldn't pull a canine from a dead dog. So I did what any mechanic would do when faced with a do or die situation: I cut the emergency brake cable in half using a hack saw and pulled the assembly loose. Problem solved. The Emergency brake cable already needed to be replaced, but I still grit my teeth in debate. In a matter of a few hours I had rendered the car useless. It had no brakes and with a price of $100 dollars, I wasn't going to replace the emergency brake cable. I was out over three hundred dollars in fines and fees yet I had only driven three miles. I looked longingly at my parked bicycle. Why had I ever left it, I asked myself.
I wrapped the Caliper housing in a blanket like a sick dog and marched it into the house. As I walked through the kitchen my father stared at me. Surprisingly, he thought I had no idea what I was doing and (shock!) seized the opportunity to criticize me.
“You know there are other people on the road you need to consider. It won't just be you who dies when those fail.”
“This is clockwork mechanics, Dad. Leonardo D'vinci once said...”
“I don't want to hear it. Just go. Kill yourself. First Brooklyn and now you.”
“Brooklyn isn't dead,” I reminded him, “and I can fix this. I just need time.”
“I don't know what to tell you, Ogden.”
“Really? That would be a first.”
“Do you even know what is wrong with it?”
“The cylinder won't move. I'd sell my soul to the devil to get the cylinder to just go back three inches into the housing. I've beat on it with everything except Twain.”
My father shook his head. The kitchen smelled like a banana. It was freezing. I hadn't watched Game Six in almost five hours! Bullwhip's voice kept calling to me, but I was committed to the brakes.
“So now you're a mechanic? You went to college for three weeks, failed all of your classes, cleaned toilets in California, hitchhiked across the country, went to South America where you wrote an unreadable treatise on morality and then came back to sleep on the beach in Florida. Now you fix car brakes? Am I missing something?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I was a bus boy in Utah for two weeks. And I put the comics in the Boston Globe for a winter with Buddy.”
“Yes, of course. I forgot. So where did you fit in auto mechanic training? Was it between replacing toilet paper and scraping food into a trash can or was it while you were surfing in Florida? Maybe I'm missing something.”
“You don't know me. You don't know Ray Knight. If I can get the high score on Star Castle then I can fix this. Just watch!”
I stomped downstairs and in two or three hours had hammered the piston out of the housing to discover that in the time the piston had been exposed to weather it had developed pockets of rust that now prevented it from being depressed. That was the problem. I sanded these rust areas off and oiled it down until it would slide smoothly. Proudly, I went back outside and, in the cold, snow filled air, with spot lights to guide me, I put the left brake assembly back on and got the new pads to fit with only a little hammering. I went to bed that night with car grease and oil on my hands and under my fingers, but that did not prevent me from caressing Darcy's sock as visions of horny Chiquitas in Cancun danced over me.
Though the storm continued into the next day, I still struggled hard with the right brake assembly. I skinned my knuckles again and cried and cursed as I could not even get the old pads out because the housing was such a mess. The manual only listed seven easy steps to remove and install new brake pads and none of them read “Detonate a pack of firecrackers on the brake assembly” which is what I strongly felt should happen. Finally, I used a hammer and a screwdriver to pound away at the tip of the piston in order to give me some room to extract the pad. But the piston was very smooth and there was only a little piece of it that I could hit. On the third strike, the tip of the screw driver slipped off the ledge of metal and punctured a rubber gasket surrounding the whole piston. I thought this was no big deal until I pulled the screw driver out and all the brake fluid in the system poured onto my lap. At the very moment the screw driver punctured the gasket my father walked into the garage. My legs were under the wheel and my back was slumped against a cabinet full of dusty junk like cracked whiffle balls, deflated basketballs and my mother's abandoned scuba diving equipment. The more fluid poured on my lap, the further I was from Mexico. How would Bullwhip like this song?
When the fluid was all out I sighed and looked up to curse the imperfect world. Then I noticed my father standing quietly at the entrance. The expression of pure defeat I wore made his expression change from cynical sadness to deep concern.
“Are you pinned under the car?”
“Only in a metaphorical sense,” I sneered.
“We could call a garage with professionals who know what they're doing. If it's a matter of money, I'll...”
“I know what I'm doing. Look, I've got tools. I've got a manual.”
“Ogden, you can put a book in the microwave but that doesn't make it a TV dinner.”
“But it makes a hot book.”
We paused in this Tete a Tete.
“I know what I'm doing, Dad.”
“Then what's wrong?”
I felt the brake fluid stick my pants to my leg.
“Nothing is wrong. Everything happens for a reason. I'm learning. Things go wrong when you learn. This gasket was broken already. This whole brake system should be replaced. Why do I need to explain myself to you? You don't know Ray Knight. You're only interested in my faults. Can't you just say, 'Do a good job.' Why can't you trust me?”
“Because I don't want you to run into me when your brakes fail, Ogden. You aren't a mechanic. What makes you think you can do this?”
“My self confidence.”
“Your self delusion?”
“If that is what you call it, then sure.”
The parental rage came back and big D. stalked off. I could hear the squeak of the snow under his feet. It sounded like high pitched laughter of the wraiths. Everyone wanted me to fail.
The auto store was closed the next day because of the storm so I watched Good Times reruns on TV and listened to Lennon and some John Denver. In a direct ratio to my failure with the brake pads, the Red Sox squandered opportunities to score in Game Six. Jim “The Turtle” Rice was thrown out at the plate to end the 7th inning, and then in the top of the 8th inning the bases were loaded with Jesse Orosco facing Bill Buckner. The Sox were leading 3-2. McNamara had to pinch hit for him. It was already late in the game and Buckner was limping like a war veteran. Quick feet might make the difference in a close play at first. But no. Buckner popped out to end the inning and then limped out to the field as Calvin Schiraldi came in from the bullpen. The Sox were only six outs away from their first World Series win in 68 years.
Sticky, they had it won. They were leading three to two in the bottom of the eighth inning. Then that ass Carter got the sacrifice fly to score Mazilli. You get a man on third base with fewer than two outs and it ties the game. Isn't that enough to show McNamara that Schiraldi didn't have his best stuff? Don't you pull him in favor of Stanley or even Bruce Hurst to face Hernandez?
The Celtics are doing pretty good this year. Have you been watching any of the games?
Mazilli got a pinch hit single to start the inning. Did Howard Johnson hesitate to pinch hit for Orosco even though he got Buckner out in the eighth? No. So why did McNamara leave Schiraldi in there when he had an opportunity to pinch hit for him in the top of the tenth? Why? Is this the legacy of the Sox? Managers trying to force a pitcher to do more than he can do?
Bruins aren't half bad either. They've got a decent chance this year. They could really do it. The Sox might stand a chance if they get a good manager.
Schiraldi didn't even care when he gave up the tying run. He just looked like he'd been doing it all year long.
What?
Schiraldi looked like he'd been losing games all year long, like Game Six was no different than any other game. Just one more loss for the Red Sox Nation. Oh, well. What did he care about my shine box?
Yeah. Whatever. You going to that Christmas party at the Monahan's? There'll be some cute High School chicks there. Maybe your mom'll be there.
Six outs away, Sticky. Six outs.
The gray skies pressed down on the seacoast. I could feel the pressure building from the weight of the snow. How many more times could I walk past Mack Wynter's water fountain? How many more times could I pass the rusty swings in the empty playground? How many more times could I walk out to Ogden's point and watch squirrels hop through the snow in search of pine nuts? How many more times could I go to Break Island and Fort Stark before I became as much of a ghost as my sixteen-year-old self sitting in the back of a police car as a truck towed his father's car away? How many more youth songs could I sing?
If it had been ready, I would have packed up my car and headed for Mexico in the morning. I called Vance and cursed at him for selling it to me. I cursed my father for not trusting I could fix it. Ice whipped against the window. I called Cristo just to tell him he was a loser and a sissy.
“Yeah, well you are too, Oggy. Why don't you go back to Florida with your mom?” he whined as his dog Spiker barked in the background. He hung up before I could respond. I didn't feel any better.
When the auto store finally opened and the roads had been cleared, I rode my bike downtown with the pieces of the gasket I had punctured. It turns out the thing should be replaced whenever possible and it was only a buck or two, so I got one and went home to find out it was the wrong size, then I returned to get the right one. Tedious stuff, car mechanics. I had to remove the caliper housing again by cutting the Emergency brake and sand down the piston again, but it went faster since I had already done it once. Caliper brakes? I was an expert. In fact, the simplicity of a hydraulic brake system fascinated me. There was a seal and pressure and impact, hoses and springs, everything working together. With a little training and tools, maybe I would be a mechanic one day.
I sat back down in the garage and managed to reassemble the brakes system (minus the emergency brake) while wearing fingerless gloves.
Step 7 in the manual stated: “Whenever the brake system has been opened you must bleed the system of air.”
I erred on the side of safety and assumed I had opened the brake system. For me, bleeding the system of air involved the following steps:
1) Place the kitchen trash can under the brake assembly.
2) Loosen bleeder valve and step on the brakes hard until brake fluid sprays across the bottom of the car, over the bucket, and onto the ground.
3) Brace a 2x4 piece of wood between the brake pedal and the seat cushion to keep pressure on the system and
4) Slide under the car to tighten the bleeder screw before air is sucked back into the system.
5) Curse as your beard is dragged through a puddle of oil.
6) Scream as 2x4 in Step 3 slips from cushion and strikes your leg.
7) Argue with father over your brake repair qualifications.
8) Repeat steps 1-7 for at least six hours.
Bleeding the brake lines proved nearly impossible to do. The manual provided no clues how one person could accomplish this without twelve foot long arms. I repeated this procedure twice before the brake fluid reservoir had run out of fluid and I was ignorantly reintroducing air into the system. Why the hell didn't they tell me to periodically check the fluid level, I thought? So, I did the whole procedure four more times, once for each tire, completely covering the garage floor and myself in brake fluid, until I was pretty sure there was only fluid in the system. (Later I learned there is a three dollar, one-way hose that enables a solo person to complete this critical phase in the brake pad changing process without losing his mind.)
When I let the car back down off the tires and jacks I noticed the severed emergency brake cable dragged on the ground. That took twenty more accursed minutes to secure it to the axle with a metal coat hanger. Then I was ready to drive. All my suffering vanished as I eased behind the wheel of MY car and started it up with the miniature harmonica key chain. I drove easily down Elwyn Avenue and when no one was behind me I gingerly pressed the brake pedal to test my work. The car magically came to a stop, though with a dramatic, involuntary pull to the right, like a horse who knows the way home better than the rider. The car stopped just the same, and that was good enough for me.
The inspection mechanic took my word and the oil soaked scars on my hands as evidence that the brake pads had been changed. He slapped a sticker on my window and told me that if I had managed to fix the brake pads on that car then maybe I should be working for him. This filled my heart with high self-regard. It was the first compliment I'd been given since Little League, and I felt I'd earned it. The brakes that had been completely disassembled in my basement were now fully operational on my car. There was even a brand new gasket on the right side!
I dialed WHEB up on the car tuner and to my delight found “Hazy Shade of Winter” as performed by The Bangles being played. I raced to the DMV to get all the missing stickers and documents, tearing up the South Street hill where it crosses Middle Street. Kids in red wool hats playing Smear The Queer in the white field turned their heads when I muscled past the park. I had become the outlaw I always envied.
From the success of my repair, Bone Harbor was now possessed by a new life. I almost felt sad that I would be leaving the church in Market Square and the tug boats and the Chickanoosuc River and the Central Little League Park. But what memories were there left to make in this cemetery? The ghost commotion had grown out of control. There was no longer room to grow in Bone Harbor. Every rock or tree I looked at was past disaster. Now that the car was ready, it was time to go to Mexico. Arriba!
Then it occurred to me that the car should have a name. I could name it Dewey or Yaz or Fisk or Hendu, but something about naming a car after a baseball player seemed inappropriate. I felt the car deserved something more historic, more rebellious. Then it hit me as the radio played “Pancho and Lefty” as performed by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard. Like Pancho Villa, I was also on my way to Mexico, to fight the good fight, to live on the road with my iron skin and kerosene breath. It was the perfect name: Pancho.
As I drove Pancho toward Cristo's house, I rolled the windows down. Despite the cold, I wanted to rid the interior of Vance's lingering odors.
I now had a car and a destination. I only needed a little dough in the wallet before I was Mexico-bound. Finally, my shine box had cleared the mud and my milk bowl was piss free. Nothing could go wrong now. Dewey's promise was within my grasp at last.
posted by Oggy Bleacher | 10:50 PM
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