Car Talk At twelve, we talked cars. I didn’t know anything about them; only that it was necessary for me to spout off words like “corvette” and “chevy” and “mustang” like I knew them; like they were as natural to me as the flavors of ice-cream —mint-chocolate chip, funky monkey fudge —words that actually did come naturally. Joseph Annen didn’t have such knowledge, didn’t understand that masculinity was directly proportional with what kind of engine was under the hood. When asked what he wanted to drive, he tapped his chin before saying, “You know, I could really go for one of those Saturns.” I think, when he said it, we were in the middle of playing basketball, and if memory serves, he swished a three-pointer somewhere around the word “Saturn.” It didn’t make a difference. I still thought he was a pansy, and I still asked him if he’d prefer to keep his purse in the front seat or in the trunk beside his makeup. “What?” he asked, then spit on the sidewalk. “It’s practical. It’s a very practical car. Don’t you know anything?” “You know Joe, yeah. I actually do know some things.” I didn’t tell him that what I knew was that a boy who dreams of a Saturn is the equivalent of a man getting a vasectomy in the prime of his sex life. We were twelve and dumb, but that didn’t mean he had to choose a
Saturn. In those days, we were all busy making bad choices, though most
of them had to do with kissing girls with braces, stealing money from
our mother’s purses —the kind of things that didn’t have lasting
repercussions. But a Saturn was like a tattoo, like a scar, really. At
sixteen, he became scarred, and he hung a vanilla-scented Christmas tree
on the rearview mirror as if to give the wound an olfactory component. *
“No, you’ve got to be nuts.” “Come on Bill, quit being an asshole,” he tried, one arm out the window, the other hand on the gearshift. “Joe, it’s ridiculous,” I said, walking away from him. “It’s my birthday present,” he whined. He was desperate. Pitiful. And he was right; it was his birthday, and I was his friend, so I got inside the aqua blue car and told him that he was crazy if he thought I’d buckle up. “You think I actually want to survive if anyone sees me in here?” I asked. He ignored me, and our friendship maintained. Joe was a good friend —he didn’t deserve my shit. He was sixteen, we were sophomores, and since he turned of age first, if I wanted a ride, he was my only hope. I put up with it, and he put up with me. I told him I would ride with him, but only until I got the mustang my father had promised. So we rode in his Saturn. We rode it to Taco Bell for late night Friday night meals. We rode it to each other’s houses. Where we didn’t ride it was obvious —to parties, to school, to places where we thought other people might see us. Joe said I was ridiculous, that the whole predicament was ridiculous. “If you can’t like me for me, then what’s the point?” We were sitting in his driveway when he said this. My initial instinct was to ask him if we were breaking up, but I held it in. “Joe, all I’m saying is…” “I don’t want to hear ‘all you’re saying.'" So I didn’t say all that I had been planning to say. We listened to that sissy engine gurgle in his drive and then, after fifteen minutes more of flipping through Goo Goo Dolls tracks, I got out of the car, told him I’d just walk wherever I wanted to go. “Hey, you know what? You can go to hell,” he shouted. “No thanks, Joe,” I replied as I stepped out into his driveway. “I’m
just going to take a whiz.” *
We didn’t compromise and go with an Accord. We didn’t compromise at all. Instead, he gave me a coupon for a free frosty at Wendy’s and sent me on my way. I walked to Joe’s house. He opened up and smiled at me, and the fireflies came out from behind fence posts and lit up our bodies. Joe asked me what was going on. That ugly, ugly eyesore of aqua blue metal shimmered in the moonlight, and I turned away from it and faced him. I didn’t know how else to say I was sorry, so all I said was: “Want to split a frosty? I got a coupon.” He said we could walk if I wanted; it was just up the block. “Naw, it’s cool,” I said and I opened up the passenger’s door, leaned down and slipped into the seat. |
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© 2007 prickofthespindle.com |
B.J. Hollars was recently named a finalist in the Mid-American Review's 2006 Sherwood Anderson Fiction Prize, judged by Aimee Bender, and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2005. He has been published in The Summerset Review, The Evansville Review, Ballyhoo, and The Lily Literary Review, among others. He was also awarded first prize in the Davenport Fiction Competition, judged by Ander Monson. B.J. is currently a book reviewer for bookslut.com and will be pursuing his MFA in writing at the University of Alabama in the fall. |