Joy Ride

"Hell, this old rust bucket has probably got more miles on it than you do. We've had it forever, and we bought it about fourth hand. It won't start in the winter; the brakes scream like a banshee when you have to stop quick, and we're expecting the transmission to go out at any time. Waldo says, since we don't have any car payments, we can afford to fix things when they go to hell. But, one of these days it's gonna quit, and there won't be enough money in the world will get it going again. It's a god damned rolling junk yard, if you want to know the truth. Stands to reason you'd think it was a nice car."

"Well, it rides real nice."

He was doing his best to be pleasant to her, a fact not lost on Josie, and she softened her tone, "Did you ever own a car, Red?"

"No."

"Did you ever drive a car?"

"I never got around to learning."

"Well, maybe I could teach you sometime."

"I don't really have much use for something like that. I mean it's not very likely I'll be getting a car, and, even if I do, I can't think of any place I have to go."

"Yeah, I suppose you're right. I just think it's a damned shame that my little brother never had a chance to drive a car."

"Well, it's not like I was an old man or anything." he conceded, "I'm still pretty young. And one of these days – when I turn my life around – maybe I'll be needing a car to drive to work and go fishing and maybe to the ball game – stuff like that. Maybe I ought to learn how to drive after all."

"Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Maybe, if you want to stick around for a couple days after Christmas, I could take you out into the country and teach you to drive."

"That sounds real nice. Maybe we'll do that."

Tokay Red sat back in the richly upholstered front seat of his Terraplane Super – one just like Josie's. Of course it was brand new, and it wasn't brown. It was metallic green and creamy white . . . no! No, it was red . . . red and black . . . black on the bottom and scarlet red in the middle and more black on the top. He drove with one hand on the suicide knob while he dexterously rolled a perfect cigarette with the other. He casually took a corner on two wheels and then decided, as long as he had it up anyway, he might as well drive the rest of the way to work that way – like he'd seen a daredevil do it at the state fair. The other guys on the job just looked at him and shook their heads when he came driving up with the whole car balanced on two wheels. "That Tokay Red sure as hell can drive."

No . . . he wasn't going to work. He was on vacation. He just came by to pick up Wise Henry and Little Ernie to go fishing and then to the ball game after that. The car was a convertible, a Terraplane Super convertible, and he had the top down when he drove across the bridge and through the university campus. And all the pretty coeds in their summer dresses turned and smiled at him. Some of them even whistled, but he just smiled back and tipped his big new Stetson hat in their direction. He hated to disappoint them, but, after all, he was going steady. He was a one woman man, which was why she had fallen in love with him in the first place.

No . . . he wasn't going fishing. He was going to pick her up at the train station. She liked to get away from Hollywood now and then and ride the race horse that he had bought for her birthday and kept in the stable at his country place. It was the same horse she had ridden in National Velvet, which was why she liked it so much.

She looked at him, and her adoration radiated from the depths of her startlingly blue eyes, and she said . . .

"Well, here we are. It hasn't changed much has it? Mother willed us the house, you know. Waldo and I took care of her when she got old and sick, so she left it to us in the will."