My Car

Hmm...

My Car
Nick Wilson
This is my car, sitting in the driveway. There are thousands of cars on the road, but this car is special. Why? Because it is my car, duh.

It isn’t the greatest car in the world, but it surely isn’t the worst. I drive a 1997 Mercury Grand Marquis. For those who are ignorant of cars, a Grand Marquis is essentially a Ford Crown Victoria, only its better. When someone asks why is it better? It is simply because I drive a Grand Marquis, not a Crown Victoria.

I step up to my car, she’s been good to me. It just goes to show you, if you love your car, it will love you back. She doesn’t look like a very well cared for car, but at over a decade old can you expect perfection? I am a college student after all.

It isn’t often enough that I take a moment to stroll around my car and see what she has to offer. The first thing anyone notices when they look at my car is that there seems to be some peeling going on. “Your paint is peeling.” They say. Well, no it isn’t. The paint is all still there, the peeling is from the clear coat. I’ve thought about peeling all of the clear coat off and starting again, but I don’t. I don’t have the time or the money.

The tires formerly had the “Bridgestone” label raised from the surface. They don’t anymore, they’ve been rubbed smooth from scraping the curb too many times. Somehow, over the years the suspension has raised and now it holds the car too high off of the ground.

The worst part about spring time anywhere is the massive amounts of pollen that get on your car. The worst part about spring in southern California is that massive amounts of pollen are just added to the dust that normally accumulates. I had washed my car a scant eight days ago and already the dust/pollen mixture was a quarter-inch thick.

Keyless entry is quite the advancement in modern technology. Too bad I don’t have it. I whip out my keys and shove the metal shaft into the keyhole. The familiar grinding greets my hand, with grace and ease I turn the key to the left. The lock comes undone and I pull open the door.
Ahh, the sweet, sweet smell of vanilla. I slide into my seat. I’ve spent so much time in this seat, it fits me like a glove. Nowhere else do I feel this confident, nowhere else do I feel this comfortable. Not the couch on Sunday, not my bed after eight hours of work and definitely not my desk chair in front of my computer. The air inside my car smells of vanilla because just about two years ago I shoved an air freshener in the air vent. With the greenhouse effect and 90 degree temperatures the freshener melted into the vent at some point or another. I don’t know the exact time, I just went to pull it out one day and it didn’t move. I pulled and pulled, the air freshener ripped and I gave up. It’s been there ever since.

I put the key in the ignition and turn. The engine turns over once, twice, three times, four times then catches. I love the sound of my V8 engine. I don’t know what brand of engine it is, or any of the other details actually, but it is a V8. It has 260 horsepower, or did eleven years ago. Whatever the case, I can get off the line.

I can get off the line so well, zero to 60 in five seconds, less even. As long as the transmission holds.

The air is stuffy in here. I would lower my windows, but alas, the motors are all burnt out. To keep the windows from falling down, I opened the doors and put a bolt in the track. It keeps the window up. For good. I rely on my stellar, super-amazing air conditioning. It just takes a couple of minutes to cool off the entire cabin. It is a full-sized sedan after all, that is a lot of warm air.
Once the air has reached a comfortable temperature, I turn down the fan and pull on my seatbelt. The clasp works right now, but it wasn’t too long ago I had dropped a dime down into the female part of the belt. I didn’t realize what had happened at first and I thought I broke my seatbelt. I found the dime and spent the better part of an afternoon trying to get it out with a couple of bobby pins.

I grab the gear shaft, it’s on steering column, and put the car into reverse. After I release the brake, the car is drifting backwards. With the ease and grace of an eagle in flight, I back out of the driveway, shift into drive and take off down the street.

My car lacks a few vital features, it is important to remember them before I drive onto a busy road. First, the headlights are very dim. All they are good for is to let people see I’m coming, I rarely see what I’m approaching. This I don’t have to worry about for twenty more minutes or so as twilight still offers enough light to drive by.

Second, my car makes an extremely loud grinding noise whenever I turn to sharp. My car uses struts instead of shocks to maintain a smooth ride, thus my wheels don’t like turning beyond a certain point.

Third, and this is probably the most important thing, my speedometer rarely works. The only way I have to check speed to gauge myself off of other cars on the road.
That being said, my car offers a very smooth ride, gets good gas mileage and in the dark it can be confused for either a cop car or a mafia/gangster car. Also, I can easily fit seven people in here, including myself.

Does my car get the ladies? No, but does it keep the ladies? Yes, it certainly does. It is always the same story. Woman says “Oh your car is so ugly.” Then I open the door for them, they sit down and get comfortable. I drive the car around and it becomes “Oh my, your car rides so smooth.” Then they rip off their shirts and try to have sex with me while I’m driving. I have to turn them down because I’m driving.

Ok, I’ll be honest, my car doesn’t make girls horny. The only cars that do that are either way out of my price range, or bounce around too much to be comfortable.

Wow, I was so busy narrating my life, and fantasizing about my car’s capabilities with women, that I just missed my turn. Oh well, that is why they invented the u-turn. (yew-ee).
There is no traffic on this street, so I ease myself over into the left hand lane. Soon enough the median ends and I am sitting at a traffic light. There is a “No U-Turn” sign, but this road is barren. I am literally the only car out here.

The traffic light switches to green, I crank the wheel. Clunk! goes my struts as I turn too sharply. It has become evident why there was no u-turn here, there just isn’t enough space for my large car to make the turn. It’s going to be close…

I can’t make it, my bumper hit’s the curb, it makes an ugly screeching noise, similar to a fork on a plate, or nails on a chalkboard. It seemed like forever, but the screeching has finally stopped. I straighten out the car and she rewards me as I push down the gas pedal and fly down the road in the right direction.

I travel maybe three-quarters of a mile when I hear the most dreadful sound any driver can hear. The quick blast of the police siren, the flashing lights come on and my inside of my car is bathed in blue.

Was he pulling me over for an illegal u-turn? Was I speeding? Did I forget to turn on my headlights? Is it illegal to hit a curb? Does this have something to do with my four unpaid parking tickets.

The icing on the cake, not that the situation I’m in is sweet and flavorful in any way, is that my driver’s license just expired three days ago. I’ve been meaning to get to the DMV, but I just hate that place. Plus, when I go to update my license I’m going to have to pay my parking tickets. They have to be $200 each by now. Can parking tickets even get that high?

I pull over to the side of the road, and for one fleeting moment I hope the cop just passes me by.
He pulls over too.

Pardon me for a second. “Damn!” Wow, that didn’t cut it. I have the whole realm of swears before me and all I can come up with is damn? Gadzooks would have been better.

I’d better make up for it. “Dashuck!” Well, at least I tried. Note to self, combing all three major swears doesn’t work.

The cop sits in his car as he takes note of my license plate. That little computer is letting him know of my traffic history. He sees that I was rear-ended in January of ‘05. That I got a speeding ticket in Ohio, summer of ‘06. That I got four parking tickets here in California: October ‘06, January ‘07, March ‘07 and July’07.

I turn off my engine and headlights. With gas prices where they are at, I don’t want to add insult to injury.

The cop eventually gets out of his car and walks up to my window. He taps his flashlight on my window and I make a move to open my door. He quickly slams the door closed on me and pulls out his side arm. Why is he so jumpy?

I hold my hands up, showing that I have nothing in them. “Window doesn’t work!” I say loudly. The cop, keeping his gun leveled at me, takes one step back from the door and motions for me to open it. I slowly oblige.

Fear is normally a stabbing thing, something that hits you in a wave. It’s just like “Woah! I am so scared right now!” This fear wasn’t that stabbing fear. It was cumulative. I went from supreme frustration, to defeated, to this slowly building terror. Looking down the barrel of a gun will do that to you. It is one thing to pull out a gun, it is entirely different level it and keep it pointing in your general direction.

The cop makes a move with his thumb on the gun. Did he just turn off the safety?
I finally finish pushing the door all of the way open. I look at the cop, my hands are head level with my palms facing forward. The cop pulls his flashlight off of his belt again and points it at my face. He leans his face over to his radio and says something unintelligible.
I’m suddenly very gassy. The pressure on my lower abdomen is so intense I start to keel over. The cop sees this, pulls his face away from his radio and renews his grip on his gun. The pressure is building. The cop looks nervous.

Rrrrripshooo! That fart nearly sent me airborne, uh oh pbb pbb pbb pbb pbb. Aftershock.
The cop visibly relaxes as I sit back up. Then he recoils, holsters his pistol and starts waving his hand through the air. He’s nearly gagging.

“Come on! It wasn’t that bad.” I say out loud. The first thing I’ve said all night.
The cop holds up one finger, letting me know to give him one second, while he walks over behind the car and starts coughing.

A breeze picks up and carries my expulsion away. The cop recovers and comes back around to talk to me. “License and registration please.”

I have both forms of documentation ready. My expired driver’s license, my registration slip and my insurance information were all in my hand. He takes them from me and starts with the license.

His eyes rove over the picture, then back to me. He nods to himself, then starts to look over the plastic card again. He’s going to see the expiration date soon. The fear is back, my heart is pounding and my armpits are pumping sweat.

His radio cackles. “Hadley?”

The cop stops looking at my license and brings his mouth to the radio. Again I can’t understand what he says as he talks into it.

“Middle-aged black male, roughly 350 lbs. Partner is middle-aged white female, roughly 110 lbs.” The radio cackles again.

What does that mean?

The cop says something along the lines of “Roger” and turns his attention back to me. He smiles uneasily and hands me license, registration and insurance card. “Sorry sir.”

“What just happened?” I say.

“Well, there was a 7/11 robbery twenty minutes ago. The perps left the scene in a green sedan, supposedly a Crown Victoria. We just got a physical description on the bad guys. Sorry to have wasted your time, sir.”

“Oh, it isn’t a problem at all. Thank you for maintaining law and order.” I say as the cop goes back to his car. I close my door, start my engine and gently roll away.

I feel light as a feather, the fear and grief had just evaporated. I feel good, that high you get after an adrenaline rush.

I’m approaching a red light, but just as I start to step on the brake the light turns green. Oh, life is good. I step on the gas pedal with glee. The engine would hum, but the valve cover are all rusted and instead I all I hear is their tortured flapping.

In the middle of the intersection I take a look to my left. Headlight are approaching fast…
I squeeze my eyes shut and grip my steering wheel with all my might. I hear the carnage, Boom! Crack, screeeeeech! I can feel the g-forces as my car is sent spinning. I’m bouncing around inside my car, eyes still closed, for what feels like an eternity.

The crash comes to an end soon enough. I open my eyes and I am looking out over the intersection. Another car is sitting in the middle of the road, completely demolished. There is a hole in the windshield. Oh my, there is the body of a little blond woman lying mangled out on the street.

The driver pops out of his car, a large black man, and he takes off running. He doesn’t get far as a cop car shows up and runs him down. It’s the cop from ten minutes ago.

Talk about coincidence, those must be the 7/11 robbers.

Back to my situation, I was just involved in a high speed collision. I wasn’t traveling to fast, but they had to have been, judging by how far the girl flew. Wow, my neck and shoulders are really sore.

Really, really, really, really sore. Also, my door doesn’t seem to be opening. I slide across the seat and exit through the passenger door. I walk around to look at the damage. I was t-boned, right in the middle of the driver’s side of my car. The two doors were dented, and the frame may or may not be dented a little bit.

I looked over to the other car, it was absolutely demolished. The front end was crushed all of the way back to the cockpit, the transmission was laying on the side of the road and the engine was sitting in the passenger seat.

You know what else I love about my car? It’s a tank.

My first story post on my first optional, personal blog.

This blog will be the new home to my short stories and novels that I just don't think are that great. Right now it will be all short stories.

My stories run the gamut of genres, from science-fiction to fantasy, to human interest, to action and others. This first story will be one of the science-fiction persuasion.

It's not the greatest story ever, but it surely isn't the worst. May I present to you, "John had Dream"


John had a Dream
by
Nick Wilson
John awoke with a start.

Where was he again? All he could think about was the dream he had which was repeating over and over in his mind. The dream about tricycles, finding love, dinosaurs and the end of the world.

It wasn’t the first time he had the dream and it probably wouldn’t be the last, it was always the same. First he would wake up from some slumber, not realizing where he was. Then he would get out of bed, brush his teeth and go about his day. At some point there would be a tricycle painted fire engine red.

In spite of all of the times he had the dream, John could never quite remember the details of it. The beginning was fine, it was normal enough, but things got hazy towards the end.

He didn’t want to face the day, but John forced himself out of bed and marched out of his room. Upon entering the kitchen he finally noticed the time. Blast! He was running late again, he would have to skip breakfast.

He checked his breath and was immediately repulsed. Whether he was late for work or not, John could not go to work with breath as hideous as his own.

A few moments later John was in his bathroom, brushing his teeth, trying to remember the rest of his dream. An image of a red tricycle was emblazoned in his mind, but there was more to it. Where was the trike? Who was riding it? It was inconsequential, really, because of where the dream went next.

An indeterminate amount of time after seeing the tricycle, John would find out that mankind has recreated dinosaurs on an island somewhere. Sort of like how it was done in the movies. But the next image John had was of a massive beast running amok in the city, killing ruthlessly anyone that crossed its path.

Well, John’s teeth were clean enough. He threw on a pair of pants and a nice button up shirt and rushed out of his house.

Driving to work was a pretty boring proposition that involved sitting in traffic for forty minutes and ignoring the honking from angry drivers. It left time for John’s mind to wander, and his wandering mind usually ended up thinking about his strange recurring dream.

As if a dinosaur rampaging through the city wasn’t a good enough sign that the end of the world was upon him, there was something later that really made the Earth stop spinning, but all John could remember was a countdown.

Something flashed by in John’s peripheral vision. On the outside shoulder of the interstate was a red motorcycle flying up the shoulder at what was easily eighty-five miles per hour.
Wait a second… Did it have a side car? Now that it was in the distance a little ways it looked just like a tricycle.

No, it couldn’t be. John thought that his mind was playing tricks on him, he had spent so much time dwelling on his dream that he was starting to see it in real life.

For the rest of the ride to work John just couldn’t help but feel his dream might have been coming to life. First he brushed his teeth without eating breakfast and now he saw a red tricycle. Which would mean that soon he would hear news of a dinosaur island. John turned up the news radio in hopes of hearing anything about resurrected dinosaurs.

Sadly, between his car and his work desk no news of dinosaurs arrived.

John wasn’t too perturbed, once he got to work he didn’t have time to idly think about his dreams. His boss, a beautiful woman his own age named Tracy, kept him pretty busy.
John didn’t mind, he just loved looking at her whenever she walked past his cubicle. He longed for her, yet she was his superior and he was way too scared to ask her out on a date.

About two hours into his shift John happily watched as Tracy walked past to the cubicle next to him.

“McKenzie, can you come with me to the convention this weekend?” John heard Tracy ask the girl who worked in the cubicle next to him.

“No, sorry, but I have to finish filing those reports on Saturday.” McKenzie replied.

“Is there any way you can put that off and do it on Monday?” Tracy’s voice again. John loved the sound of it, so soft, yet so strong.

“No, I missed two weeks of work last month while I took a vacation to Europe. I got a little too loose with my spending. Now I need the overtime hours to recover financially.”

Tracy thanked her for her time and walked to the cubicle across from John. He couldn’t help but look at her backside as she leaned to look over the top Harvey’s cubicle.

“Can you come to the convention this weekend?” Tracy asked.

“Sorry,” Harvey replied. “I can’t because my wife is expecting to have our baby sometime in the next couple of day and I need to be here just in case.”

“Very well.” Tracy turned around and John quickly started scribbling on a piece of paper to look like he was doing something important.

“John?”

John pretended to just now notice her presence. “Hey boss, what can I do for you?”

“There is a convention this weekend in Ohio and I need to bring along an assistant. Can you come along with me?”

John’s heart went all a flutter. He tried once to say “Yes” but couldn’t say anything because his throat had quickly become to dry. He covered it up with a cough and said. “Sure, I’d love to see Ohio.”

“Thank you so much. Meet me here on Friday at eight pm. We’ll take a business car to the airport. Plane leaves at 10:30.”

John gave her a cheesy thumbs up. Tracy smiled and left.

A few moments later, his heart rate had finally dropped enough for normal breathing again. He was going to a convention with Tracy. So what if he wasn’t the first, or even second choice. At least he was a choice, right? This was his chance to score some points, look good and ask her out on a real date! Life was looking up.

Later, at lunch, John was sitting alone eating his usual lunch of microwave chicken alfredo. He couldn’t even remember the last time he ate anything else for lunch.

As he was biting into his next to last bite of prepackaged goodness, he heard the theme from Jurassic Park coming from the staff room. Curious, John rose from his seat and to see what was going on. There was nobody in the staff room, yet the small television had its volume set to full and Jurassic Park was playing on screen.

Tracy walked up behind John. “Turn that down, would you. I can hear it from my office.”
John turned around to say it wasn’t him, but she had already returned to her office a little ways down the hall. Oh well, John walked up to the little television and turned it off.

He returned to his desk and finished his meal before resuming work.

Twenty minutes later Jurassic Park was blasting throughout the office again. John went back and found nobody in the staff room. Once again he turned it off and returned to his desk.

Another twenty minutes went by and once again the movie was blasting the roars of dinosaurs and the music of John Williams all throughout the office. This time before he turned it off John went into Tracy’s office to tell her what was going on.

“What is it John?” She asked him.

“Someone keeps turning on the television in the staff room, and it ain’t me.”

“Whatever, lets take a look at it.” Tracy then rose from her desk and followed John to the staff room. He turned down the volume and then turned off the television. “Somehow it keeps turning on at full volume. It’s probably Frank who keeps doing it.”

“Frank is sick today.” Tracy responded. “Here, let me take a look at the knobs and things.”

As she was toying with the television, John looked out the window. “Wow Tracy, do you get this view from your office too?”

Without even looking up from her work Tracy responded “Yes, sure do.”

“I didn’t even realize we were this close to the airport.” John stated. “I just don’t hear the airplane.”

“Well, I don’t think the planes come to close to the building.” Tracy said as she left the television. She walked up next to John to look out of the window. “Do you see that?”

“See what?” John asked.

“That plane coming into the runway, it looks like its smoking or something.”

John scanned the horizon for a few frantic seconds before finally finding what Tracy was looking at. “How did you see that, your vision is amazing.”

Instead of answering Tracy said, “I don’t think that plane is going to make it.”

John stared at the plane for a few more moments before voicing his thoughts. “He’ll make it, they always do. It’s a trained pilot in there. Just watch, you’ll see.”

The two watched in silence as the aircraft approached the runway, somehow the jumbo jet seemed to be speeding up as it approached the runway. John now knew the aircraft wasn’t going to make.

“Tracy, we should look away.” he advised.

They didn’t, they watched in abject horror as the jet came down to attempt a landing. It was traveling too fast to actually land on the runway and didn’t touchdown until the final hundred yards of tarmac.

John grabbed Tracy and quickly turned her around. The explosion was unmistakable, the massive boom actually shook the office building.

John was afraid to look back at the accident, but he did anyway. The fireball was so intense that he didn’t notice the flying piece of plane debris that was flying straight at him until it was too late.

The massive chunk of metal was twisting and turning violently through the air and by the time John finally noticed, it was crashing through the window.

John braced himself to face death. Then everything froze. The piece of plane was just floating in the window, pieces of broken glass were hovering in the air. A chunk of debris stopped about four inches in front of Tracy’s terrified face.

A woman’s voice boomed from everywhere around him. “Simulation paused. Death of subject imminent.”

John looked around, but could find no source for the voice. “Where are you!”

Everything started to disappear around John. First the ceiling folded over onto itself and vanished, then the walls, then the floor.

Now all that was left was floating debris, Tracy and John. But the floating debris disappeared piece by piece. “What? No!” John screamed as Tracy’s lower body folded over onto her upper body, and then just disappeared.

John was standing alone in a massive expanse of pure white.

“Simulation will restart in sixty seconds unless the terminate button is pressed.”

John’s dream came back to him in a flurry. He woke up, brushed his teeth, saw the three wheeled vehicle, the “tricycle”, finally started on a path with Tracy, the violent explosions. It was all in his dream, he just remembered it fuzzy and out of order.

Now the world ended, and his time was counting down to from sixty.

“Simulation will restart in thirty seconds.”

John panicked. “How do I cancel the restart?”

“The simulation can be cancelled by pressing the terminate button.”

That didn’t help John in the slightest. “Where is the Terminate button?”

“The subject need merely to initiate the terminate button.”

John’s heart rate was elevated higher than he had ever thought it could go. “What does that mean?”

“Twenty seconds until simulation restart. Subject must initiate the terminate button.”

“Initiate the terminate button?!” John shouted in exasperation. But to his surprise a podium appeared in the floor and rose up until it was about chest high. In the middle of the podium was a button. Presumably the terminate button.

John reached for the button, but found it had a clear covering over top of it.

“Fifteen seconds. Please enter you password.”

John didn’t have time to be annoyed. A keyboard appeared on the podium between the edge and the button. What could the password be. He tried typing his name J-O-H-N. A small beep told him it was the wrong password.

T-R-A-C-Y John tried the name of the woman he longed for. Nothing.

“Ten Seconds”

John was in full panic. His mind raced as his time counted down.

“Five seconds.”

T-R-Y-C-I-C-L-E Another small beep. Wait, he spelled tricycle wrong.

“Four seconds.”

T-R-I-C-Y-C-L-E. The beep again.

“Three seconds.”

John thought as hard as he could. But the only thing that came to his mind was the damned Jurassic Park theme song.

“Two seconds.”

Wait a second. J-U-R-A-S-S-I-C “One second” P-A-R-K. The glass lifted away. John reached for the button, his fingers were just about to touch it.

John awoke with a start. Where was he again?