The low, smooth rumble of the 390 engine made Josh smile. It sounded like a car. The light blue 1965 Ford Galaxie had been through a lot, but today its new life began.
“She sounds great doesn’t she?” Dale said from behind the open hood of the car. “The new carburetor is a thing of beauty, man. Put it together myself. The freeze plugs were every bit as frustrating as I thought they’d be.”
Dale approached the driver’s side of the car, pulling out a pack of cigarettes with a grease covered hand, propping one in his mouth and lighting it in a manner he’d probably done a million times before. Dale had gone to high school with Josh’s father. According to him, Dale was a gearhead even back then. Dale inhaled, then blew the smoke away from Josh.
“I’ll tell you the bitch of the bunch though. All the shit we did to bring this car back to life and the hardest part was the goddamn radiator.”
“How’s that?”
“Well, you ever notice how the side of the car says, three-fifty-two, but the engine in it is a three-ninety?”
“Yeah. Erica’s dad took the engine from a sixty-nine and put it in this sometime in the nineties.”
Dale nodded.
“Thing is the radiator hoses go on the opposite sides in a sixty-nine. Thought I was going insane for a minute. Ended up going through three different radiators before I found the right one.”
The radiator had been what Josh had originally brought the car in for. It had this habit of overheating and according to Erica, the radiator had been rebuilt half a dozen times. So it seemed like time to replace it. And as long as he was having Dale do that, why not fix all the other little problems, like the shitty carburetor, and those freeze plugs?
When he and Erica began their relationship, the Galaxie sat in her mother’s garage having not been touched since her father’s death years ago. Josh saw it and imagined driving on an empty road, the sun rising or maybe setting, and Erica sitting next to him. He felt the car had a romantic nostalgia to it.
“So what’s all this going to run me?”
“Two grand will cover it. That’s family prices.”
“No problem.”
Josh thought it was going to be three. He counted out twenty-one hundred-dollar bills from his wallet. He was looking forward to surprising Erica with her now fully functional classic car.
Out on the road, Josh waited for the traffic to dissipate on South Tacoma Way before really hitting the gas pedal. The Galaxie wanted to go fast. He doubted that’d be a viable excuse if he got pulled over, but he wasn’t too worried about that.
With the window down and a warm early summer breeze, Josh Carter let himself just exist in the moment. Or at least he tried. He couldn’t help thinking of everything that brought him to this life.
He’d bought it. This new life of his.
The Condo. The rehabbed classic car. Of course he hadn’t bought Erica, but then again he did buy those extravagant dates, didn’t he? The weekend at the Salish Lodge? That night in Seattle? That bar crawl through McMenamin’s Elks Temple that ended in that tiny secret bar? All those little adventures of the past few months bought and paid for by who?
He didn’t feel guilt about the money he had stolen. Instead he had thoughts that bothered him for not being guilty. Or maybe that’s what guilt was?
Josh physically shook his head as if the thoughts would fall out. He pulled the switch for the headlights as the sun got lower.
Byron sighed. Getting busted sucked. Not only did the cops destroy his front door and take all of his drugs, but since word got around about the bust, Byron’s constantly ringing phone sat silent. Even when he ran into Crazy Gun Jeff at the Fast-Mart, Jeff acted like he didn’t know him.
And they took the cash Paul had given him. He’d kept that money in a hiding spot in the bottom drawer of his dresser, but they’d found it.
At least the cops left the beer in the fridge. As Byron sat in his bathrobe watching Survivor with a mild beer buzz going, he came to the realization that reality television without the use of heavy narcotics was some boring ass shit. Something would happen on the show and then right after it happened, they’d cut to one of the contestants explaining what just happened as if he hadn’t been watching twenty fucking seconds ago.
Byron took another drink of his beer and wondered how long it’d be until he got his hands on some real drugs. Maybe he could find a party and get high there. Nope. Wednesday evening. No parties on Wednesday. He was about to put on some more X-Files when what was left of the front door opened. Who the-
“Knock, knock,” a voice said.
It took a moment for Byron to realized who it was. Or maybe he just didn’t want to believe it.
Because the man in the doorway was supposed to be in jail.
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