In Your Car

"IN YOUR CAR"

by Jamie S. Rich

"Do you need a ride?"

Alex looked down into the cab of the orange Volkswagen. The Beetle purred with a warm hunger, and it caused Alex to take a step back. He adjusted the black bag slung over his shoulder. The strap was pinching a nerve, and it was making his back ache.

"I can always use a ride," Alex replied. "Are you going downtown?"

"No."

"Well, I can take the bus--"

"I'll take you for two bucks."

"What?"

"I need gas money."

"Oh . . . okay, sure."

Carl reached over and pushed the door open. It came dangerously close to Alex's kneecap. He vaguely wondered if Carl had meant to hit him.

The seat leather crackled under Alex's weight. It was stiff, like a dry tortilla. Alex closed the door and hugged his bag to his chest. As the car pulled out of its parking space, Alex realized, as if it were a new revelation, that there was a cash transaction involved. He fished his wallet out of his back pocket.

"Will two be enough?"

"Well, three would be asking too much. I need to get out by the college. I'm meeting Vicks there."

Alex took three bills out of his wallet. He shoved them into the empty ashtray between him and Carl.

"Is it okay if we run by my place first? Vicks left her jacket there."

That was twice Carl mentioned Vicky's name, and in that familiar, cute-cute way that made her sound like a cough drop. Alex was starting to keep track in his head.

"I put the money in the ashtray."

Carl laughed. "That's funny," he said. "I just quit smoking."

Carl was slim to the point of looking anorexic. Or British. Alex noted that the veins stood out on his forearms when he shifted gears.

"Is this Rush we're listening to?" Alex asked.

"Mmm-hmmm," Carl answered, his teeth clamping down on his bottom lip.

Alex hated Rush. Why did he get in the car? Christ, he could have walked home in the time it would take them just to get to Carl's apartment. And the walking would be glorious, solitary, Carl in absentia.

"Where were you heading?" Carl asked.

"Oh, I was just going to a shop down here. The newsstand. Looking for a magazine."

It was a fanzine, actually. A little photocopied tract for girls who were angry but were also into cutsie things, not punk rock. It was a favorite of Vicky's that you couldn't get just anywhere, and he had bought it for her. But he couldn't tell Carl that. He almost thought he could feel it through the canvas of his bag, a lump of folded-paper guilt.

"A long way for a magazine," Carl chuckled.

"It's mainly for the atmosphere," Alex lied. "Chain bookstores just don't compare to the old newspaper stands, you know?"

That's it. Play up your feyness. That'll make him comfortable, defuse the threat.

"Shit," Carl moaned. "We're hitting every red light. What's up with that?"

Alex looked at the car next to them. It was a blue muscle car, the kind where the engine sticks up through the hood. Alex was surprised it didn't have flames painted on the side. The driver was muscular, wearing a tank top and mirrored RayBans. He saw Alex looking, smirked, and revved his engine. Carl looked over and gave the jock a thumbs up. "Way to go, man!" he said. "Hey, Alex, isn't that the kind of guy that used to beat you up in high school?"

"How would you know, Scrub?" Alex shot back. "The view couldn't have been very clear from inside the toilet."

"Fuck off," Carl snapped. The light turned green. Carl squealed his tires and rocketed past the muscle car. He took the corner at just over forty, a small screech coming up from under the car, the veins on his arm extending all the way to his neck.

Alex had gotten him. The old high-school nickname. He contemplated for a second bringing up the old joke about shit-eating grins but thought that would be bludgeoning the poor slob. What a lapse of judgement! Bringing up Alex's bully problems when Carl's own were so much worse!

The new street they were on had a stop sign on every other corner, so Carl chilled and kept the speed low. He reached out and turned the volume up on the stereo. Geddy Lee was hitting a particularly high and excruciatingly prolonged note. "Man, this part kills me every time," Carl said. "You know? I mean, listen to that voice."

"Yeah," Alex said, biting the chunks of sarcasm that buoyed the comment, hoping to restrain them before they escaped. "Have you heard that Pavement song where they namecheck him?"

Carl rolled down his window and spit out of it. Then he rolled it back up. "I hate that lo-fi bullshit," he said. "Why try to sound like crap? Pavement can afford studios."

"I hear Steve Malkmus lives around here."

"If I ever see him, I'll punch him in the gut. I mean, that effete stuff is so calculated. He's trying to be a rebel. Rush, man, they were rebels. They did what they wanted and didn't give a shit. People need Rush. That's what's great about them. They're always there, and people need them, but they just don't know it yet. Rush knows it, and that's why they stick around. Test for Echo was a true return to form."

"I just bought an old Beautiful South record," Alex said, "and it's pretty cool because the music is relatively insidious. They use traditional pop songs, like Burt Bacharach or Neil Diamond or something, but they have these real bitter and cynical lyrics over the top."

"Never heard of 'em."

"The main guy is Paul Heaton. He used to be in The Housemartins."

"Smiths-wannabes. Whiny shit."

"I think the best line he's ever written is, 'My heart's in the right place, and my heart's twice the size of his arse.'"

"That's stupid."

"What the hell are you talking about? That's awesome! There is so much bile in that line, such a hatred for being thrown over for some baboon."

"It's just crap. It doesn't even rhyme."

"It does when he sings it. He phrases it so 'heart's' lines up with 'arse.' It's dead clever."

"No, it thinks it's clever, but it's just not."

"Sure, Carl . . . this from a guy who likes Beck."

"What the hell is wrong with Beck?"

"He can't write. He's that weird kid in high school that made up poems that made no sense, but then pretended that they were deep because no one could understand them. No one could understand them because they were meaningless! And he's just like Rush when it comes to music--just pile a lot of shit on top of each other so no one will notice there isn't a song."

"Oh, my God, Alex, you're nuts." Carl rolled down the window and spit again. "You know . . . Vic likes Beck."

Number three. And as a spike to an argument, with the name honed down to a sharp blade.

"I'm sure Victoria has her reasons," Alex replied.

They had entered Carl's block, a row of old houses with front porches and pointed roofs. When Alex's dad visited, he had commented that the Northwest looked a lot like the Mid-West. It hadn't adopted the faux-Mexican stucco look that California had, but stuck to the good, old-fashioned American tradition of solid home building. His dad probably would have moved here, but he would've had to be near Alex's mom. And his dad hated the strain of "hippy treehugger" that lived in the area. If only he knew that many of the houses were occupied in the same way as Carl's--about six kids crammed into it, all musicians, all non-Republican. Yet another American tradition invaded.

Carl parked by the curb, going against traffic. "I'll be right out," he said. "This'll give you a chance to be alone with your sick ideas."

Then again, maybe there were some things Carl and Alex's dad could agree on.

The engine was still running. Carl ejected the Rush tape and surfed the radio. He settled on oldies. The Beach Boys. "Shut Down."

Alex looked around the car. The backseat was a mess. Food bags, magazines, tape cases. On the floor behind Carl's seat, there was a pile of clothes. A paycheck stub was sitting on top. It was the same kind of check they used where Alex worked. He knew he shouldn't, but he couldn't help it. He grabbed the stub and quickly examined it. Nothing spectacular. Carl was taking home very little, working very little. Alex put the stub back on the clothes.

The two of them vaguely knew of each other in high school. Neither of them was popular or cool, but they were misfits in slightly different ways and hung out in different misfit crowds. Alex was part of the smart kids who traded comic books and listened to weird music instead of joining the chess club, and Carl hung out with drama kids and played in band.

After high school, they didn't see each other at all. Alex thought Carl went away for a while, while Alex went to the local commuter college. Post-school, Alex was designing websites and making 'zines. He ran into Carl, who worked at a copy shop, and Carl invited him to come see his band. It was at the show that Alex met Vicky, who he had heard about because she also did a 'zine that he enjoyed very much. He and Vicky hit it off, and they talked a lot after that. Vicky wrote up Carl's band in her next issue, and Carl saw it. When Alex and Vicky went to another of Carl's shows, Carl asked Alex to introduce him. The next thing Alex knew, Carl and Vicky were dating.

Alex was thinking of starting a new 'zine called I Hate Boys in Bands.

Carl tossed a jacket into the backseat. It was dark blue with a white fur collar. "Vicks came over last night to watch some videos," he said, getting in the car.

That was number four.

"She forgot it when she left this morning."

Ouch. And it had two prongs.

Traffic was heavy going into downtown. It was poor timing. There was a minor league baseball game going on, and it was screwing up everything.

"Did you ever know Derek Malone?" Carl asked.

"I'm not sure," Alex replied. "Was he that guy in school who ate food off the ground for money?"

"Uh-huh," Carl said. "I saw him the other day. He's like a junior executive or something at a shoe company."

"Wow. That's weird."

They were stuck in the right lane behind a bus, and every time it stopped, they had to stop. Carl tried to get out. He'd signal and start to nose over, but no one would let him into the left lane, and eventually the bus would go and people behind them would start honking.

"Hey, Carl, how come every time I'm with you we end up talking about high school?"

"What do you mean?"

"You didn't buy that crap about it being the best years of your life, did you?"

"Shit! If I did, I may as well cap myself now."

"Maybe you should give that some thought."

Carl didn't even look at him. He pushed the Rush tape back into the player.

The bus was picking up a guy in a wheelchair. And it appeared the lift was stuck midway.

"You know, he didn't actually eat the food," Carl said.

"Who?"

"Derek . . . He'd put it in his mouth if he had to, and then when people looked away in disgust, he'd spit it out. Most of the time, though, it was sleight of hand."

"That's comforting to know. I'd hate to think he exploited Asian children and ate food off the ground. One crime against humanity is enough."

"Asian children?"

"A shoe joke. Never mind."

"Fuckin' bus! Is there a good side street to your house?"

"Yeah, hang a right," Alex said, "and then take a left at G Street."

"But then won't we have to circle back a couple of blocks?"

"Well, yeah."

"Fuck it." Carl slammed his fist against the steering wheel. "Why is this taking so damn long?"

"It was your idea."

"Bite off, Alex."

Alex leaned his head against the window. The glass was cold against his skin. It made him long for the freeness of the night air, for an endless sky of stars, for a warm kiss to fight away the chill.

Carl pulled the car up next to a fire hydrant on Alex's corner. Alex shoved open the door and got out. "Thanks," he said. The concrete was a hard relief.

"No problem," Carl said. "It all goes to the cause. Should I say 'hi' to Vicks for you?"

Number five.

"Sure. That would be groovy."

"Okay, man. Check your head."

"Uh-huh."

Alex closed the door. He gave one last look and waved good-bye. Carl drove away.

Walking up the steps into his building, Alex felt every crag in the cement through the soles of his shoes. His feet were tired.

A bulb was burnt out in the hallway leading to his apartment. It was dark. When he opened his door, it was dark inside his studio, as well, and the blinking red light of his answering machine was the only thing waiting for him.

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