“Stop hitting him, then,” she yelled, and promptly pointed to the now rather bloody face of a dusty boy. “What did he ever do to you, other, than weigh less? Get off him!” Her ponytail swished lightly from the jostle.
“I’m not afraid of you,” Bret sneered as he looked at her.
Runaway moved closer to Bret and put her foot, with that pointed toe, right between his legs, as far up as she could without touching precious territory. Bret was still sitting on the poor beaten-down boy, so Runaway had her foot on his stomach.
“I’ll tell you what, Bretsky,” she mocked, “You may not be afraid of me, but if you don’t get off this boy, your voice is going be in the soprano range and you’ll be just like a pansy, singing with all the girls in the choir.”
Grant, who was also a rather large boy, not because of weight like Bret but because of pure muscle mass, was standing behind Runaway and glaring at Bret, ready to back her up.
“You’re the pansy, Runaway,” Bret said, as he pushed off the kid and immediately got up, apparently not wanting to find out whether she would follow through or not.
“By the way, how’s that little number-three pedal car?” he jabbed. “Oh, that’s right—you lost it.” He stared at her.
“Keep talking, fatso,” Runaway said with a smirk on her face.
Just as Bret got to his feet, Miss Nelson walked up with daggers in her eyes.
“What is going on here?” she demanded.
Runaway looked at Bret and said, with the sweetest voice she could muster, “Well Miss Nelson, we had just come out of class when we saw that Bret was beating up this new student. I’m just trying to tell him to stop.” She looked up at Miss Nelson as innocently as she could with her big green eyes.
Miss Nelson glared at Bret, grabbed his arm and snapped at him. “I have had it with you, you little tyrant.” Seething, she dragged him to the principal’s office, where he was punished with a three-day suspension. Those were the happiest three days of the entire school year for us.
Meanwhile, Runaway looked down at the boy lying in the dirt. His nose was covered in blood, while the rest of him was covered in dirt and splattered blood. When she reached out her hand to help him up, he just looked at her for a minute and then took hold of her hand. He stood and tried to wipe the dirt and blood off, but it was pointless. Brandon handed him a handkerchief to wipe the blood off his face.
“You do not have to assist me, you know—I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” the boy said as he attempted to clean up his nose and face.
“I’m sure you can,” she answered, “But,” she added, “Bret is the school bully, and I just thought you might like some help, seeing as you’re new to our school and all.”
The boy just looked at Runaway and didn’t say anything. By now, the crowd had left, and he stood there staring at all of us. I could tell he didn’t know what to think about what had just happened. A girl had come over to help him?
Weird,
I thought.
Does this make sense?
“Where are you from?” Runaway asked, just as innocently as she had spoken to Miss Nelson.
“New York—Millbrook, actually.” His voice was flat, but held an air of superiority.
“Hmm,” she raised her eyebrows. “I don’t exactly know where that is, but do they have good chocolate malts in Millbrook?”
“I cannot accurately respond, as I am not familiar with them,” the boy replied, still looking at her rather quizzically.
She wrinkled her eyebrows. I knew she was as confused as I was about this kid never having a malt… ever. But she quickly shrugged it off and said, “Wow, that’s odd. Well, after school I’ll introduce you. I know a little diner that makes the best… okay?”
“Um…” he paused. “All right—certainly, then,” he consented.
Brandon had been standing next to me, staring at this boy from New York, when he suddenly said, “You talk kinda weird… why?”
The boy stared back at him. “I beg your pardon?”
Brandon elaborated. “I mean, you use weird words.”
Grant quickly hit Brandon in the arm. “He speaks English, dork—he just does it better than you.” Grant threw a grin to the new kid. He seemed to appreciate it, because he smiled back.
“My name is Runaway,” she interrupted as she introduced herself and then the rest of us.
“The big guy over there is Grant Taylor—you don’t really want to mess with him, as he thinks football is life.” She winked at the boy. “That’s Brandon—the one who gave you the handkerchief—and by the way, if you ever need one again, ask Brandon—he always has them—although, I’d personally watch out for the snot.”
The boy looked warily at the handkerchief in his left hand while Brandon stared at the ground and kicked a small rock aside.
Runaway continued with her introductions. “That over there is Topher,” she said pointing to me. “Short for Christopher, but you can call him Topher. He worries about everything, but it’s cool—you’ll get used to it.”
Great,
I thought.
Thanks, Runaway.
She now leaned in and looked him straight in the eye. “What’s your name?”
The boy looked directly at her, still questioning what he had gotten himself into, and just what exactly had happened.
“Stephen,” he said, as he stood up straight and took pride in his dirt and blood. “Stephen Morton.” He paused, and then looked her straight in the eye, and added, “Stephen with a ‘ph’.”
That was how we had met one of our best friends. Stephen was rather tall, with dark hair and eyes. There was something elegant about him. He was not the kind of person who spoke often, on every subject, or jabbered nonsensically. I would have called him more “pithy,” in that he usually had sarcastic—yet gentlemanly—comments for most situations. Not that we could understand him more than half of the time. His vocabulary was highly elevated—he was like the walking standard of what proper English should be. He was academically brilliant and always spoke in the most refined manner. Years later, as an adult, I read
The Three Musketeers,
and was struck by how much Stephen and Athos were similar in their characteristics—gentlemanly, ethical, articulate, and crazy smart.
Stephen’s dad had a doctorate in botany—he ran a botanical garden. His mother was a librarian. Both parents insisted on making him read constantly. They did not tolerate simplistic thoughts or explanations. What we enjoyed was that Stephen always liked adding a bit of sarcasm into everything he said.
We were happy to learn that Stephen’s family had moved into our neighborhood about the same time as Bret’s family moved out. We always teased him, because he came from New York and we considered him our resident east-coaster. He was mostly quiet and shy in the beginning, but we weren’t fooled—he had one of those tempers that would blow up after going months or years without getting mad.
He also had the memory of an elephant—he never forgot or forgave Bret for the schoolyard beating he had taken. Consequently, when we were in junior high school, Stephen finally got his revenge on Bret.
Stephen patiently held his grudge for years before the two got into a fight again over what seemed to be nothing. If I recall correctly, it was because one of them looked at the other one the wrong way. Instead of Stephen backing down from Bret’s glares, he popped off with a sarcastic remark—something about how Bret must find him enormously handsome, because he was always staring at him. This put Bret completely out and so he jumped up and cleared his lunch bench. He headed toward Stephen, thinking he would back down—or, at the very least, get up and run.
But Stephen waited for Bret as he approached. Then he punched him the moment he got close. He beat the crap out of Bret. It was a wonderful sight to see.
Bret, knowing he had lost after suffering what appeared to be a broken nose, called Stephen a pansy and went his way (hell bent on revenge, I’m sure). Stephen allowed himself to bask in the moment and even gloated a little, with a sly, telltale smirk. Even if he and Bret got suspended, Stephen noted, it was well worth it.
Chapter Three
Things really started to change for us as we got older and headed into our final year of junior high school. Our hearts and heads were full of stories and songs—images of cars and people living a life we had never known—yearning for something none of us could describe, yet happy with the life we faced.
We spent every waking moment at The Oasis, picking Mr. Thompson’s brain for more stories to satisfy our appetites.
Soon we all—especially Runaway—developed a yearning to own and race our own cars. Part of her dream began to materialize when we were still about ten years old. We had come to a consensus that, come hell or high water, we would have cars by our sixteenth birthday. We didn’t know how we would get them, but we were determined to try anything.
From listening to Mr. Thompson’s tales, we learned specific things about cars—how engines worked, and how to make every engine different than had been when it rolled off of the production line. Runaway’s dad was also a wealth of information, as he was always working on some engine or something. Growing up during the 50s, he was a true “shade tree mechanic” and knew more about cars than Mr. Thompson did. He had built many hot rods, and even still owned his 1954 Chevy from high school, and his dream car—a 1940 Buick Special. It looked something of a mobster car from the 40s, I always half expected a guy in a black suit clad in a matching hat to be leaning out of the window with a Tommy gun. But, he explained engines where Mr. Thompson had left off.
Some of the things that are most important to know about building engines are horsepower, gear ratios, and what a simple change of a rear axle could do.
We didn’t like new cars, because they were too difficult to figure out. Heck, with all the fuel injection, computer chips, and smog paraphernalia, you could get lost in an engine and never find your way out.
Our passion was for the old engines with carburetors—the ones you could actually work on without needing a $10,000 machine to diagnose what was wrong with an engine. We loved old cars; cars we could work on ourselves with screwdrivers, ratchets, and other simple tools—cars we could make our own with simple modifications and a couple of extra parts. These were the things we dreamed about.
Another reason we were biased against new cars was that they didn’t allow for space in the engine compartment—working on a new car was like trying to put your hand in a garbage disposal. Something as simple as changing the oil was as difficult as trying to get a hand into a snack machine when the chips wouldn’t fall.
None of us liked foreign cars, either—Stephen called them “rice rockets.” We were partial to American-built cars. Runaway was especially big on this one. She hated foreign cars, even older foreign cars. She did have great respect for some, like Mercedes and Porches, of course, but according to her, the only real cars were the ones that were made in Detroit.
We were so entrenched in the lost days of Mr. Thompson and that bygone era that we literally tried to recreate it ourselves. We were inspired by stories of amazing cars doing amazing things, and every one of us wanted to live that dream.
Maybe it sounds weird that five kids could love cars that much at the age of ten, but that was what we were growing up on. Cars were our biggest love. The Wall of Fame from the diner was always in the back of our minds, and we somehow knew that one day we would make it onto the wall.
We decided to work and save enough money to buy our own cars. Therefore, all of our time was spent washing cars, mowing lawns, delivering newspapers, and whatever odd jobs we could find.
Half the time I felt a little like the character Billy from
Where the Red Fern Grows,
saving my money in an old baking soda can, Billy did everything he could to save money to buy two hunting hounds. I saved my money and hoped and prayed for a car.
The more we worked and saved, the more determination we got. Runaway, I think, always had more of a fierce determination than all of us put together, but that was just her.
Finally, in the summer when just about all of us turned thirteen, Runaway had saved enough money to buy her car. She always had a fancy for the 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air coupe and we knew that was just what she would buy. People’s tastes in cars are very personal, and at times, can be obsessive. It’s like the difference between being attracted to blondes or brunettes—you can’t explain it—you just prefer one over the other. That was how I saw Runaway and her ’57 Chevy—pure attraction, mingled with obsession.
People are drawn to manufacturers just as they are drawn to people—there is chemistry. Individuals who have an undying passion for a Chevelle will more than likely also like Corvettes and Camaros, as all are made by Chevy. But the Chevy lover will not necessarily be interested in Buicks, as Buicks are the luxury muscle cars. Likewise, a Ford lover will not care for either a Chevy or a Buick. And so this was what it was for Runaway—she was a hard core Chevy lover.
I will never forget the day that Runaway brought her dream car home. Being thirteen, we were just excited about one of us owning a car.
That day, Grant, Stephen, Brandon, and I were all standing out in front of her house waiting for her. Earlier, she had left us a message that she had found a car and her dad was taking her to go buy it. We weren’t really surprised that she was buying a car, but we were amazed that she had found one so quickly. Now here we all were, gathered in front of her house, waiting impatiently.
“What do you think she got?” Brandon asked.
“Got me,” I said. But I knew she would not have bought anything other than her ’57.
“Oh, she probably got some hot rod,” Grant said reflectively.
Stephen broke in. “I am fully confident she purchased her Chevy,” he said as he watched the street for their car.
“No way,” Brandon piped up. “Do you have any idea what those things cost? She’d have to do a lot more saving than just three years’ worth. And they are a rare find, too.”
“Would you care to make that a bet?” Stephen said impassively, not looking at him at all.
“You’re on! I’ll bet you your paper route money for three days.” Brandon turned his head and looked down at the ground grudgingly. “I’m sure she probably got some old junker, and her dad is nuts to let her buy it.”
“Perhaps,” said Stephen. “Nevertheless, it is still her purchase, and therefore we must respect it.”
“Respect it?” Brandon said, disgusted. “What for?”
“Because, you simp,” Stephen said stoically, “she is our friend.” He now allowed himself to look at Brandon.
Stephen’s tone was final and he clearly was not open for any more discussion.
“I think you’re both wrong,” Grant said.
“I think you’re both right,” I interrupted, while peering down the street of our neighborhood. I squinted my eyes. “How about just a piece of junk?”
Everyone looked up and saw Runaway and her dad coming down the street. It looked like her dad was towing what seemed to be a ton of multi-colored scrap metal on a flatbed car trailer. As they drove into the driveway, we could all see that Stephen and Brandon were both right. Runaway had bought a ’57 Chevy, but it was the grossest, most dilapidated thing we had ever seen.
In envisioning our cars over the years, they had been perfect—perfectly painted, perfectly running, and perfectly put together. We had never imagined our cars as pieces of junk, least of all Runaway’s, so this was more than shocking. But here it was, before us. I wondered what she had been thinking. When Runaway did things, she always did them in the extreme.
“What the hell?” Grant commented first, clearly puzzled.
“I win,” Stephen said to Brandon as he watched Runaway and her dad pull in and park in the driveway. “You owe me.”
“That’s not fair!” Brandon yelled as he pointed at the trailered car. “The car is a heap!”
Stephen now looked at Brandon. “It does not matter—the bet was that she would buy a ’57 Chevy, and I won—you owe me cold, hard cash, buddy.”
“Do you know how much that is going to cost me?” Brandon whined, staring back at Stephen.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do,” he replied with a slight smile.
Grant finally interrupted with impatience. “Would the two of you shut up and settle it somewhere else? It’s becoming annoying.”
“It’s still not fair,” Brandon whined again, looking dejectedly at Grant.
“Well that’s what you get for making bets with Mr. New England over there,” I said, laughing and looking at Brandon.
“I don’t care—I still don’t think I should have to pay him, when he only won half the bet.”
“Brandon, for God’s sake, would you finally shut up about it? You lost—deal with it,” Grant said. He was starting to get more than irritated.
“Well, I still don’t care, I…”
“Oh! For the love of everything that is holy!” Stephen said, rolling his eyes. “You don’t owe me anything. Disregard the whole arrangement, if you persist in being a baby about it!”
“I’m not a baby,” Brandon said.
“You are, too!” we all yelled at the same time, glaring at him.
“Okay, fine—I’ll keep your unfair bet,” Brandon conceded.
“Fine—now would you shut it?” Grant said impatiently.
“Yes, but one more thi…”
“Brandon!” Grant and I both yelled.
“Okay, fine—I’ll shut up now.” He sniffed, wiping his nose with a dirty handkerchief, looking completely wounded.
By the time we had finished our arguing, Runaway had gotten out of the car and was walking over to all of us—or perhaps “walking” is too calm of a word. “Skipping” was more like it.
“Well, what do you think?” She clearly hadn’t noticed the bickering, but even if she had, I don’t think it would have mattered. She had a grin from ear to ear and a gleam in her eye.
We didn’t really know what to say about the ridiculous piece of junk sitting on the car trailer. I thought it best to not blurt out my initial thought, but I also knew it was pointless to lie. The problem was, I couldn’t say anything positive, and I knew it.
“We’re speechless, Runaway, really…” I managed to stutter.
Not knowing where to begin addressing the many problems with the car, I just stared and let it sink in. Good Lord, this car was ugly. It seemed to be a complete lost cause and a waste of money.
First off, the car was probably about six or seven different colors, and that was not an exaggeration. What was worse, it was painted without rhyme or reason, as if it had been squirted by a two-year-old with cans of spray paint. Either someone had been practicing graffiti, or the car had been seriously vandalized.
Besides being multiple colors, the car had flat, rotted tires with pitted rims that most people would be ashamed to put on a car. This car had all four tires thus disgraced.
On one side of the car, the shocks were completely broken—the body was sitting not more than five inches from the ground, apparently resting entirely on the frame. Cobwebs hung from every visible part of the car. In some places, you couldn’t even see through them to know what they were covering. Most of the windows were either broken or missing. The headlights were smashed in and playing host to some insects that I didn’t care to meet.