FRITZ’S CAR

       Rounding the corner in muddied boots and hard hat in hand, I looked down the block and there he was, perched on our stoop like a king on his throne. As I approached, his eyes lit up with a look of permanent jest, defying a lifetime of sorrow, and a smile spread wide on his grizzled face. And then, as if my presence signaled some unspoken marker, he reached into his baggy pants and pulled out a half-pint bottle of whiskey. With great ceremony, he untwisted the cap and offered me a hit. As always, I politely declined, and Fritz then tipped back the small bottle, taking two swallows, one for me and one for himself. Satisfied, he carefully recapped the half-pint and returned it to his pocket. It was now my turn to pull out my pack of Marlboros and offer him a smoke, which he graciously accepted. We lit our cigs, sitting next to each other, and exchanged small talk for a while. This was our routine at the end of my workday, and it had been for the few weeks I’d been a tenant at the Melvin hotel.

       When I first arrived in Denver, I connected with Lisa, a girl I had dated briefly back in New York City, where I’d attended Columbia University. Lisa was spending the summer in Denver and asked me to look her up should I ever travel there. She said she’d be staying at the YWCA. Having completed my sophomore year and feeling intensely adrift, I decided to stick out my thumb on Interstate 80 and hitchhike out to the Rocky Mountain state. Arriving with very little money and no place to stay, I was grateful for Lisa’s offer. She managed to sneak me into her room at the YWCA three nights in a row until the Christian staff figured out there was a man in the building after curfew. They promptly kicked us both out, but by that time Lisa had met up with friends in the suburbs and I had landed a construction job downtown.

       From a distance, the Melvin Hotel looked like a dusty three-storied picture of decrepitude, with a slight tilt hinting at imminent and catastrophic collapse. Up close, it was even worse. But to my young eyes, it was a saving grace, because, with a job in hand, I could afford my own room. And not just any room, but the luxury suite. According to the grumpy concierge, it was luxury because it was the only room in that fine establishment with its own bathroom. For an extra ten bucks a week, on top of the basic rate of fifteen, it was well worth it.

       It turned out that my room was situated right next to the room occupied by Fritz and his wife. At first, I thought it would be a good thing to know my immediate neighbors, the people with whom I shared a wall. Then I met the wife. It was hard to imagine a more unfriendly face, and my impulse was to turn and run away. By chance, I happened to cross paths with her out in the hallway and I said, “Hello”. She turned and looked at me with an expression that seemed to say, “I will stab you to death with my stiletto if you say that again.” The following day, with a subtlety only I could appreciate, I asked Fritz about his wife. He told me that she’d had a rough life, harder than his own in many ways. That’s why they were still together, they shared an understanding of life. Plus, every day before she left to begin her waitress shift at the diner, she slipped Fritz a fiver, just enough to buy his daily ration of Wild Turkey. If that wasn’t true love, he didn’t know what was.

        One Friday, after work, Fritz and I were having our usual smoke on the stoop of the Melvin when, out of the blue, Fritz asked me if I’d ever seen his car.

        I said, “No. I didn’t know you had a car.”

       “Oh, I’ve got a beaut,” he said, the wrinkles deepening around his eyes.

       “Really? What kind?”

       “1962 Chrysler Imperial 300 four-door sedan, fully automated, push-button everything, even the transmission is push-button.”

       “Really? I didn’t know they made a push-button transmission.”

       “Oh yeah. One of a kind. Only made them that one year. A real collector’s item.”

       “Where is it? Does it run?”

       “Does it run. You wanna see it?”

       “Yeah. Where?”

       “It’s parked in the open lot just a few blocks west. C’mon, I’ll show you.”

        Fritz slowly picked himself up off the stoop and we ambled west a few blocks toward the outskirts of town. We arrived at the parking lot, its perimeter protected by nothing more than a rusty chain-link fence. There was no barrier at the entrance. Inside, there were three cars scattered apart from each other, none of which anyone would want to steal. Most of the gravely lot was punctuated with scrub brush and a variety of weeds. Then Fritz pointed out the car in between the other two.

       “There she is. Ain’t she a beauty?”

       “Wow. She sure is big,” I said.

       “Biggest car ever made in America.”

       “Really? Wow. She’s a beast.” 

      “Barely a scratch on her,” Fritz said, standing between me and a huge scratch on the driver-side door.

       “Can I take a look inside?”

       “Go right ahead. Feast your eyes.”

       I swung open the heavy front door and scrunched down to survey the interior. It was in remarkably good condition, only a few rips here and there along some of the seams. Turning to look at Fritz, I asked him if I could get in. With a big smile, he already had the keys dangling in his hand. He extended them to me and said,

       “Help yourself. Start her up if you want.”

       I climbed into the big car, sinking into the cushion behind the steering wheel, and inspected the instrumentation on the broad dashboard. Everything seemed to work, at least it looked that way, even the radio. As I opened and closed the glove compartment, I heard Fritz say,

       “Fifty bucks.”

       Turning to look at him. I said, “What?”

       And he said, “Fifty bucks and she’s yours.”

       It took a moment before this registered, then I said,

       “You want to sell me your car?”

       “We never use her.”

       I looked at Fritz, disbelieving, and then said,

        “Let me get this straight. You want to sell me this car, for fifty bucks?”

       “Yep. Deal of a lifetime.”

       “What’s wrong with it?”

       “What do you mean, what’s wrong with it?” Fritz said, looking a little insulted.

       “Well, I mean, no offense, but why so cheap?”

       “It’s like I said, we never use it. It’s just sitting here.” Fritz shuffled his foot across some gravel and looked away as if a soft memory had just punched his heart. “And besides”, he went on, “you could put it to use a lot more than we ever will. Like that Lisa girl you told me about. You could take her for a spin.”

        He had a point. I hadn’t seen Lisa for a couple of weeks. She probably would enjoy a country drive.

       “Okay if I start her up?”, I asked.

       “That’s what keys are for,” Fritz said, smiling again.

       Inserting the key into the ignition, double-checking to make sure the push-button transmission was set on N, I turned the key. She started right up, purring like a big husky cat. Fritz had circled around the car to the passenger side, and as he opened the door, he said,

       “Let’s give it a go. See how she rides.”

       Taking a deep breath, I pushed the D button and immediately felt the transmission engage. Lifting my foot off the brake pedal, the beast slowly surged forward. Crossing the near-empty parking lot, I could hear the gravel crunching beneath the tires. Pulling to a stop at the exit, I turned and looked at Fritz, who was grinning from cheek to cheek.

       “Go on,” he said, indicating the street, “take her out.”

       And so, I did. We cruised around several blocks, me getting used to everything, while Fritz chatted along happily. After about fifteen minutes, we pulled back into the lot, and it was clear from the twinkle in Fritz’s eye that he knew he had a sale. I never did have much of a poker face.

        “You have the title and everything, it’s legal?”

       “Yessireebob,” he replied. “Course it’s legal.”

       “Sorry. Just making sure.”

       Fritz stuck out his hand, “Let’s shake on it and seal the deal, before you go all wobbly on me.”

       So, we shook hands and that was that. The beast was mine.

       Back at the Melvin, I pulled my small savings out from under my mattress and counted out fifty bucks. In the hallway, I handed it to Fritz. He quickly shoved the cash into his pocket, giving a hurried look over his shoulder to make sure nobody witnessed the transaction. He had already signed over the title to me. Leaning against the door frame and grinning as wide as ever, he said,

       “Good doing business with you.” And with a wink, a skip, and a quick about-face, he disappeared down the dimly lit hallway.

       It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, so Lisa and I were happy to be getting out of the city. I had called her up the night before and asked her if she would like to go for a ride out into the country.

       “In what?” She asked.

       “In a car,” I answered.

       “You have a car?” she asked. “When can I see it?”

       “How about tomorrow? I’ll pick you up in the afternoon. We can drive up to the Rockies and have dinner.”

       Traveling due west out of Denver, it didn’t take us long to feel the incline of the foothills. The shadow of the Colorado Rockies had already begun to darken the eastern edge of the massive mountain range, its looming silhouette growing ever taller in front of us. We had decided to explore our way up the mountains, confident we’d discover the perfect rustic restaurant along the way. We picked roads at random, always seeking higher elevation. The higher up we went, the darker it became. The roads gradually narrowed and the forest on both sides thickened. What little light was left of the day struggled to penetrate the trees. By the time we crested onto a level section of the road, we hadn’t seen a single sign of civilization for some time. All conversation between us had stopped. It was completely dark, the full onset of night falling like a hammer much faster than expected. The weak beams of the headlights cast a dim yellow light as I steered the Chrysler slowly forward, careful to stay on the road. We were lost, there was no getting around it, but I decided not to share that with Lisa. She seemed preoccupied enough biting her thumbnail without me adding to her anxieties.

       Then, the lights went out and the Chrysler rolled to a stop. Dead silence. The electrical system shut down. Even the dashboard lights were gone. Leaning forward to locate the ignition key, I began to hear soft murmurings of distress coming from Lisa. Finding the key, I quickly turned it, but nothing happened. It didn’t make a sound, not a click. The Chrysler’s power source was completely dead. And we were sitting in a darkness so black I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face, much less Lisa, sitting two feet away. And that’s when she started to scream. And not just any scream, but a scream from the deepest depth of her being. A scream so piercingly loud, so terrifyingly real, I thought my heart would explode. It was a Janet Leigh shower scream with the lights turned off. And she gave no indication she intended to stop.

       Calling out her name, calmly, with a soothing tone, I hoped to bring her back from whatever horror show she had fallen into. But she couldn’t hear me above her panic. Reaching across the space between us, I gently placed my hand on her shoulder, thinking this might be reassuring, but instead it only served to propel her into an even greater height of howling. Inevitably, I began to feel the beginnings of my own panic. I couldn’t see a damn thing, Lisa’s fear was out of control, I had no idea where we were. Might we freeze to death at this altitude? What about bears? Wasn’t this grizzly country? I started yelling too, pleading with her to stop screaming, hoping my louder yell could subdue her. But I quickly realized that was a losing strategy. It had absolutely no beneficial effect. I was at a total loss to know what to do.

       Just then, from out of the blue, there was a sound. It was a mechanical sound, like a bell, or like an old-fashioned cash register. Ka-ching, ka-ching. Turning to look behind us, there was a light coming in our direction. It was at roughly eye level, no bigger than a flashlight. Then, it stopped moving about twenty feet from us. A momentary silence ensued. Even Lisa held her breath at this mysterious intrusion. Was it friend, or foe? There was no way to know. Finally, venturing into the unknown, I decided to end the impasse. Sticking my head out the window, I said,

       “Hello?”

       After a short pause, a little voice from the darkness spoke, and said, “What do you want?”

       I couldn’t believe my ears. It was a kid. A little boy on a bicycle. He couldn’t have been more than eight or nine. Nothing could have been more unexpected. A little angel come to save a couple of people screaming at each other in a broken-down car in the middle of nowhere. Exploding with gratitude, I said,

       “Hello! Our car died. We need help.”

       “What are you doing here?” he said, suspiciously.

       “Sightseeing,” I said.

       “I’m getting my dad.” He said, “He’s got guns.” He jammed down on his pedals and sped away, vanishing into the night.

       “No, wait. Really.” I called out. “Our car died. We just need a jump. Ask your dad if he has jumper cables.”

       But the kid was gone.

       Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out my pack of Marlboros and lit a cigarette with my lighter. The flame provided just enough glow to see Lisa. She stared at me with a mysterious mixture of shock and hatred, as if she had no idea who I was or how she got there. Doing my best to sound reassuring, I said,

       “Help is on the way.” But Lisa simply continued to stare at me, not making a sound. This, I must confess, had its effect on me. Closing the lighter, plunging us back into darkness, I chain-smoked the rest of my cigarettes.

       After what felt like a long fifteen minutes, we saw headlights approaching from up ahead. Rounding a curve, an old pick-up truck pulled to a stop alongside the Chrysler. A man in dirty overalls climbed out of the driver’s side door and stood there looking at us. The little kid stayed in the cab.

        “Hello,” I said, in as friendly a voice as I could muster. He was a big man and severe, and when he turned and reached into the bed of his truck, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d pulled out a chainsaw. But it was a set of jumper cables he held in his hand when he turned around.

       “Unnerstan you need a jump,” he said.

       “Yes, God, thank you. I can’t tell you how grateful I am. My car, it just died.”

       The man nodded, and we went to work hooking up the cables. When that was done, the man climbed back into his truck and started his engine. He gave it a couple of loud revs, then signaled me, and I turned my ignition key. The beast started right up, smooth as pie.

        After thanking him profusely, he said,

       “Careful going back down the mountain. Don’t turn your engine off, it won’t start again.” Then he and his son slowly drove away. The little kid watched me from the back window of the truck, his little face hanging like a small pale moon between the two rifles in the gun rack. I waved goodbye, but he didn’t wave back.

       The return trip back to Denver was uneventful, if not awkward. Lisa seemed to relax a little the closer we got to the city, but it was a quiet couple of hours. I worried that she may have suffered some irreparable emotional damage due to the extreme intensity of the breakdown she experienced on the mountain. But when I tried to engage her in light conversation about what happened, her monosyllabic responses shut down any meaningful analysis. Pulling up to her house in the suburbs, I apologized again for how the evening turned out, saying,

       “Maybe we’ll have better luck next time.”

       “Uh-huh. Sure thing.” She said, quickly exiting the car.

       It was late in the evening when I pulled into the open-air lot and parked the Chrysler between the same two junkers. Switching the ignition off, I listened to the beast exhale what sounded like its last dying breath. Then I walked back to the Melvin, through the empty streets, quiet for a Saturday before midnight. Closing the door to my room, I undressed and crashed onto the bed, asleep before a siren sounded in the distance.

       The following morning, I watched the tow truck driver from the junk car dealer fasten the last safety chain onto the undercarriage of the Chrysler. When he finished, he stood up and pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket, counting off a quick $35, which he handed to me, saying,

       “It’s a sad state. They just don’t make ‘em like this anymore. They’re only good for parts.” With that, he hopped up into his cab, closed the door, and pulled out of the lot, towing the beast behind him. That was the last I saw of the Chrysler Imperial 300.

       Later that evening, I was in my room, when I began to hear the mumblings of conversation coming from the other side of the wall. It was Fritz and his wife, and the tone of their voices was quickly escalating into anger. A serious disagreement was taking place. I couldn’t make out, at first, what the issue was, but I soon began to suspect it had to do with the Chrysler. Fritz hadn’t obtained his wife’s permission to sell it and she was furious about that. I could hear Fritz trying to apologize, but she wasn’t having any of it. The more he attempted to placate, the louder her outrage became. Then I heard a slap and a thud against the wall, and it was obvious that it was Fritz who took the hit. He cried out, “Baby, please. I’m sorry”. He began to sob, loudly, and she stopped yelling. It was quiet for a long time after that, only Fritz’s sobs could be heard. When those died down, the rest of the night was silent.

        The next day, after work, rounding the corner in my muddied boots, I saw the Melvin at the end of the block, but no Fritz. The King wasn’t on his throne. And I felt a sadness I couldn’t define. Every day that week I came home hoping to see him. But the King had abdicated. And I never saw him again.