First Love
"Follow me, son," Mr. Hyde said.
There was a chill in the air as the sun set. Orange light
fell upon towers of rusting, flattened hulks, creaking in the wind.
Emmit cleared the hair from his eyes and followed Mr. Hyde from the
office, an old trailer, just inside the chain link fence surrounding
the yard. Mr. Hyde limped across gravel, a cane quivering beneath
his right hand as he continued past a metal shed. Its corrugated
walls were smeared with midnight blue, peppered with patches of rust.
"There's a lot of history here," Mr. Hyde said. "Not the
kind you learned in school. Small histories. People's lives.
Ordinary families."
Mr. Hyde grinned, stood before a wall of rusted metal,
nearly twenty feet high. Emmit drew up beside him. A gust of wind
produced a deep groan, which moved, like a wave, from one end of the
wall to the other. Emmit stiffened his stance, withdrew his hands
from his pockets. Mr. Hyde chuckled, removed a soggy cigar stump
from his shirt pocket, stuffed it between his teeth.
"Don't worry! Nothing short of a tornado could disturb
these heaps of junk! Almost happened about ten years ago, too!"
Emmit blushed, skimmed his left boot along the gravel.
Mr. Hyde stepped sideways, stood inches away from his new hire,
shoulder to shoulder. Emmit smelled a cigar, and an unpleasant
odor, like a dog's fur after being in the rain. Mr. Hyde smelled
soap, a hint of shampoo. He regarded the young man beside him,
swept his glance from the boy's new Timberlands, up the stiff,
blue Levis, to his red flannel shirt. His frame was sturdy,
youthful. He had heard that Emmit was quite the ladies' man.
"How many cars do you get each day?" Emmit said.
Emmit squinted, gazed into the sun's fire. The black truss
of the crane boom loomed against the sky. The crane's engine had
fallen silent hours ago.
"It varies a lot, son, day to day. There's a mother lode
of iron and steel here, though. Takes a while to salvage each
wreck, and then they line up for the crusher. If you've never
seen that happen, stop by early someday, before five. It's a sad
thing to watch."
"Why sad?" Emmit said.
"Because the car dies. Loses its soul."
Emmit looked askance at Mr. Hyde, who spat upon the ground,
then turned to him and explained.
"When a car rolls off the assembly line, it's bright,
shiny, new. But it doesn't yet have a soul. It takes a long time
for that to happen, a lot of love, confidence, care. In today's
modern world, so much happens by way of the automobile, the vehicle of
our society. Family outings, shopping, first love affairs, Church on
Sunday, rush-hour drives to and from work, business deals, muggings,
utumn drives beneath the crisp leaves -- you name it. Even babies
are born there. As we live through our cars, some of that mental
energy rubs off. The car keeps some of that love, that fear, and,
over the years, becomes a kind of living thing. What kind of car do
you have?"
"An '85 Cavalier. I plan to get something better soon. It
runs rough, but it gets me around." Emmit watched the ground as he
spoke. "It's my first."
"It goes without saying. Your car has seen a lot. I can
tell. You'll be moved to tears to see that first car go, believe me.
You'll never forget that first car, her feel, the sound of her engine,
her smell. Like a first love."
Mr. Hyde's voice trembled upon his last word, trailing off
on the wind. He stared straight through that wall of crumpled body panels,
fenders, and frames, the eviscerated remnants of what once was. The wind
rose again.
"Then," Mr. Hyde said, "the crusher. I love to hate that
thing. First you disembowel the car, removing the engine, the
bumpers, seats, windows -- everything but the outer body and metal
frame. There's the loud suck of a magnet upon the roof. If it just
rained, you can smell the rust in the air, sour on your tongue. A
loud thud as the car drops into the crusher's mouth. Hydraulic jaws
close from all sides, flat metal walls, drawing ever closer. There's
a loud groan, a screeching of metal upon metal, as parts give way.
Sometimes there's sparks, as the car's frame fails. It's like the
life energy, the soul, is draining from what's now a twisted piece
of wreckage. That's when the car dies..."
Mr. Hyde saw Emmit's attention wandering, his gaze floating to
the wall of metal. Mr. Hyde stopped preaching and resumed his limp
along the neatly stacked wall of corpses. They walked in silence and
cleared the wall, as more piles of wrecked metal and car parts came
into view. Mr. Hyde shot glances at Emmit, as he took in the scale
of what surrounded them. The sun had set, and clouds spread across
the sky. The metal had faded, from burnt orange to blue and black.
Piles of metal creaked in a macabre symphony. A full moon rose and
edged the clouds with light.
Just ahead, four black shapes shifted upon the ground. Emmit
realized they were dogs -- large ones. Mr. Hyde stretched out his arm.
Emmit stopped a few inches short of his hand.
"Heyaaaa!" Mr. Hyde shouted.
His cry echoing from the piles of wrecked cars. The dogs
jumped to attention, two of them barking deeply. Another danced, wagging
its tail, flashing milk white teeth in the twilight.
"You practice that," Mr. Hyde said. "Heyaaaa!" he shouted
again.
Emmit blushed, gave a half-hearted impersonation, and then
all four dogs rushed toward him, snarling, steel chains jingling,
tensing suddenly, drawn taut above the gravel. The dogs strained
forward, huge teeth flashing, eyes glinting in the darkness. Emmit
froze as Mr. Hyde laughed.
"You have to mean it," Mr. Hyde said. "Try it again. Quick,
before they learn to hate you!"
Emmit cleared his throat. This time, he shouted loud and
deep. Two of the dogs fell silent, the other two still growled.
"Take my jacket," Mr. Hyde said.
He removed the blue windbreaker and handed it to Emmit.
The boy donned the damp, smelly garment and saw Mr. Hyde reaching
into his shirt pocket. He removed an unwrapped cigar and held it
before Emmit.
"In your mouth," he said.
Emmit obeyed, and they approached the dogs slowly. Wet,
black noses sniffed the air, snorted, sneezed as they began to
yelp and whimper. Mr. Hyde reached them first, and they surrounded
him, padded about him, jumped up, nearly knocking him to the ground
with their mighty paws. Emmit drew toward them cautiously, and
first one dog, then the others, began to sniff his legs, their
muzzles trembling as Emmit kept his hands at his sides. Cold flesh
nosed at his hands, and one of the huge dogs slipped a forehead
beneath his hand. Mr. Hyde watched Emmit stroking the dog, as the
animals jostled Emmit this way and that. They frisked him,
deposited their fur scent upon him, wagged their tails, panted.
Finally, Mr. Hyde unleashed them, and they tore off into the
darkness, vanishing amongst the wreckage.
"In another week, they'll protect you like they do me," Mr.
Hyde said. "Wear that jacket around them for a couple of days. It
has a familiar scent."
They resumed their walk toward the far end of the yard. The
moon struggled free of the clouds, and he could suddenly make out a
small grouping of cars ahead. They were older models, apparently
from the fifties and sixties. Somehow, they had been spared from
the crusher's jaws. He counted three vehicles in all. Mr. Hyde
halted and turned back toward the office.
"What are those cars doing here?" Emmit said.
Mr. Hyde sighed, his breathing tremulous. He shook his head
slowly from side to side.
"Just some special cars I keep around, son. No concern of
yours, okay?"
Emmit's gaze froze upon the nearest vehicle. From fifty
feet away, in the moon's glow, it looked like a wrecked Camaro.
Relenting to Mr. Hyde's call, he turned and followed him back to the
trailer. Once there, Mr. Hyde showed him the office, sat him
behind a battered desk, and brewed a pot of coffee. He would spend
the first several nights with Emmit, showing him the ropes.
"Now comes the boring part," Mr. Hyde said.
Mr. Hyde reclined behind his own desk, kicked his feet across
the bare wood surface, and opened up the evening gazette.
"I hope you brought along something to read?" he said.
Emmit looked blank, then slowly shook his head.
"The biggest challenge of this job, son, is boredom!"
Mr. Hyde broke into laughter, his fat cheeks shining and pink
as he held out several sections of the newspaper. Emmit wheeled
forward upon his chair and accepted the offer.
The next few hours were quiet, as night fell upon the
graveyard. The wind shifted outside the office walls. They heard
each creak of wood and metal, the tick of the clock on Mr. Hyde's
desk. The smell of coffee suffused the trailer, lit dimly by lamps
upon both desks. The moon wheeled through the sky, passed beyond
the window along the trailer's side. The wrecks creaked and swayed
in the wind.
Emmit checked the clock every hour, then every half hour.
He scanned the newspaper for the twentieth time and peed twice from
drinking three cups of coffee. Mr. Hyde finally nodded off to sleep,
snoring, his chin upon his chest, his chair leaning back, perched
upon two legs.
Emmit worked on a list of things to bring to work the next
day. They included a stack of magazines, a radio, and a small TV, to
help him pass the time. He fought off drowsiness, got up and walked
about the trailer, rubbed his hands together in the cool air. Emmit
sensed motion from outside, and he quickly switched off both desk
lamps. He stood in darkness before the trailer window. As his eyes
adjusted, he saw two dogs trotting past the trailer. He breathed a
sigh of relief, then noticed that the snoring had ceased. He felt Mr.
Hyde watching him.
"Good eyes, son," Mr. Hyde said.
There was a creak, the rubbing of clothing against wood, as
Mr. Hyde leaned forward and rose from behind the desk.
"The dogs don't move around much during the night," Mr. Hyde
said. "If you hear them barking loudly, it's either because of an owl
or a trespasser. And you have to worry about only one of those. But
that hasn't happened for two years now. And, when it does, it's
usually kids, around your age, scrounging parts for their street rods."
Mr. Hyde shuffled across the floor and breathed his foul breath
of cigar smoke and black coffee, brewed double strength.
"I'm going for a walk," Mr. Hyde said. "You okay here?"
"Sure."
Mr. Hyde turned, found his cane, and started for the door. He
opened it and let it slam shut. Mr. Hyde left Emmit watching him from
the window, as he began his walk in the graveyard, moonlight shining
a path to the east. Mr. Hyde removed something from his pocket.
Several steps later, a small bottle tipped back in the midnight air.
He resumed his staggering stroll, between the rows of smashed cars.
He walked toward the flock of vintage cars. He took another sip, the
whiskey burning his throat. Then his stomach rumbled, as cool vapor
flowed into the night. Liquid sloshed within the hip flask. He
stopped, stared at what sat before him.
An upraised hood rusted in the night. Before the empty pit
where an engine once roared, two headlamps stared into darkness. One
lens bent the cloud-veiled moon clearly upon its crystal. The other
was milky, a cataract of spent tungsten hazed across glass. A breeze
squeaked the metal jaw. It flapped above the grill, smashed inward,
edges crimped. The wind tickled strips of roof vinyl, whistled
through a horn gagged with a greased rag. Metal hips flared and
curved above four cinder blocks upon the ground. A gaping wound
rusted in place of a door. Inside, the driver's seat remained, its
leather slashed. Half the windshield was punched outward, the round
hole rinsed with rain. Spiders webbed the rear window.
Mr. Hyde stumbled forward, arms braced above the left fender
to support his weight. He sucked in the breeze and squirmed into the
seat. With another tip of the flask, his throat was numb and warm.
He felt the heaviness in his legs, the aching fatigue in his muscles.
He glanced through the driver's half of the windshield, intact, but
laced with cracks, glittering in the moonlight.
Mr. Hyde closed his eyes, felt his face flush with heat. He
turned and remembered her sitting next to him, her legs shaved smooth
hours ago, her tanned skin shining softly in the dashboard lighting.
He jammed the pedal to the floor, heard the squeal of rubber upon
pavement. A white cloud spun from beneath the rear wheels as he and
Jean sank into the upholstery. The squeal faded beneath the engine's
roar, humming through the dashboard, climbing through the seats and
tickling their skin. The V8 drank gasoline by the mouthful, breathed
exhaust into the night. Jean cranked up the radio and sang with the
blaring lyrics. She smacked a fresh pack of Kools and lodged a
cigarette between her lips. A flame sprang from her lighter. She
sucked on the cigarette, the ember illuminating her face and hair.
She exhaled a plume of smoke, then spoke from between her smoldering
lips.
"Johnny, you're really going fast!"
The speedometer needle climbed across the gauge, lit green
with numbers. 80... 90... She giggled, unfastened her seatbelt,
squirmed to the edge of her seat. John felt her lips wetting his ear,
her tongue tracing about the firm flesh, then diving inward. Her
fingers slid softly across his thigh. She unzipped his pants, reached
inside. John breathed hard, swung his gaze back to the road as the
Camaro skimmed the shoulder. She dropped her head to his lap. John
moaned, his eyes rolling.
"You're gonna kill us!" he said.
He gasped as she sat up straight. Air ripped through the
open windows.
"Then hurry!" she said. "They close the gate by nine. We
only have about ten minutes."
She crawled back into her seat, planted her feet upon the
floor, lifted herself from the seat as she worked off her skin tight
shorts, then her panties. She spread her thighs, smiled, then grinned
slyly, ear to ear, as he leaned over and slid his hand across her
thigh. He squeezed her flesh, felt the supple elasticity, the
firmness. He leaned further, his foot weighing on the accelerator,
the engine's roar resurrected as they continued along a mile-long
straightaway. He massaged her, pleasured her as best he could. Two
miles down the road, they'd have each other completely. Then her hand
found him again. She chuckled and played stick shift, her eyelids
fluttering as she arched her back.
Then there was a loud rattle, and the car leaned to the right.
Her eyes snapped open, and she screamed. John sat up, gripped the
wheel. Ten feet in front of the hood, a telephone pole glowed in the
darkness.
Mr. Hyde remembered the deafening crunch. Its echo burned in his
heart and faded upon the wind. He drank again and sank deeply into the
seat. He heard Emmit approaching the car, his shoes crunching upon
the gravel. His feet stepped from gravel to grass.
Emmit saw that the second vehicle was a Cadillac ambulance, its
siren horn stripped of chrome, one red emergency light still anchored to
the roof. The third car was a black hearse, stripped of windows,
interior, wheels, and engine.
Mr. Hyde sighed, and Emmit whirled around. The two looked at each
other, and Emmit turned back toward the trailer.
"It's okay. I'm not upset with you, son," Mr. Hyde said.
His words were slurred, not angry. Mr. Hyde sucked air through his
nose. Tears poured backward into his throat, as he struggled from the
car's interior. Emmit helped him, smelled the whiskey on his breath.
Soon, they stood together in the moonlight.
"Remember what I said earlier, son?"
He wavered on his cane, found his balance, wiped his eyes with
his sleeve.
"Most cars have a soul. Especially the first one. My first
love."
"Was she killed?" Emmit asked, his heart thudding in his chest.
"Yeah," Mr. Hyde whispered.
He pointed, without looking, to the ambulance.
"That was the next to the last car she ever rode in."
Then his trembling hand swung to the hearse.
"And that was the last. Twenty eight years ago. To the day."
About the hulk, a thousand metal skeletons decayed. Stripped
of wheels, excised of engines, their requiem rose upon the wind, floated
across the chain link fence to a hill rising black beyond. There,
marble sculptures divided the lawn into rows and columns.
