Look at how different this is after my first series of revisions. You can't say that's not constantly improving.
Ron
stared out of the window of his little shack with eager anticipation. He read the letter from Stacy over and
over again.
“I
hate my mom,” He read to himself
with zest. “Remember that movie
star auntie you said you had?”
Ron
shook continuously as he drank coffee straight out of the pot. A police cruiser came down the street
and he ducked, reaching up to twist the blinds shut. He heard the car door slam and the crunching of footsteps
coming up the drive. Two sets of
feet.
The
doorbell rang and Ron ran into the bathroom, parting his hair with a wet comb
and throwing a polo shirt on over his mother of pearl wife beater. There were a couple of loud knocks,
followed by a few more rings of the doorbell. He could hear his step daughters voice outside.
“Officer
McKenzie, first division. I found
this young lady wandering down the side of the road.” Officer McKenzie said, flipping up the shades on his
eyeglasses. The air conditioner
blared in the window, the cool lines coming off of it were almost visible
powder blue squiggles.
Ron
was taken aback by the unfriendly greeting, and used it to buy time to think of
something to say
. “Your mother couldn’t give you a
ride? That woman is no-good. Do I
have to do everything for this family”
Ron said unconvincingly.
The
officer looked over at the closed blinds.
“Why’d you close the blinds? Is there something I should know?”
“No,
I just don’t like the police, you know?”
He looked at Stacy pleadingly.
“Step
aside. I’m going to come in and
take a look around.” The cop said.
“Don’t
you need a warrant or something?”
Ron said weakly as the cop pushed him aside with a flattened
outstretched hand.
Ron
stepped outside and looked desperately at Stacy. She removed a piece of gum from its tinfoil and rolled her
eyes up at him.
“I
think I hear your police radio.”
Ron said. “It sounds like
something important is going on.”
“You
know it’s illegal to lie to a police officer, daddy.” Stacy said with narrowed eyes.
Luckily
for Ron, he had cleaned up a little for Stacey. He vaccuumed the purple shag carpeting, although it still
had a few inconquerable stains.
The wicker coffee tables flanking the lumpy loveseat looked clean
enough, granted you didn’t remove the coasters and lamp that were stuck to
them. The beads hanging off of the multicolored chandelier were dust free. However, the garbage can sitting next
to the TV was overflowing with empty soda bottles, and a few had jumped ship
onto the few on the floor next to it.
“You
weren’t planning on having this girl stay with you here, were you?” The officer asked. Ron walked back in sheepishly. “This
looks like a single mans apartment if I’ve ever seen one.”
“I
was gonna sleep on the couch.
They’re fumigating her mom’s place.” Ron said, the cop crossing his arms. His moustache stood bristling at full
attention.
Ron knew he had to lay down on the couch. The cushions crunched underneath him,
and the best he could do to get his whole frame onto it was to cram his legs
and head into a V shape.
“It’s
not comfortable but I have done it before and I’ll do it again.” Ron said. He added: “I’d
do anything for my little girl.”
The
cop gestured at Ron to come over into the kitchen and whispered.
“I
saw the periphenalia in your bedroom.
I smell drugs all over this place.
I know you aren’t thinking of taking that car out front and running away
with her. You’ve got your rough
spots, but I think you’re an honest man.
I don’t want to embarrass a man in front of his daughter.”
The
police officer rubbed two fingers together.
Ron
looked up dumbfounded for a second and then understood he was being solicited
for a bribe.
“I’m
a little short, right now.” Ron
said. The cop crossed his arms and
shook his head.
Ron
and Stacy stood in the driveway silently as the cop pulled away. He drove slowly, and Ron rearranged the
thick stack of money in his wallet, unbeknownst to him Stacy was watching the
entire time.
“Are
you sure we should even be driving this thing?” Stacy asked.
Ron stepped heavily on the gas and a stream of smoke formed around each
window like they were sitting on a hot spring. Stacy rolled up the passenger side window and wiped dirt out
of her eye.
“It’s
my car, Stacy. It’s tougher than it looks. Got a lot of character.” Ron responded and dropped the car back into neutral. “Get out and help me push it.”
“Ron,
I heard that cop say you shouldn’t be driving it.” Stacy said and picked at peeling sea-green paint covering
the rust that grew like a barnacle underneath. She dropped to her knees and looked under the thing, and
stood up and kicked the rotting exhaust pipe. It fell off easily, like a dead part of a house plant. Ron grabbed it and pushed it into the
black circle it occupied.
“We
gotta get going or we’ll never get to Auntie Fiona’s house. The pools a lot more fun during the
day.”
“I’m
going to call mom.” Stacy said as
Ron pushed from the open drivers side door. The front tires plopped up on the lawn, the car looking
temporarily like a hungry killer whale.
“What? No, no no! You know mom, she gets
jealous.” Ron said, hitting the
red button on Stacy’s Iphone. “As
a matter of fact, I’m going to hold onto this in case she calls. We’re going to have a nice, quiet,
relaxing day. Besides, she’s
always been jealous of Fiona’s looks and success. You know your mother used to want to be an actress. It will only upset her.”
The
car started fine, three gutteral coughs and then a long wheeze that diffused
into palpatations. It sputtered
like Porky Pig’s car in an old cartoon as it flung pebbles in each direction as
it scurried onto old Arvsdale Avenue.
“Wave
goodbye to the house.” Ron said
wistfully. Stacy found this remark
more ominous than Ron intended.
“This
death wagon.” She said under her
breath, popping her head out of the window and breathing in the hot, musky
desert air.
Mr.
Beasley stepped out onto the turf for his ten A.M cigarette. He pulled off his plain blue
sweatstained visor and squinted.
He
was down to the nub of it when he noticed the gaping hole between his tractor
trailor and haywagon. He took his
flip phone out of the front pocket on his overalls and dialed whilst swearing
to himself under his breath.
“Boy
ain’t paid his rent in months, now he’s taken my old Impala.”
“Ursa-Mae,
get your sister.” Rita said
between puffs. “That girl could
sleep through a thunderstorm.”
Ursa
pushed into Stacy’s room, her alarm clock blaring. The bed was a mess, girly magazines laying open. And the window was wide open, the
curtains fluttering in the breeze.
She pulled the blanket up to the pillows and went over to the
window. Her mother was out in the
yard.
“Ma,
she’s run out again.”
Ursa
Mae: Jealous of the fact everyone
is paying more attention to her sister.
The more bookish of the family.
Rita: Afraid Ron is going to have sex with
daughter. 40s
“She sleep over at Harlie’s house?”
“She
isn’t friends with Harlie anymore.”
“Well
she better not be out that deadbeat creep Ron.”
“He’s
not that bad.” Ursa said.
“What
was that?”
“Ron,
he’s not that bad.” She spoke
louder but didn’t quite yell.
Ursa
dug through Stacy’s drawers and retrieved two crumpled twenty dollar
bills. She took a dress out of her
closet and hung it over her arm.
“I
called and she ain’t answering, phone must be off.” Rita burst into the room. “Get dressed we’re going to go find her.”
“Yer
boy took the truck and he’s gone.”
Words leaked out of Beasley like air out of a flat basketball.
“He
isn’t MINE. We got DIVORCED. And you’re his boss, not some friend of
the family.”
“No
matter. If you see that boy, tell
him not to come back. He’s fired,
and he can’t live here anymore.”
The
car rumbled past the “Population 500” sign, along a freshly paved onramp and
onto the thick tar of the city road.
Stacy
smiled over at Ron. He looked back
sheepishly and refocused on the road, a light blush painting itself onto his
cheeks.
“What’s
she like?” Stacy asked.
“Oh,
you know. Like any other movie
star. She is nice, rich, nicest
woman I’ve met.” He reached an arm
over behind her head. “When I was
growing up, we always looked forward to going to Fiona’s house. She would cook up lobsters on the
grill, she had fancy juice in a big pitcher with ice cubes and limes floating
in there, we would spend the whole day by the pool. Some of her movie star friends showed up, too. They came and went like it was their
hangout.”
Stacy
checked her makeup in the mirror.
“You know, if you didn’t always sound like you were full of shit I’d say
you were BSing me.”
“What’s
all this crap?” Stacy said,
climbing halfway over the backseat and putting her butt up in Ron’s face. “This is all of your shit, isn’t it?”
On
the side of the road, Montgomery sat in his smoldering black leather police
cruiser. Ron’s car flew by, and it
wasn’t dark enough he didn’t notice their tail light was out. He reached up at the siren switch
tentatively, and took a sip of his gas station coffee. He mulled it over, and typed in the
license plate number on the laptop.
“Ron
Durante.” Montgomery said outloud
to himself, sipping more of his coffee.
He picked the computer up and put it on his lamp.
Right
about this time, Ron’s air conditioning decided to stop working.
“All
this sweat’s making my makeup run.
Hey, there’s a car guy.
Pull over.” Stacy said.
“No
can do, Stace.
The
heat thermometer had its arrow pointing firmly off the spectrum, past H. Stacy turned the radio down and the
whirring noise of the engine was truncated by a persistence bump.
“What’s
that noise, Ron? That does it, I’m
calling mom.”
Ron
cringed at the idea of his ex wife being “mom”. He turned the radio back up, and a reporter interrupted
their soft adult contemporary music.
“…on
the lookout for a green rusty truck…”
Ron
turned the radio off and drove in silence. When Stacy seemed like she was going to talk again, he
interrupted.
“Alright
we’ll get the car fixed.”
They
pulled into a rest stop and Ron pushed his legs out to open the heavy
door. He came around to Stacy’s
side and pulled hers open.
“Go
in and get yourself a bite to eat.”
Ron said, handing her a twenty from his wallet.
The
mechanic had a wide smile and was standing upright. With his blonde hair he looked like a ripe ear of corn.
“Jim. Nice to meet you, Jim.” Ron said and extended a hand. Jim’s handshake was a vice grip
compared to his own.
“Mister,”
He said, looking under the hood.
“You better find yourself a place to stay, this car might going to take
a very long time.”
“You
don’t know what you’re talking about.
What’s wrong with it?” Ron
planted his hand on his forehead.
“Well
you see,” The mechanic said,
propping the hood up and resting it open.
“Your coolant is out.
You’re lucky the car didn’t start smoking on the way here. On a hot day like today, you could have
baked alive inside this thing.”
“Ok
so I get some more coolant.” Stacy
looked at him from across the street, two teenager boys on each side of
her.
“That
fast food is going to destroy that girls figure. Damn shame too, she’s a real piece.” Jim said with a slight whistle coming
from between his teeth.
“That’s
my goddamn daughter.” Ron
said. He looked at Jim sternly,
and Jim kept glancing out the window.
“Show some goddamn respect.”
“The
festival’s beginning.” Jim said,
tossing his wrench down onto the big metal slab the car was perched next
to.
“What
about my car?” Ron asked.
“No
work during the festival, state law.”
Jim said with his arms up akimbo.
“Your daughters already there, anyway.”
“Yep,
looks like he took that big rusted thing.
Unbelievable he even got it started.”
