I Flipped Him the Keys to My Car & Told Him Not to Leave Any Stains on the Back Seat...

Previously, Part Two: I Just Turned Eleven. I had No Idea Girls Did Things Like That...

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I knew the time had come to move out of my aunt and uncle's basement in Needham. My younger cousin and I didn't talk much, and I knew my presence made her uncomfortable.

I didn't have another place to go, so I went to talk to my friend Jay. He and I had become close our senior year in high school after the "Kill Vinnie" debacle made me question my friendship with the guys I played football with.

Jay was home from college for the summer and working at UPS in Brockton, loading packages. In high school, he worked for the Sharon Post Office. One day, he was driving one of those little square postal trucks and heading down the North Main Street hill by the Sharon Box Company when something went terribly wrong on the curved section, and he flipped the truck. Not surprisingly, he wasn't hired back the following summer.

Jay and I were very different, and that's what made our friendship work. He was a soccer player, and I played football. He did well in high school, and I didn't care about grades. We did have a lot in common, too. We both liked smoking pot, music, partying down the Cape, and chasin' skirt. He and I did Peyote together once, and that experience created an unbreakable bond.

During the winter of '75, I transferred from Norwich University to Boston University, where Jay went. While on breaks from Norwich, I'd occasionally visit him there and always had great times. Without the military stuff, it was one big party with lots of girls. The guys from New York and New Jersey always had the best weed. It was where I got to smoke Sheba-Sheba and momentarily forgot my name and how to drive a car…

I had good grades at Norwich, being in the top 3 percent of my class, so I was accepted at BU, which never could've happened out of high school.

Once I was attending BU, I realized that Jay was no longer the different one; it was me. All his friends were like him, and I wasn't comfortable there. After two semesters, I left BU, but Jay and I remained close friends.

When he heard about my housing dilemma, he immediately had an idea. He was living in his parent's basement for the summer and said he'd ask them if I could stay there with him for a while. There was an extra twin bed that was unoccupied I could sleep on. I don't know how he did it, but his parents agreed to let me stay in their house, a small ranch with a two-car garage under. It didn't include food, just a place to hang my hat, shower, and sleep. 

I traded the commercial air compressor I confiscated when I departed Plymouth to my friend's brother for a '63 Ford Falcon with high mileage. It was gold-colored, but the paint had long since faded and rusted, and the interior was heavily worn and had a moldy smell. I hung an evergreen air freshener off the rearview mirror and placed another one in the back on a garment hook, and the car smelled a lot better. It started and stopped, ran okay, and had a working AM radio and a functional backseat… Life was good!

Jay and I both had girlfriends, but after we got home at night, we'd burn a fatty and suck down some coffee frappes I picked up on my way home at Bendinelli's Variety. We were having a blast with the new living arrangement.

Jay's father, Len, was in his early 40s and a mailman. A big guy, six foot two, with a big frame. His thinning brown hair was lightly salted and combed over to one side. He had medium-length mutton chop sideburns and a classic '70s mustache. Because he worked outside, he always had color. From the stories Jay told me, he had a temper, but while I lived there, I rarely saw it. Jay and his younger brother were scared shitless of him. I could see that.

While I was living there, after he came home from work, Len had dinner with his wife and then spent most evenings sitting on his leather recliner in the small den watching the Red Sox. I was downstairs getting ready to go out and always finished by blow-drying my hair. It was the disco era, a '70s thing.

There wasn't cable TV then; most people had rabbit ears on their TVs, and some were lucky enough to have antennas on their roofs. Whatever Len had, when I fired up my blow dryer, it messed up the picture on his TV. There was a lot of static running vertically, and it pissed him off, and rightfully so. Jay mentioned it to me and asked if I could use the blow dryer before the ballgame started, which I did.

My girlfriend had to work one night, so I decided to stay in. Jay asked me if he could use the Falcon to take his girlfriend out. I flipped him the keys and told him to have 'er home by midnight and not to leave any stains on the back seat…

A half-hour after he left, he returned home. I asked, "What the fuck happened? She break up with you?"

"No," he responded. "She refused to get in the Falcon. She said it was an ugly car…"

"Really," I quipped. "So my car's not good enough for your girlfriend? Maybe you have a little dick. Because a big dick with an ugly car seems to be working out pretty well for me!" Then I laughed and admitted the Falcon was a pretty shitty-looking car.

Later in the week, on Friday night, Len let Jay use his Buick Century. It was a nice-looking car in Royal Blue. I suggested a restaurant in South Norwood, the Cafe Venice, and he said he was gonna take her there.

After having a great meal, they walked out to the car, and while they were inside, someone hit the passenger side door in the parking lot and pushed in the panel. Jay told me about it when he got home, and I told him to wait till tomorrow morning; there was no need to piss Len off late at night.

On Saturday morning, Jay told Len what happened, and they walked outside to look at the damage. Len did not look happy…

Once he saw the door, he went off. He pointed his index finger in Jay's face and yelled, and as angry as he was, he seemed to be enjoying it. Jay, not so much…

I still worked at Muzi Motors in the body shop, where I learned a few things. I knew how to fix that dent…

I went into the bathroom and grabbed the family plunger. While Len stood there yelling, his arm outstretched and his index finger waving in Jay's face, I ducked under his arm and stood in front of the damaged door, plunger in hand.

Len stopped yelling momentarily and lowered his arm, and I could tell by the look on their faces they were both wondering what the fuck I was doing…

I slammed the plunger against the door panel and got a sound bite. I paused momentarily, then pulled hard, and the dent came out. I looked up at Len and said, "It's all set!"

Jay smiled, and after the blood returned to his face, he said, "Dad, Vinnie fixed it."

I looked at Len, expecting him to at least smile, maybe even thank me, but he looked even more pissed, and this time at me. I suppose I had stolen his thunder and snuffed out his rage, and he wasn't happy about it.

That wouldn't be the last time I'd piss him off…

To be continued…

It's not about the car…

*All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental…