Destroy All Cars (5 page)

ME:
Here we are.

SADIE:
You should give me your cell number.

ME:
I don't have a cell.

SADIE:
Still? I just got one. My parents gave it to me on my birthday. I felt like the last person on earth to get one.

ME:
Well, you're not. Since I don't have one.

SADIE:
You should get one. They're so handy. Maybe you should ask for one for your birthday.

ME:
I just had my birthday.

SADIE:
Oh yeah. That's right. I noticed the day. I thought about you. It's weird that I hardly ever see you anymore.

ME:
Yeah…

SADIE:
Maybe we should…I don't know…hang out some time.

Sadie's face was always the draw. That was the killer for me. Her face. Because she's so smart. She doesn't always act it, but she is. And she's reasonable. By that I don't mean practical, I mean she understands the limits of things, and the limits of people. She never has stupid ideas. She never says she's going to do something that you know she can't or won't do. You might think that's not that unusual, but in high school, most girls still think they're going to be the next American Idol. I'm serious. They do not quite have a foothold on reality. Sadie did. She was deeply intelligent, deeply real, even as she tried to recycle plastic forks in the lunchroom. It's hard to explain. It was in her eyes. It was in her expression. It was even in the way she got annoyed with you (me). She got stuff. You did not have to explain it twice. She understood.

There was a protection thing, too. I thought she could protect me. That sounds weird but that's what it felt like. She's the kind of person that is constantly moving forward. It's hard to hurt a person like that. And if you're with them, you think you won't get hurt either.

SADIE:
Here, give me your home number. Also, I want to see “Destroy All Cars.” Is it a blog?

ME:
No. I don't do blogs.

SADIE:
Why not? Everyone else does.

ME:
Exactly.

SADIE:
How long is it?

ME:
It's short.

SADIE:
That reminds me. Did you hear about what's happening over by Carl Haney's house?

ME:
No.

SADIE:
Some developer is going to turn all those woods into a subdivision. Like where the pond is, on both sides of it.

ME:
The pond? Are you serious?

SADIE:
I know. Activist Club is going to do a petition. And I talked to a guy at
Willamette Week.
And I called the mayor's office and I'm meeting with their special zoning person. That's what I came down here for. To check the zoning records.

ME:
How do you have time to do all this stuff?

SADIE:
How do you have time to write in your journal all night?

ME:
I don't. I just do it anyway.

SADIE:
That's what I do.

Rode around with Jessica Carlucci today after school. She had her mom's car. I stared out the window a lot. Jessica asked me why I was being so quiet and I told her about seeing Sadie at the library.

“I knew it,” she said.

We drove to Pet World and I followed her around while she bought some vegetarian dog food for her dog. She told me about this college in New Mexico where you do nothing but read the classics of world literature. No
Intro to Basketweaving.
You start with Plato and work your way forward.

She's trying to get me interested in college. I don't know what I think about that. Of course my parents want me to go.

Later, I called Gabe and went to his house. We played ping-pong. Then we watched TV. I have not done any homework in three days.

Scary, the effect talking to Sadie for five minutes has on me. I have become useless, lethargic, unable to concentrate.

I don't want to start liking her again, that would be counterproductive.

Gabe counsels against it as well. “Get a new girlfriend,” he tells me constantly. “Don't get caught in this all over again.”

But what does he know? He still worships Renee, who barely acknowledges his existence.

James Hoff

Junior AP English

Mr. Cogsweiller

MAKEUP ASSIGNMENT:
personal reflection on a place or location

I was at the mall, reading a book called
The Bell Jar,
when a goth girl started talking to me. She seemed to think I was goth, too, because of my black sweater and my long hair. Her name was Kristine. She had dyed black hair, red lipstick, and a ring in her eyebrow. She said that she had read the same book, and she liked it, and what was my name? I told her my name was Rob, though my actual name is James.

She sat down across from me. We talked about different things. Because Kristine was goth, she mostly had goth-style opinions. She was depressed, for starters. She liked weird, dark music you never heard of. And she hated authority of any kind. All of which were consistent with the goth philosophy.

After we talked for a while, she asked if I felt like going to a movie. I said okay and we went to see
The Hills Have Eyes 3,
which is about these mutants who got radiated by nuclear tests and murder people who happen to wander into the contaminated area. (Think about that for a second: There are now large sections of the
earth where you can't go because they are so poisoned and radioactive that if you went there, you would die.)

Anyway, so then a Typical American Family gets lost in the contaminated area and that's when the fun begins. Mutants vs. Typical American Family. There was lots of gore and splattering blood. It was kind of hard to watch, actually. Kristine liked it. I kept glancing over at her as the movie played. She wasn't the most beautiful girl, but she was sort of appealing in her goth way. She had black nail polish on and bright red lipstick. I had never hung out with anyone who wore lipstick before.

So then after the movie, Kristine asked if I felt like driving around. I said okay, and we went to the parking lot and got her car. It was an old Pontiac sedan. It was kind of sad. Even though I hate cars, I still recognize the status implied by the different brands. That's another thing cars do for us. They put us in categories depending on what level of Consumer American we are. Poor people drive crap cars. You see a crap car, you know who's inside it.

Kristine wanted to get cigarettes. She was quitting smoking, or had been, but now, because of the scary movie, she was too riled up to not have a cigarette. So we drove to a not-so-great neighborhood, to a place called the Lucky Stop Market. We went there because Kristine knew the guy and he would sell her cigarettes.

It was pretty grim there at the Lucky Stop. I think someone was selling drugs by the restrooms. Kristine
got her cigarettes, and then as she was paying, she turned to me and said, “Should I get some condoms?” I swear she said that. I hadn't thought about if we might need condoms. It was pretty much the furthest thing from my mind.

I shrugged. I didn't know. She bought them.

“Just in case,” she said.

I got a Pepsi.

So now we were set. We had cigarettes and beverages and condoms. Also, back at the Lucky Stop, under the fluorescent lights, I had noticed that Kristine's forearms were covered with cut marks and burn scars. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I just mention it to paint a complete word picture.

We drove around. We ended up parked in a vacant lot by the river. She lit a cigarette and started talking about this guy named Dale who screwed her over. She met him at her job at Walgreens but he cheated on her with her best friend. Then he gave Kristine crabs when he cheated on the best friend with her. Then the best friend got arrested for throwing a rock through Dale's window and peeing in his car and trying to light his house on fire.

I drank my Pepsi.

At some point, Kristine decided that I wasn't her type. “You're like this nice boy from the suburbs,” she said. She wasn't trying to be mean, that was her honest opinion. To prove her wrong, I leaned over and kissed her. She liked that. We started making
out. She was a good kisser, slow and sexy, lots of licking and touching of tongues. But she tasted like lipstick and cigarettes and I was worried I might get crabs. Eventually we stopped, and I slid back onto my side of the seat.

Driving back, I didn't want to tell her where I lived, so I told her to take me back to the mall, I could walk back from there. She dropped me off. Just before she pulled away, she said, “Nice to meet you, Rob.” By then I'd forgotten I'd given her a fake name. For a second, I wasn't sure who she was talking to. But I recovered.

“Nice to meet you, too,” I said.

The End

Mr. Cogweiller gave me an A—for my mall story paper and wrote on the bottom that I should submit it to the literary magazine as a short story. The problem is, it's not a story, it's true.

He also said I shouldn't mess up my writing with little asides. And that if I can, I should avoid constantly harping on my political agenda. That's so funny he thinks I have a political agenda. DUDE, IT'S NOT POLITICS, IT'S THE SURVIVAL OF OUR PLANET.

I think he's just saying that, though, to prove I'm not shocking him. Old Cogs, he may look like Mr. Oxford Button-Down, but deep down he still wants to be cool with the kids.

Sadie never called. Not that I thought she would.

I did email her “Destroy All Cars,” though. She wrote back, “Thanks, James! I'll show it to the Activist Club.”

Yeah, like they'll be able to deal with it.

I shouldn't be bitter. Sadie is just trying to be nice. She just wants to be friends again. Or at least make it so we can pass each other in the hall without electrical storm clouds forming.

I talked to Jessica about it. She seems to think it's a natural part of the healing process.

Gabe wants me to ask out one of Renee's friends so we can double-date.

The thing about asking out other girls is that they are other girls. They are not Sadie.

Other girls are CONSUMER AMERICANS. They are tedious and superficial and at some point they will want to know what my problem is.

And what will I say then?

There was an article in
The Oregonian
today about the subdivision behind Carl Haney's house. It's true: They're going to bulldoze the whole area. It's too bad because the pond is a very popular spot among kids who live in a certain area. People hang out there. And park there. And party. It's like a tradition. Sadie and I even made out there a couple times. I mean, it isn't a very
nice
pond, it isn't like a public park. But that's part of what's cool about it. It's an actual pond in an actual wilderness, with weeds and mud and “critters” and whatnot. You have to drive down this old dirt road to get to it. That's a pretty rare thing in this area. Pretty much all the woods and creeks and stuff have been developed. It was the last place kids could hang out and actually be away from civilization.

Went to the mall with Gabe and his mom this morning. She had to buy some bath towels. Also, she can't resist the makeup counters. Gabe wanted to look for some new skateboard wheels. I went along for the ride.

We took the Ford Expedition, all of us spaced far apart and strapped in so we could withstand impacts from other Sports Utility Vehicles. If anything smaller than an SUV crashed into us, well, that's too bad for them. Those people should buy bigger cars if they want to survive collisions. God knows
we
needed a big car—we're buying bath towels.

We parked and went in and strolled through Nordstrom. Gabe's mom got snagged by the first labcoated makeup person she saw. Gabe and I escaped the evil makeup counters and found our way to Concourse B.

Concourse B is our favorite: the high ceilings, the plastic plants, the steady flow of CONSUMER AMERICANS moving like fish along an endless stream of merchandise and consumables. Plus there's girls. That was Gabe's main concern: where can we stand, sit, eat, drink, and still have the widest range of girls to check out. I was also somewhat interested in this.

We went to McDonald's first. Gabe's mom doesn't like him to eat there because she thinks it's unhealthy. But he does, anyway, on the sly. That's his little rebellion. Unfortunately, the girl possibilities at McDonald's were limited.

So we went to Deck, the skateboard store. That place is pretty cool, I have to admit. I wish I was better at skateboarding—they have the raddest stuff. Some seventh graders were skating around in the back, doing tricks on the carpet. Skateboarding is cool. Simple. Clean. Energy efficient.

Gabe finally bought his wheels and some stickers to go with them. After that we cruised down the concourse and came across something called Caribou Coffee, which we hadn't seen before. We were like, what's this? A new Starbucks rip-off? That uses the catchy name of an animal species we are no doubt wiping off the face of the earth? We were so there. Plus there was free coffee for the grand opening.

We went inside. We got some free coffees. We tried them. We stood around with the other Consumer Americans evaluating the new product. Some people liked the Caribou Coffee. Others, not so much. Is it too bitter? Too strong? What
is
a caribou anyway? Mall goers discussed it: “It's this thing like a horse.” “Isn't it an island?” “It's like a dog, but it has fur that hangs down.”

After we got bored at Caribou Coffee, we ventured onto Concourse B again to look for girls. Gabe wanted to stand outside Abercrombie & Fitch but I thought that was too obvious. So we sat on some benches instead. Gabe and I looking for girls has, historically, not been a big success. Even when we see ones we like, we're too afraid to talk to them. Even when we see ones who seem
to like us, we're too afraid to move in their direction. And when we see girls who like us and actually come over and talk to us, we still screw it up (this has never actually happened, but if it did…). So the looking-for-girls thing is more like we're
observing
girls. And studying them. For future reference.

So we sat on the bench for a while and then a girl I actually recognized walked by, a girl who goes to our school. I elbowed Gabe to look, and he saw her, too. She seemed to be with her mom or some other adult. She glanced over and saw us, too.

For some reason, I waved to her. It was kind of a half-assed wave but I did it and she waved back, smiling a little, like:
Oh my God, I'm stuck with my mother, how much does this suck?

A second later, she was gone. “Dude,” I said to Gabe. “Who was that?”

“I don't know. But she waved to you.”

“Lucy,” I said, trying to think of her name. “It's Lucy something. She's a sophomore.”

“Oh yeah, Lucy Branch,” said Gabe. “Rich Herrington went to the Christmas dance with her last year.”

“What's her deal?”

“Don't know. But she
totally
waved to you.”

I tried to see if Lucy Branch was still in sight, but she had disappeared down Concourse B.

Lucy Branch,
I thought. I liked the sound of it.

Lucy Branch does not have a definite look. Or rather she falls into that vague “Jeans and Urban Outfitters T-shirt” universe. She was wearing Nikes at the mall with a Ramones T-shirt. I doubt she even knows who the Ramones are. She looks more Classic Rock to me, but who knows? She does seem somewhat aggressive in her personality. Like she actually waved back to me at the mall. And today she did the same thing in the cafeteria, smiling and waving again. This caught me off guard and I spilled tartar sauce on myself.

She is signaling to me some form of romantic interest. I would not be brave enough to do that if I were her. Or maybe I would. I went to Sadie's stupid dance. Still, I don't know what to make of Lucy Branch. I can't tell if I would like her. I guess I would like any girl if I got physically close enough. Lucy is cute and she has a cute body. And she likes me. Or seems to. That is the important thing.

The fact that Lucy Branch might like me indicates to me that my look is not representing my true personality. She's not really my type at all. Can't she see that?

Or maybe girls don't care. It's like music, girls don't care what band it is, they just like the song.

Lucy is so different from Sadie. I can't tell what Lucy's into. Nothing, most likely. She's just a girl, just a person. She wakes up, goes to school, goes home, watches TV. I don't know who she's friends with. I feel sorry for her in some vague way but I don't know why.

But if she would have sex with me, what difference does it make what she's into?