The Gate (14 page)

“That may be,” Dirk said, “but you'll spend more with me than the car is worth. If I were you I'd be thinking less about what this could do to his reputation and more about what it could do to yours. Maybe you'd better talk to Al before you do something stupid.”

He was right and I knew it, but hearing him say it pricked my balloon. “You may be right,” I said, “but it isn't fair.”

“Who ever said the law was fair?” Dirk said. “Call me tomorrow and let me know what you want to do.” With that he hung up.

I talked to Al, and eventually we decided the best thing was just to cut our losses, and that's what we did. I wanted to go slash the guy's tires or superglue his door locks, but I didn't. I went back to selling cars and he went back to preaching, and I took some comfort in the fact that someday we'd both have to answer for what we did.

———

Here it is: there are crooks in any business, but most car dealers I know are pretty straight. I'm not saying they're choirboys, but they're not turning speedometers back or packing bad transmissions with bananas to keep them quiet. That stuff went out with AM radios and whitewall tires. But when it comes down to feeding their families, sometimes they stick their toe over the line. And that's where Ben was.

Mary Alice, Ben's ex, spent money like they were printing it in the garage, and neither one of them was willing to live on a
budget. It was like a contest. If Ben spent money on something like a battery for the lawn tractor, she'd go out and spend an equal amount or more on something she wanted.

Ben was having one of those kinds of months when he sold the five-speed that wasn't. It was August, and the new models were coming out in a few weeks. We had some of last year's models in stock, but we'd spiffed them, which is to say we paid an extra two hundred dollars to the salesman for every one he rolled, and they were going fast. Ben had a customer who wanted a rojo red two-door Rabbit, but it had to be a five-speed, and they were hard to get. The rule in the car business is that when you can't sell them what they want, you sell them something you can get. It's called a flip, and Ben was good at it, especially with women. He'd flash that million-dollar grin of his, give a little wink, and before they knew what happened he'd have moved them from a two-door to a four-door, or from a red one to a green one, or in this case, from a five-speed to a four-speed. So he walked her through a buy like we had a basement full of red five-speeds.

He had me appraise her trade, told her five-speeds cost more and didn't really get that much better mileage, and tried to move her to a four-speed on the floor. But she wouldn't budge. Her boyfriend had told her that
Road and Track
tested the five-speed and said it was faster and smoother, and with a lot of highway driving it would pay for itself. Ben tried everything, but she just kept saying, “My boyfriend says . . .”

Finally he wrote her up for what she wanted and took a deposit. Of course Ben knew we didn't have a chance of getting one, but he also knew that the more people she told that she'd just bought a new car, the harder it would be for her to back out when and if he had to flip her.

We searched the locator, but the only one for five hundred miles was Jim Morran's demo. Jim was on vacation, but he was coming home on Friday, the 29th, so Ben decided he'd flip her into that.
He called her in, explained the situation, and after a little banter, he wrote it up for three hundred less than their original deal and told her she could pick it up on Saturday the 30th.

The problem was that somebody's grandma backed her Buick into the side of Jim's demo while they were camping at the state park, and when Ben pulled in on Friday, his heart sank. He needed that car to make his month, but he also needed more than a day to pull out the fender, put a new door skin on it, and get it painted. He called Larry the body shop manager, but he said there was no way to do all that by Saturday morning. That's when Ben put his toe over the line again.

He called back to Donny in the wash bay, told him to go over to the parts department, get a five-speed shift knob, put it on the red two-door demo that Mary Alice had been driving, and get the car cleaned up for delivery. The car was a twin to Jim's except it had premium sound, a couple thousand less miles, and a four-speed.

On Saturday, paperwork-wise he sold her Jim's demo, but he delivered Mary Alice's. He told the customer that the radio was his mistake and he'd eat the cost of it, and the fact that it had less miles was simply a bonus.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Ben said. “Don't try to put it in fifth gear until after the break-in period at the five thousand mile inspection.” He figured he'd drive Jim's car until she brought it in for the five thousand mile service, switch the two out then, and no one would be the wiser.

It would have worked all right except for the boyfriend. He couldn't wait to drive it, and when he couldn't get it in fifth gear, he pulled it up to the shop and asked Marty, the service manager, to take a look at it. Marty spilled the beans, and within minutes the boyfriend and the girl were in my office. I told him to calm down, that I didn't know what happened but somehow we'd make it right. Then I went out and talked to Ben. At first he was mad at Marty for not covering for him.

“What was he thinking?” he said. “It had our badge on the back. Before he said anything he should have come and talked to me.”

“Don't try to push this off on Marty,” I said. “He was just doing his job. This is on your head, and you're going to go in there, tell them what happened, and try to make it right.”

The two of us went back in, told them what happened, and offered to put them in Jim's demo and give them a five hundred dollar service and parts credit for their trouble. As always, Ben gave them the smile and a little wink, but the boyfriend wasn't having any of it.

“We're going to sue,” he said. “You guys are crooks! We want our money back and our trade-in back, or we're going to the cops.”

“Hold on,” I said. “Ben stepped over the line here, there's no doubt about that, and I'll deal with him later, but I found out about this when you did, and I didn't try to cover it up. I came in here and laid my cards face up on the table, and I'm now willing to do whatever it takes to make this right.”

I told Ben to leave us alone, and after a few minutes the boyfriend calmed down some. I offered to order them what they wanted in next year's model at no additional cost, and I said that they could continue to drive the demo until their new one came in.

“What about the bank?” he asked. “All the paperwork is wrong.”

“I'll take care of the bank and the state,” I said. “Give me a chance to make this right.” Eventually they agreed, and once again, I'd bailed Ben out. When I told Al, he thought it was funny, but I wasn't laughing.

Nowadays, when someone says to me, “Do you ever miss the car business?” I think about days like that and I say, “Not very much.”

———

For a while we drove along Oceania Drive in silence as I was thinking more about what Ahbee had said. Lately, it seemed, I'd been so busy reading the Bible looking for the answers to the questions that people ask me every day that I'd stopped asking
questions of my own. It had become a duty instead of a privilege, a have-to instead of a get-to, and that had to change.

Ahbee pulled off the road and parked the Volvo on the rocks overlooking the sea. “Lunchtime,” he announced, grabbing the little picnic basket from the backseat. “We're going Mediterranean. Hope you don't mind.”

With that, he began to unpack the basket. It was full of coarse brown bread with nuts, dried cherries, yellow raisins and cream cheese, green olives stuffed with feta cheese, two small fish that had been breaded and deep-fried, some dried dates, and a small flask of sparkling white grape juice.

As we ate, he asked me a question. “Do you remember what Joshua said when they asked him what the greatest commandment was?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And love your neighbor as yourself.”

“Very good! Now, do you do this?”

“I try.”

“That's your problem: you're trying too hard. Love is at its best when it's simply an expression of who you are. Josh didn't
try
to love the world, he just loved them, and that's what you have to do. You need to stop trying so hard to fix people and just love them for who they are and where they are. When they see that, when they know that you really care, then they'll be more willing to listen to what you have to say.”

His words went through my heart like a knife. “That's not fair!” I protested. “Many times I have loved the unlovable for your sake. Most of the people I deal with are wrestling with demons of some kind. Their marriages are hanging on by a thread, or their addictions have got them by the throat, or their regrets are eating them up inside, and without me they'd fall off the precipices.

“And as for those who do fall,” I continued, “well, it's not my fault if they don't take my advice. Besides, most of them don't really want to change. What they want is for me to baptize their
stupidity. To tell them that what they're doing is all right. I'm the last stop on the bus in their minds. A hoop they have to jump through before they do what they want. That way they can tell their friends they tried. I may not be perfect, but I'm a better Christian than most people.”

Who are you keeping from falling today?

“I agree.” Ahbee nodded. “You're right, but most people haven't had the education, the influence, or the opportunities that you've had. There's no need for you to get defensive. Being a Christian isn't a contest where the best score wins. I know exactly what you've done. Like Moses, you've kept people from falling at times. But who are you keeping from falling today?

“Your words have been an inspiration to some, and your kindness has been a comfort to others, but there have also been those you have chosen not to love. You're a selective lover; you don't love equally, and you know it. And to be perfectly honest about it, sometimes you love sin more than you love me, and you know that too.”

“Has anyone ever told you that you reading their hearts can be very unnerving?” I asked, trying to turn the conversation in a different direction.

“Yes,” Ahbee said. “I've heard that many times, but we were talking about you, not me. You expect a lot from yourself, and that's good. You have high standards. My standards. No one could say that you haven't poured your heart and soul into everything you've done. I've heard your prayers for Ben, and for others, and I've watched you try your best to help him. But I'm afraid that sometimes you expect too much from the people around you.”

For a moment Ahbee paused, putting his hand to his chin as if he were thinking, and then he continued. “Florence was right when she said you should never miss the chance to make someone's life better
.
But sometimes you do. I know you don't mean to, but you do. You can be a little intimidating. It's hard for
others to stand in your shadow, and at times that's been a source of pride to you, but it breaks my heart.

“Never have I told you to work harder,” Ahbee continued, “but many times I've said to love deeper. Do you have any idea what a word of encouragement from you could mean to Ben? I don't expect you to save the world, but I do expect you to save those you can, and Ben is in that camp. Like so many others, he really struggles with self-doubt and insecurity. Whether you know it or not, he looks up to you. He always has, and so you need to work at being a little more gracious.

“What I want is to be able to welcome you home someday with the words, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant,' and I know that's what you want too. But I've got to tell you that the measuring stick in my kingdom is not what you have or what you've accomplished; it's who you've helped. I'm much more concerned with
people
than
performance
, and this is your chance to make a difference.

God never asked us to work harder, but he has asked us to love deeper.

“You have a lifetime of experience. Don't you think it's time you shared some of it? Come on, Scout, it's time for you to do this. I want you to share your successes, but most of all I want you to share your failures. Let Ben go to school on your mistakes. Become the coach I know you can be. Teach him; inspire him; challenge, motivate, and encourage him. Pour yourself into him. That's what brothers do, and that's what brotherly love is all about. Just as I believe in you, so too you need to believe in him. I know you can do this!”

Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.

Dale Carnegie

O
n the way back, I was feeling a little sorry for myself, and a little underappreciated too.

“Ahbee,” I said, “how can you be so hard on me? If I had stayed in the car business, I'd be a millionaire by now. After years of sacrifice and education, I still make less now than I used to because I believed you wanted me to help people. I am one of the few who read the story of the rich young ruler and took it to heart. Don't I get any credit for that?”

“No one is questioning your willingness to sacrifice, Scout,” Ahbee said. “Or your deep desire to make a difference. That's why you're here. Because of that, I wanted to give you a chance to get out ahead on this. I'm hoping that you can share some of the things that I've shared with you, but before you challenge people to search their souls, I thought you ought to do a little soul-searching yourself.”

“Maybe I'll just go up to bed early tonight,” I replied.

“That's up to you,” Ahbee said, “but I think maybe you'll change your mind when you see who's waiting for you back at the cottage.”

Curious but cautious, I kept my thoughts to myself, and the rest of the ride back was pretty quiet. The windows were down,
and I could hear the whining, rhythmic sound of the tires against the pavement. I laid my head against the side window, and my thoughts and my eyes grew heavy.

Before we challenge others to search their souls, we should do a little soul-searching ourselves.

I must have fallen asleep because I woke up with a start as the tires on the Volvo hit the gravel driveway of the cottage. There, parked in front of the garage door, was a fire engine–red '53 Buick Roadmaster convertible. The only person I knew who ever drove a car like that was my uncle Herb.

“Herby!” I shouted as I jumped out of the Volvo. He came around the corner from the front of the house and gave me his usual greeting.

“Hi, how-are-you, hi, how-are-you?” he asked, in a singsong sort of a way that mimicked the Indian drums of an old western movie.

Uncle Herb was wearing tattered leather loafers, white tube socks, seersucker Bermuda shorts, a navy blue Hope College sweatshirt, and his signature yellow vest. Before he went into the Marines, Herb had been a tailback at Hope College. Twenty years later, I followed him there.

There was a thing that my mother called the Herb-Sky-Dave syndrome because Herby, my cousin Dave, and I all had to learn things the hard way. Too often we masked our insecurities with bravado, and in our younger days, we all had a reputation for being hot-headed and quick to fight. They were both tougher than I was, but what I lacked in toughness I made up for in bullheaded stupidity, which was sometimes mistaken for bravery. Mercifully, we all outgrew most of that and became lovers instead of fighters.

I stuck my hand out to greet him, but Herby was a hugger. He believed that the world would be a better place if people hugged more often. He grabbed me, picked me off the ground, and said, “Hope you're hungry, Tiger.” I suddenly realized I was starving.

———

Uncle Herb was my dad's younger brother and had been his closest friend. Ten years separated them, but they'd had one heart. They fished together, hunted together, and vacationed together, and most of the time, they let me tag along.

Herb and Gerry were the cool aunt and uncle everyone wished they had. I remember when I was four years old and they pulled up in front of our house on Hazan Street in that red Buick, and the next thing I knew, I was sitting on Aunt Gerry's lap and we were going for a ride.

The world would be a better place if people hugged more often.

When Uncle Herb honked the horn, it went
Ahuuuuga! Ahuuuuga!
That started my lifelong love affair with cars. Dad always drove station wagons—sturdy, practical, dependable, roomy, and boring—but Herby thought cars ought to be fun, and I agreed.

Uncle Herb was named after Grandpa, but he was given the letter P as a middle initial to avoid mail mix-ups. Nobody knew for sure what the P stood for, but Grandma used to joke that it meant, “Please, God, don't let him be anything like his father.” Thankfully, he wasn't.

Like Grandma, Herby knew how to laugh and he knew how to love. Later in life, when Gerry had Alzheimer's, it robbed her of who she was little by little, but Herb never forgot who she was, and he never stopped loving her. She was the love of his life. The two of them fit together like cherry pie and ice cream. I can't think of one without thinking of the other.

I don't remember it, but I was the ring bearer at their wedding the same year that I rode in that Buick. Looking through their wedding pictures, I thought Gerry was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen. I think Herb thought so too, and from what I could tell, his feelings never changed.

———

“Sky's here!” Herb hollered as we walked out in front of the cottage. Gerry rose from the lawn chair she was sitting in. She
looked as young as she did in their wedding pictures, with long, flowing, rusty brown hair; high cheekbones covered in freckles; and a smile that would melt your heart. She was wearing red shorts, a white sleeveless blouse with a blue rope and anchor around the collar, a big floppy straw hat, and a pair of Foster Grant sunglasses.

Gerry was a hugger too, and as she put her arms around me, I noticed that she smelled like flowers and baby oil. Then she laughed for no particular reason. She had a great laugh, and even when everything else was taken from her, the laugh never left her.

On the table in the screened-in porch was potato salad, ice-cold lemonade, and sliced homegrown tomatoes. Herb was butter-basting chicken pieces on the charcoal grill outside. He always slow-cooked it over low coals, and then right before it was done, he'd switch from basting with butter to barbeque sauce.

Even when everything else is taken from us, we can still laugh.

The sauce was a recipe Carol and I received from the chef at a restaurant we frequented when we were dating and she has tweaked over the years. She freely passed it out to everyone, and my family has put it on everything. It's a thick, sweet, tomato-based sauce, and there was a mason jar full of it sitting on a tray next to the grill. Herby painted it on each piece with a brush, and as soon as he got them all basted on one side, he'd turn them over and do the same on the other side. As the brown sugar in the sauce began to caramelize, the chicken turned golden brown and crispy.

Alongside the chicken Herb was grilling salmon. He'd made a boat of aluminum foil, placed the salmon filet skin-side down, and then placed six pats of butter on top. Then he poured a half a bottle of French dressing over the fish, liberally loaded it with parmesan cheese, and sprinkled it with salt, pepper, and dill.

“It's all about the timing,” Herby said as he stuck a meat thermometer into one of the chicken breasts, and after a minute or
two, he announced it was time to eat. He plated up the chicken and the fish, brought them inside, and then got a little choked up as he said grace.

After supper we moved to the living room and talked mostly about the people we loved.

“I miss your dad,” he said.

“He misses you too,” I replied. “More than you know.”

“And my boys too,” Herby added.

“They're all doing fine,” I said. “Both of them are kind of growing into your shoes, Herb. Dave's more like you every day, and you'd be so proud of Steve. Since he quit drinking, he's become the man you always knew he could be. Like you, his heart is tender toward anyone in need.”

“I always knew he could stop drinking,” Herb said. “I couldn't, but I knew he could.”

He got a little emotional, and Gerry moved closer to him and put her arm around his neck. We sat in front of the fireplace, roasted a couple of marshmallows, and talked about what was and what will be as it slowly became dark. Time has a way of getting away from you sometimes, and this was one of those times.

Finally he got around to asking about Ben. “How's your little brother doing?” he asked.

“To be honest, I'm a little worried about him,” I said. “He's never gotten over what happened up at the lake. Money's a problem, Mary Alice is a problem, and spiritually I don't know where he's at.”

“Maybe you know more than you're telling,” Herb said.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“Two weeks ago you saw him come forward crying like a baby when Pastor Bill asked if anyone wanted to come up and leave their past on the altar.”

“I saw him,” I said. “I'm just not sure I believe him.”

“Oh, so now you are the judge of who's sincere and who's not?”

“No, I'm not saying that. It's just I know some things, that's all.”

“You know some things, but you don't know everything. Besides, right now he's been trying to make it right, and maybe he will and maybe he won't, but you've got to give him time. You of all people can't give up on him. Hope is all he has, and he's hanging on to that by a thread. Right now he needs you to believe in him more than anything else.

“Listen,” he continued, “he comes from a long line of prodigals. Some of us are slow learners. We have to learn everything the hard way, and we take our own sweet time doing it. Give him time, Sky, give him a little more time.” Then he got up and started to walk toward the door.

Where there is no hope, there is no life.

“Come on, Tons-of-Fun,” Herb said to Gerry. “We've got a little bit of a ride, and Ernie will be by pretty early tomorrow morning.”

Ernie was my great-uncle on Grandma's side, and when Dad and Herb were young, Ernie always took them hunting, and they returned the favor later in life.

“What are you guys doing?” I asked.

“Oh, Ernie wants to go do a little bass fishing up at Promise Point,” Herb said.

As we walked outside, I hugged Gerry good-bye and opened the Buick's side door for her. Then I went around to Herb's side. “There's something I need to tell you,” he said to me. “Where there is no hope there is no life. You have to
hold on to hope even when things look hopeless
.”

“In my heart I know that's true,” I said, “but sometimes I feel like the hope has dried up inside of me.”

“That's why I'm here. I know what you're going through. I've been right where Ben is too. Some days, faith comes easy, it's smooth as butter, but sometimes, doubt smothers our faith like a wet blanket. On those days you want to believe, you kind of believe, you wish you would fully believe, but doubt has got you by the throat. Am I right?”

“You must have been reading my mail,” I said.

“I haven't, but God has,” he said. “And that's why I'm here. Just because you got a hot-shot counseling degree doesn't mean you're not human. You're no different than the rest of us. We hope and we fear. We pray with confidence and we worry. We believe, and God help us, we doubt.

“In the book of Jude, the author says to ‘be merciful to those who doubt.' Who do you think he's talking about? Everybody has doubts. No one is immune. That's just the way it is. And if you try to deny it, if you swallow your doubts, if you keep putting a Band-Aid on your broken faith, it'll fester. You've got to deal with it. You've got to talk about it. You've got to get it out in the open. And that's where prayer comes in,” Herby explained.

“Listen,” I responded, “I've always prayed. Sometimes out of gratitude, sometimes out of fear, and often out of habit, but lately I've been wondering if it makes any difference. I guess I've just seen too many unanswered prayers.”

“There's no such thing as an unanswered prayer,” Herb said. “Sometimes the answer is ‘No,' and sometimes it's ‘Not now,' but it's never
not
answered. Usually what happens is that we don't like or don't understand the answers we get, and so we think that Ahbee has failed the test, but it's really just the opposite.”

“I'm not sure I get what you mean by that.”

“Well, don't you put Ahbee to the test every time you pray? If he answers, if you get what you want, he passes, but if he doesn't, then you start to question him. Am I right?”

“Well, I guess that's the way it works sometimes,” I answered.

“So like I said, when you pray, you're really putting God to the test. But what if it is the other way around? What if you are the one being tested?”

“I guess I've never thought about it that way before,” I said. “Besides, the whole idea that God tests people never made much sense to me. For example, why would a loving God tell Abraham to sacrifice his son by burning him on an altar? It always seemed like a barbaric exercise to me. What was the point of that? If
God knows everything, he already knew what Abraham would do before he asked.”