Walt (6 page)

XII

W
e at last reached
my apartment. Walt seemed to enjoy its comfortable smallness. I suppose it might have reminded him of a snug Tristanian home, or perhaps a boat of some sort.

He did not comment on the interior decoration. I thought this odd until I realized that he had no idea of what was the normal method of livening up one’s home with things in this part of the world.

My roommate was a great collector of lunchboxes. Lunchboxes lined every wall from floor to ceiling, hundreds of them. It was not uncommon for him, the roommate, to spend thousands of dollars at a time for particularly rare or beautiful boxes. Walt must have considered this normal decor. Perhaps it was just the first of any number of misconceptions which I fed him.

There was, of course, my piano to contend with as well. I was a little surprised to learn that, in the midst of Walt’s worldly inexperience, mine was not the first grand piano he had seen. Of the few visitors who have come to my small apartment, most have been intimidated by my piano. To reach any part of the small studio save the bathroom, it is necessary to climb either over or under the piano. It also doubles as my tabletop, writing surface, and ladder for climbing to my bed, which lives up on stilts to preserve precious floor space. Walt was different. He seemed to genuinely enjoy the piano, and admire its multitude of uses.

Walt was now visibly in pain from the intensity of the transmitter. After all, I had built the thing to communicate with another planet, and it had a power supply several dozens of times as strong as the Federal Communications Commission would have allowed. I found myself faced with a real problem. How could I get away from Walt, who was by now following me like a puppy, for long enough to get up on the roof and modulate transformer power? And, if I could even do this much, how could I avoid blowing my cover?

I hit on a plan that was remarkably simple. I was able to get across to Walt with shouting and some impromptu sign language that my roommate, the owner of the lunchboxes, had magical powers. Through living with him, I had been able to slowly become initiated into some of the mysterious powers which my roomie possessed.

I told Walt that each of the lunchboxes helped protect the bearer from a different form of evil or sickness. I told him that children most often carried them because their parents wanted to protect them from harm.

I selected one of my favorite boxes, a red “Bullwinkle”, and rummaged around for some string. I told Walt that I would have to perform some very involved incantations alone and outdoors. I explained to him that the roof of the apartment building was the ideal place for this. However, the magic of the charm would work only if Walt received the box without my coming back inside. Of course it could only protect him as long as he kept it in his immediate physical presence.

Walt seemed to buy the story. Stuffing some basic tools into my pockets, and telling Walt to open the window and wait, I headed up towards the roof.

I spun about twenty feet of twine off of the spool and bit through it. I wedged a screwdriver into the main rheostat of the transmitter’s power amplifier and tied the length of twine to the handle. I carried the loose end of the string with me to the edge of the building.

After waiting what seemed a sufficient amount of time for incantations to have taken place, I tied the handle of the lunchbox to the twine still on the spool. Calling out for Walt, I started lowering the lunchbox to the window of the apartment.

I saw Walt lean out the window. Just as his fingers grazed the lunchbox, I pulled on the string tied to the screwdriver. Miraculously the whole contraption managed to work. Walt caught the lunchbox just as I had the power down to a level where he could still hear the Easybeats clearly but without pain.

Neither Walt nor I knew it at the time, but just a few blocks away, the Easybeats got very nervous. The Easybeats are well known in certain circles for being impatient and edgy. When the power went down on my transmitter, they literally jumped several feet into the air, hitting their heads on a low beam in the ceiling of their boiler room home.

When I had returned to my apartment I found Walt greatly relieved. He looked as I have imagined Hercules must have when he tricked Atlas into holding the world again.

XIII

I
t is difficult for me to describe
the days following, during which Walt and I were constant companions. I showed him the City and, little bits at a time, exposed him to life as I lived it. We rode the bus to Golden Gate Park to look at the buffalo. We ate adzuki bean ice cream, in a dish with a cone on the side, at Joe’s Ice Cream down on Geary, the street on which I was born. We walked for hours on end, spent whole days sometimes in the museums, particularly the Museum of Modern Art. Walt was fascinated by the paintings, pictures like he had never imagined on Tristan. He completely surprised me during one of our trips by announcing that he might, someday, like to try his hand at painting.

We were, both of us, experiencing friendship for the first time. I found Walt childlike in that he had so little understanding of things that I took for granted. Yet with Walt I found none of the distance I had always felt around children. Walt I could talk to.

Somewhere along the line he had taken to continually humming the music that made counterpoint to whatever was going on around him. The music of the Easybeats was with us wherever we went on those days.

One adventure particularly sticks in my mind. We had by this time explored most of what I felt we could see on reasonable walks and bus rides. Walt had never ridden in a car. It was time for the 49 Mile Drive.

The 49 Mile Scenic Drive was created by the City as a means of low-cost automotive entertainment for tourists. It is supposed to take half a day and cover most of the major points of interest to those visiting San Francisco. That is the official version.

There is an old joke here that no native San Franciscan has ever actually completed the Drive. I have proven this wrong innumerable times. The rhythms of the Drive are familiar to me. I know all the difficult spots where the path is not well marked. I know the way through the park, and I know which way to go at Webster Street.

To me the drive is something philosophical. It is the closest thing I have to a religion. It makes for a wonderful panorama of misunderstanding. Places are passed by before there is any possibility of exploring or understanding. Like life, I suppose, the Drive covers a great deal of ground in less than a day.

In any case, the Drive requires a car, and that is one item which I did not have. I knew that it would not be much of a problem; it would simply require a visit to Jose, King of the Parking Lot.

Walt and I walked up to Nob Hill carrying packages of food and small things that we thought we might be of use during the Drive. Walt, of course had his constant companion lunchbox held closely by his side. I had by this time told him that lunchboxes were also useful for carrying things, especially food. Pandering to Walt’s fascination with the thermos, I had made some hot soup for him.

He was trying to drink some out of the red plastic cup as we walked up the hill. His attempts were unsuccessful; he was splashing it all over himself. I was thinking ahead to the Drive and not talking. The only sound aside from the shuffling of our feet was Walt slurping his soup and occasionally letting out little yelps when he spilled some and burned himself.

Just over the crest of the hill, barely out of the shadow of Grace Cathedral, is the parking garage over which Jose presides. Whenever I arrive at the garage, Jose is invariably found sitting on the floor in a full lotus position, eyes closed. His breathing is impossibly slow and controlled. One side of his head is substantially larger than the other, swollen upward in a strange way.

Perhaps I should note before the narrative proceeds any further that the garage which I currently describe is located in one of the wealthiest quarters of the City. Rich people pay huge sums of money to rent reserved spaces in Jose’s garage. In so doing, they ensure that they will never have to deal with the problems of parking and tickets and towing that make up such a large part of life for other local drivers.

Many of Jose’s patrons have three or four or more vehicles living in the garage. Since the number of vehicles they can be using at any one time is limited, I figure that they will never notice if I should happen to use one of their cars for an afternoon. I have a routine which has never failed me.

I walk up to Jose and nudge him with my knee. This seldom rouses him from his meditation so I grab him by the shoulder and shake. When his eyes finally open, I yell at him and abuse him as I imagine his rich customers must. Jose has a terrible memory, or so it seems. He always seems to recognize me, but is never sure if I am a customer or something else.

At this point I call him an ingrate and an incompetent. I announce that I will take all my vehicles out of the garage if he does not produce my favorite car immediately. Whichever car he brings around I am grateful for. I smile at him and tip him generously for his efforts. As I drive away, I can see out the mirror that he has already crossed his legs and is again farther away from the San Francisco I can see than Walt ever was on Tristan.

It was in precisely this manner which I obtained a car for Walt and I to use on the Drive.

Jose disappeared into the recesses of the garage, seeming more to float than walk. I have never been a great fancier of cars, but I have always enjoyed the tension and the expectation that rises whenever Jose disappears into the nether recesses of his domain to bring out a car for me to use.

As he rounded the corner from wherever in his concrete dungeon the car had been parked, I studied his expression behind the wheel. It was ethereal. He seemed to be on the receiving end of some sort of cosmic bliss that may or may not have been connected to the car. My guess is that it probably was not.

It took me a while before I thought to look at the car. It was white and sort of boxy looking. It was not any kind that I had seen before, or that really grabbed my attention. I did notice that it was a convertible. The tan colored top was up.

Only when Jose had pulled up right in front of me did I recognize the insignia on the grill. Jose left the car idling when he got out. He left the driver’s side door open, and ran around to open the other door for Walt. Walt eagerly climbed into the car, but I stood by the open door blankly staring at the pedals.

Jose had brought me a Ferrari.

I was worried for several reasons. One, of course, was that joyriding a car worth as much as a whole block of homes in the Sunset District was probably a very serious offense. This risk I could accept. The problem I was staring at was the mysterious third pedal on the left. I had never driven a stick shift before.

I very nearly lost my control at that point. I was worried that Jose might discover my fraud. I looked over at him, but he was already sitting on the concrete floor in a full lotus position, his head back in the stars.

I climbed into the car.

I tried to do everything very slowly, with much thought in every action. I knew you used the clutch every time you wanted to switch between gears. At least, I thought, I have a good theoretical understanding of what I will be doing. I had also noticed that people with stick-shift cars used their emergency brake much more frequently than was the norm in cars equipped with automatic transmissions.

My first thought, then, was to locate the brake handle in the Ferrari. It was off to my left, between the edge of the seat and the door. The handle was all the way down. I thought that perhaps Jose had forgotten to set the brake. That seemed to make enough sense.

By this time Walt was staring at me curiously. Even though it was his first time in a car, he seemed to have some suspicion that everything was not quite in order.

Breaking any sort of eye contact with him, I put the clutch pedal all the way to the floor, moved the shifting handle into the slot marked with a one and gently stepped on the gas.

The engine made a racing, whirring sound. I realized that I probably should take my foot off the clutch. When I did this, the tone of the engine changed to a much deeper roar. We still were not moving.

In a blast of insight I grabbed for the emergency brake lever. I pulled up on it and noticed that it did not make any clicking noise. I pulled further until it felt like I had caught hold of something. Then I pressed the button and felt a tremendous surge as I let the handle down.

By this time the car was making a great deal of noise, but we were hardly moving. I stepped on the gas even harder. The car felt as if it were ice skating, gently moving forward as it wobbled from side to side. The horrible smell of burning rubber filled the garage, and in the mirror I could see blue smoke pouring out from the back wheels. Through the rapidly thickening cloud of smoke I saw Jose open one eye.

Just then, fortunately, oh fortunately, the wheels got a grip on the pavement and we were gone. We shot out onto Sacramento Street. Just a few car lengths ahead of us was the stop sign. I jammed on the brake and the clutch, actually managing to come to a stop several feet before the white line. The shifter was still in first. I sat at the stop sign for several long moments, thinking.

Nob Hill is, of course, a hill. It is a tall and, even by San Francisco standards, rather steep hill. I realized that my species does not possess enough feet to properly execute the maneuver I was now presented with. I needed to simultaneously use the clutch, brake, and gas pedals. Unfortunate me, I had only two feet.

I decided just to try it. I took my foot off the brake. The car immediately started rolling down the hill.

I had to divide my attention between trying to make the pedals work and steering out of our trajectory parked cars and other obstacles. We had now rolled back about half a block and were rapidly gaining speed. I screeched on the brakes. At least, I thought, reduce our velocity. I was having horrible visions of rolling into Chinatown backwards in a stolen Ferrari totally out of control with a Tristanian lobster fisherman as my accomplice.

I let the clutch out as I stepped on the gas, not so hard this time. When we got to the top of the hill, I blew off the stop sign, making a left turn past Grace Cathedral and the Fairmont Hotel without even slowing down. One block away, on California Street, I made a right and we were on the Drive.

Walt enjoyed riding in the car tremendously. He naturally understood the rhythm of traveling. He adjusted to the pace of the Drive, knowing exactly when to look for the next sign.

When we got to the Palace of the Legion of Honor we stopped to get out and look at the Holocaust memorial. Of all the epic statuary to forgotten glories in the City, this simple memorial is by far the most effective. I have no idea if the Second World War involved Tristan de Cunha, but Walt knew nothing about it. I explained to him a little bit of the history and why people felt memorials to be necessary.

By this time it was getting on towards later in the day. I have very fair skin and I constantly have to worry about getting sunburned. I thought that by now, with the sun reaching a lower angle relative to the horizon, it might be an excellent time to put the top down on the car.

We found the catches for the release and released them. I took hold of the leading edge of the roof and pushed it towards the rear of the car. This all went very smoothly until the roof was about halfway down. Then it got stuck. We pushed and pulled and prodded and cajoled the roof, but we could not get it to go down any further. When we tried putting the roof back up, we found that it no longer fit properly. We had resigned ourselves to driving around with the roof stuck half open and half closed.

Walt got in the car first. It was than that he noticed a metal bar running underneath the fabric top. Further investigation revealed a way to remove the bar. When we had done this, the top went down the rest of the way effortlessly.

I stepped back several steps to admire our handiwork. Something still did not look right. The top was still attached to the rear portion of the car. I examined this and found that it was attached to the body of the car with a series of snaps. It took much pulling and grunting, but these, too, finally gave way.

I was beginning to like the Ferrari. We drove off in more style than I had ever imagined possible.

I felt that my competence was rapidly increasing. I was not afraid of the car as I had been just an hour or two before. Even the shifting was becoming familiar and easy. The only problem was that I had never had a chance to use any gear higher than second.

I knew I would have an opportunity soon, though. I paid almost no attention to the part of the drive we were on, so intently was I focusing on the part to come.

After the drive goes down Army Street, it takes a jog through the not-really-all-that-scenic Bayview district. From there it goes onto Highway 280. This is the part I was anticipating. This freeway has been closed since the earthquake. Thoughtfully, a two mile section of it has remained open almost exclusively for the purpose of the 49 Mile Drive. This stretch of road is utterly barren and devoid of traffic at any hour of the day or night. Of all the places to be in a Ferrari in San Francisco, this was undoubtedly the best.

When we finally came to the on-ramp I could barely contain myself. I briefly explained to Walt what was going to happen: we were going to go very, very fast. The speedometer went up to 160. I wondered how fast the car would actually be able to go.

The light changed and I jammed on the accelerator.

I have always been disappointed by airplanes. Somehow distance takes all the reality out of speed. Yes, an airplane may be cruising at 400 mph, but at 40,000 feet it seems to be just barely crawling along. The scenery inches by agonizingly slowly. Even at takeoff and landing the sensations of speed and power are minimized.

I was not disappointed by the Ferrari. The acceleration pinned my body against the seat, my head forced into the cradle of the headrest. I imagined, or think I imagined, little waves in the flesh of my cheeks. I had to grip the ball of the shifter tight in my right hand and not let go. I was sure that if I did my arm would be flung to my side and I would never be able to force it out against the force.

At the one mile mark we were doing 118 mph and I still had the car in fourth gear. I shifted and we leapt forward. At one and one half miles, we had attained 156 mph and I was afraid to go any faster. I also remembered that in half a mile we would have to deal with a swerve, a stoplight, train tracks, and a city street. I decided to start slowing down now.

After we had negotiated the stoplight, I pulled the car over, killed the engine, and got out. I had started trembling when I first brought the car back down under 100 mph. By now my shaking would best be described as convulsions. I lay on my back in a patch of dirt, unable to keep from thrashing on the ground. I felt sharp rocks poking me in the back, weeds and stickers getting into my socks. Only after several minutes of hyperventilation was I able to stop shaking. Finally I was able to get back on my feet.