Paragrapher (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} paragrapher) wrote,@ 2008-07-18 15:19:00 |
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Taking the Golden Hawk Out
On my current commute, I drive through a hairpin turn so sharp the posted limit for it is 5 MPH. At a very low rate of speed I've skidded on that turn - luckily when no one was in the opposite lane - so I respect the sign. I don't want to haunt my car - or haunt whatever toasters and refrigerators get used from the steel of my wrecked car once it's cubed and remelted.
Taking the Golden Hawk Out
The battery on Ernie’s 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk would last so long as it was taken out of the garage once a month. Ernie drove it on a 20-mile round trip through a state forest. Ernie liked polishing the Golden Hawk and keeping the engine in working order, but he had three reasons to hate driving it. Ernie’s first reason was that the car had no seat belts. Ernie wasn’t the best about wearing his belt, but to not have the option felt irresponsible, and no one made Golden Hawk belts any more. Ernie’s second reason was the ghosts. As best he could figure, they had crashed and launched themselves through the windshield some time during the Johnson administration. They would scream whenever Ernie got the car above 30 MPH. Ernie wished they were transparent people in the backseat wearing skinny ties and poodle skirts. No, they had no shape: just whispers in his ear, goose bumps on his arm, and a growing feeling that the Golden Hawk was a runaway train. The faster Ernie went, the more vigorously the ghosts manifested. The more they manifested, the faster Ernie went, eventually taking 25 MPH turns at 60 MPH. Ernie screamed in such fear during these drives that he couldn’t even get proper curses out. The third reason Ernie hated driving this car was that the ghosts made him do it. Ernie would love to roll through a parade or a classic car show with the Golden Hawk, but he couldn’t muster the willpower to take the car anywhere but this forest. Ernie didn’t know which tree the ghosts had crashed into, but on every sharp turn Ernie could swear he saw dried blood on the bark. Ernie was increasingly sure that his latest drive would be when his own blood was added to it.
On my current commute, I drive through a hairpin turn so sharp the posted limit for it is 5 MPH. At a very low rate of speed I've skidded on that turn - luckily when no one was in the opposite lane - so I respect the sign. I don't want to haunt my car - or haunt whatever toasters and refrigerators get used from the steel of my wrecked car once it's cubed and remelted.
Taking the Golden Hawk Out
The battery on Ernie’s 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk would last so long as it was taken out of the garage once a month. Ernie drove it on a 20-mile round trip through a state forest. Ernie liked polishing the Golden Hawk and keeping the engine in working order, but he had three reasons to hate driving it. Ernie’s first reason was that the car had no seat belts. Ernie wasn’t the best about wearing his belt, but to not have the option felt irresponsible, and no one made Golden Hawk belts any more. Ernie’s second reason was the ghosts. As best he could figure, they had crashed and launched themselves through the windshield some time during the Johnson administration. They would scream whenever Ernie got the car above 30 MPH. Ernie wished they were transparent people in the backseat wearing skinny ties and poodle skirts. No, they had no shape: just whispers in his ear, goose bumps on his arm, and a growing feeling that the Golden Hawk was a runaway train. The faster Ernie went, the more vigorously the ghosts manifested. The more they manifested, the faster Ernie went, eventually taking 25 MPH turns at 60 MPH. Ernie screamed in such fear during these drives that he couldn’t even get proper curses out. The third reason Ernie hated driving this car was that the ghosts made him do it. Ernie would love to roll through a parade or a classic car show with the Golden Hawk, but he couldn’t muster the willpower to take the car anywhere but this forest. Ernie didn’t know which tree the ghosts had crashed into, but on every sharp turn Ernie could swear he saw dried blood on the bark. Ernie was increasingly sure that his latest drive would be when his own blood was added to it.
