The Highway Kind(2)

Patrick Millikin





TEST DRIVE


by Ben H. Winters

I WAS GIVING it to this SOB with both barrels, boy. I tell you—I was laying it on thick.

“This vehicle right here, this is the real thing,” I told the test driver, and I was giving him my usual go-getter grin, my usual just-us-fellas wink. “Minivan or no minivan, this thing is the real deal. It looks like a dad-mobile. Right? And it is priced like a dad-mobile, especially when you buy it from us. But hey—you feel that? You feel that right there?” The engine had given a little kick, perfect timing, just as the guy eased it out of the space. “It doesn’t drive like any dad-mobile, now, does it? No, it does not. Pardon my language, sir, but hell no, it does not.”

I widened the go-getter grin. I eased back in the shotgun seat, tugged on the seat belt to get myself a little more breathing room. The test driver’s name was Steve. I hadn’t caught the last name, if he’d offered one, but that didn’t matter. I’d get the name when he signed the contract. A test drive takes all of fifteen minutes; it would take another forty-five to do the paperwork; I’d be home with a beer, celebrating my fourth sale of the week, by seven o’clock. I whistled a little through my teeth while Steve maneuvered the 2010 cobalt-blue Honda Odyssey out of the lot and headed west on Admiralty Way along the water.

That’s the test drive: the long block down Admiralty, right on Via Marina, another right on Washington, then one more right and you’re back on our lot. A quick loop, but plenty of time to get a man to fall in love with the vehicle. But those Odysseys, boy? Especially the 2009s, 2010s, those third-generation Odysseys? Well, I’ll tell you something, they really do sell themselves.

“That’s a V-six engine in there, three point five liters, and you can feel it, right? I don’t care how much tonnage a vehicle is, I really do not. You give me a darn grand piano and you slip this V-six in it, the thing’s gonna drive.”

Steve grunted, the first noise I’d heard from him since we got in the car, but his expression did not change. I knew what I was dealing with here: tough customer, cold fish, not about to let himself get conned by some smooth-talking-salesman type. Et cetera, et cetera. Listen: I’ve seen ’em all. I was not concerned. I could handle the Steves of the world.

“You’re right, my friend. Let’s just enjoy. You just drive and enjoy.”

He gave me a sidelong glance and I gave him the wink again, the magic wink: Just you and me out here, pal. Wife’s at home. No kiddies. Just two men talking, and it’s men who know what makes a car a car. But Steve was not a smiler. His hands were tight on the wheel. He was a little old for a soccer dad, I noticed. His hair was gray at the temples and retreating from his forehead. He drove exactly at the posted limit. His eyes were blue and watery behind thick glasses.

I sighed. I looked out the window, watched the late-day surf rush against the beach. I didn’t need this grief, this pain-in-the-ass, late-day closing-time hard-case test drive. I was the manager, wasn’t I? I was running the whole show down there at South Marina Honda. I was doing the test drive only because I liked to do test drives every now and then. Keep my ear to the ground, if you know what I mean. Keep my dick in the soup. And I seen this fella, this Steve, giving Graham a cold look and heard him saying, Who do you got who’s been around a while?

That was me. I been around a while.

“Okay, so you just wanna make this right here, when you get through the light. We’ll take her around the block, and when we get back, you know what you’re gonna say?”

Steve sniffed. “What?”

Miracle of miracles! The man could speak!

“I’ll take it. You are going to sign the papers and drive home in this gently used 2010 Honda Odyssey. You mark my words.”

“We’ll see,” said Steve, lips tight, teeth clenched. Showing me he was no sucker. Showing me who was the boss in this situation. But he was wrong. I was the boss. I was always the darn boss.

Steve took the turn, kept the thing at an even forty-five, letting cars stream past us on the left.

“So you live right around here in the area, Steve?”

“No.”

“No? Oh—here—so hang a right just here, after the light. We’re going to go around the block, the long block here. There you go. So where you down from, then? Malibu? Bel Air, maybe?”

I chuckled. This was a joke. The man was not from Bel Air. Not in that bargain-bin windbreaker. Not with that haircut. Steve didn’t laugh.

“Folks come down here from all over the city looking for a deal,” I told him. “They hear about us, they hear we’re the guys that are wheeling and dealing. They hear our ad.”

“‘When you hear our deals, your ears won’t believe their eyes,’” sang out Steve suddenly, loudly, and I laughed. I slapped my knee.

“Our commercial!” I said. “You’ve heard it!”

But that was the end of it. My test driver was all done being convivial. His eyes stared straight ahead. His hands stayed at ten and two. And he had this look on his face like...well, I don’t know what to call it. Whatever he was looking at, it wasn’t Washington Boulevard. It wasn’t the world around him. He was looking at some memory, this guy, or looking at the future. I don’t know. His eyes, though, man. This guy’s darn eyes.