“Did you crash into a guardhouse, too?”
“No, just left town and didn’t need it anymore.” I had a flash of my beat-up Toyota Camry, she of the constantly blown alternators, hissing radiator, and odometer that had topped 200,000 miles before it even came into my possession. The last I’d seen it, it had been parked in Peter’s huge garage, between his Lexus and SUV, as out of place there as I was. “She was a good car, too. Just kind of . . .”
“Shitty?”
I nodded, and he pumped the gas, then the brake. I could see a car behind us, turn signal on, waiting for the space. The person behind the wheel appeared to be cursing when the Volvo suddenly roared to life, a burst of smoke popping from the tailpipe.
“Nothing like driving in the snow,” Dave said, hardly fazed as we turned out of the lot and headed down the hill to a stop sign, flakes hitting the windshield. As he slowed, the Volvo’s brakes squealed in protest. He glanced over at me, then said, “Seat belt, please. Safety first.”
I pulled it on, grateful he’d reminded me. My door was rattling, and I was just hoping the seat belt would hold me in should it fly open at forty miles an hour. “So,” I said, once we’d gotten going, “thanks for the thyme.”
“No problem,” he replied. “I just hope you weren’t offended.”
“Why would I be offended?”
“Well, you don’t like clutter.”
“It’s one spice container,” I pointed out.
“Yes, but it’s a slippery slope. First you have thyme, then you get into rosemary and sage and basil, and the next thing you know, you have a problem.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” The car wheezed, and he hit the gas. The engine roared, attracting an alarmed look from a woman in a Lexus beside us.
“How long have you had this thing?”
“Little over a year,” he said. “I bought her myself. Took all my savings bonds, bar mitzvah money, and what I’d made working at FrayBake.”
The brakes squealed again. I said, “That much, huh?”
“What?” He glanced at me, then back at the road. “Hey, this is a great car. Sturdy, dependable. Has character. She might have a few issues, but I love her anyway.”
“Warts and all,” I said.
He looked over at me suddenly, surprised. “What did you say?”
“What?”
“You said ‘warts and all.’ Didn’t you?”
“Um, yeah,” I replied. “What, you don’t know that expression?”
“No, I do.” He eased us into the turn lane for school, then took his left hand off the steering wheel, turning it over to expose the black, tattooed circle there. “It’s where this comes from, actually.”
“That’s supposed to be a wart?” I asked.
“Sort of,” he said, downshifting. “See, when I was a kid, my mom and dad were both teaching full-time. So during the week, I stayed with this woman who kept a few kids at her house. Eva.”
The snow was really picking up now, giving the wipers a workout. Just two small arcs of clarity, with everything blurry beyond.
“She had a granddaughter who was the same age as me and stayed there, too. She and I napped together, ate glue together. That was Riley.”
“Really?”
“Yep. I told you, we’ve known each other forever. Anyway, Eva was just, like, straight-up awesome. She was really tall and broad, with a huge belly laugh. She smelled like pancakes. And she had this wart. A huge one, like something you’d see on a witch or something. Right here.” He put his index finger in the center of the tattoo, pressing down. “We were, like, fascinated and grossed out by it at the same time. And she always made a point of letting us look at it. She wasn’t embarrassed at all. Said if we loved her, we loved it, too. It was part of the package.”
I thought of Riley’s wrist, that same black circle. The sad look on her face when Deb pointed it out.
“She got cancer last year,” he said. “Pancreatic. She died two months after the diagnosis.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. It pretty much sucked.” We were turning into the school parking lot, going past the guardhouse. “The day after her funeral, me and Riley went and got these.”
“That’s a pretty amazing tribute,” I said.
“Eva was pretty amazing.”
I watched him as we turned down a row of cars, slowing for a group of girls in track pants and heavy coats. “I like the sentiment. But it’s easier said than done, you know?”
“What is?”
I shrugged. “Accepting all the good and bad about someone. It’s a great thing to aspire to. The hard part is actually doing it.”
He found a spot and turned in, then cut the engine, which rattled gratefully to a stop. Never had a car seemed so exhausted. Then he looked at me. “You think so?”
I had a flash of my mom on the phone that morning, her wavering voice, the words I’d said. I swallowed. “I think that’s why I like moving around so much. Nobody gets to know me well enough to see any of the bad stuff.”