Brake Neck Speeds

By Faith J Forster

 ‘I bought a Cadillac,’ Wilson hollers over the phone. He overwhelms me with talk about his newly acquired car. He’s gone mad, I decide and collapse flat on my back to pedal my legs in the air. A thing I do to get in a few seconds of fitness while attached to lengthy calls.

‘What year?’ I ask during a brief respite.

‘Not new, it’s a 1974 Coupe Deville in super good nick’ 

Wilson’s in love with the American Dream. To me it’s odd when a displaced Londoner goes gaga for coliseum sized beer parlours, gorges on hot dogs slathered in mustard and now prattles nonstop about a used American car. ‘I would love to take the caddy up to the Cascades over the weekend. You’ll never guess what!  I bought a piece of land up there and I plan to park a trailer on it. You could come along and help me pick the best spot for it.’ His excitement surges through the transmission lines.

 He’s bought vacant land in the middle of nowhere! A home where he thinks the buffalo roam. Wilson wants my advice, so naturally he asks me out on a date. 

‘I’ll come.’ I say way too quickly but I cannot resist the idea of relaxing back in a big old Cadillac while motoring up to the mountain meadows.

Wilson is quirky, blonde, blue eyed, a bit short but sturdy and as a total package he comes across as kind of cute. I have to laugh when he tells me he never beds anyone over thirty and that he buys his clothes in places like Bloomingdales and Nordstrom. One look at his wardrobe of second- hand clothes and worn- out athletic sneakers lets me in on the truth. I’m pretty sure he has a good idea how old I am but he is hard at work trying to bed me. 

At times he irritates me by acting the cock of the walk as if he is smarter than everyone else. Friends warn me. ‘He’s a drifter, a know it all; have fun but don’t commit.’ My amateur analysis reasons he is an uprooted Londoner reacting to feeling like a fish out of water in his new location.

On Saturday Wilson is behind the wheel of his big roomy Cadillac Coupe Deville wearing a houndstooth cap and grinning like some chauffeur. I giggle at the sight and his face turns red. A much-used trailer attached to a trailer hitch under the rear bumper sags dangerously close to the pavement. I sink down as far as I can into the plush white leather passenger seat to avoid being discovered in an old Cadillac hitched to a trailer.

Cruising along the highway, the Cadillac purrs and in the comfort of the magnificent Coupe Deville, we delight in the hilarity of our mission. Twisting and spinning up the gravel mountain road, we arrive at a patch of hardscrabble land dotted with Ponderosa pines. The dry yellow grass is alive with small rodents and insects darting about in their habitat. The total picture is pleasing with pines swaying in the breeze and snow -capped mountains in the distance.

Wilson bumps the Cadillac up a hill over roadless ground and stops under the branches of an expansive Ponderosa pine. We jump out and gaze out over Wilson’s acres. Only a pitchfork could complete this picture.

Wilson strokes his chin. ‘Well, is this a good place for the trailer?’ 

‘Maybe moving a bit forward would be good? The ground is a little higher and flatter. Your view would be the best there’

He jumps in the caddy and inches it forward. ‘Here, is that good?’

I pause to deliberate on the best spot for his dented second -hand trailer balanced on its four tiny wheels.

‘Um, maybe even more forward.’ I really want him to get the ultimate view for his money. 

Wilson maneuvers forward and finds his sweet spot under the shady pine perched atop a hill above the surrounding grasslands and distant mountains.

‘Ok, let’s release the trailer hitch. This is as good as it gets.’  Feeling his mission accomplished, he struts to the rear bumper and unhitches the trailer.

The Cadillac no longer held back starts a gradual roll down the hill. He makes a grab for the bumper but within seconds, the car picks up speed and soon it’s flying like a bat out of hell through an old deserted apple orchard until we hear a loud bang followed by the grind of bending metal and the shatter of glass. The charging Cadillac has come to its final stop in a burst of debris and a deluge of dust that fills the air. And then everywhere turns deathly quiet. 

  Wilson’s high -pitched laugh cracks the silence but, in my shock, I can sense reality will come soon. Trancelike, he goes to see what remains of his Cadillac. I stand in my tracks with my mouth wide open and gaze after his descent to the orchard.

Wilson retreats from the scene of the wreck with his head drooping down and I can feel his pain from such a sudden loss. The apple orchard looks unscathed as if nothing has happened for a century. It occurs to me, we are stuck in this wilderness with a smashed Cadillac and a trailer with no electricity, water or useful means of existence. 

We trek back down to the road and find a sympathetic farmer who offers us a plastic covered bed for the night. The next morning looking like two hangdogs, we go back to Seattle on the Grey Hound bus. As time passes mitigating the effects of memory, the land becomes known as Cadillac Ranch, after an ill-fated Cadillac resting at the foot of an old gnarled tree as a comfy cozy nest for the field mice who inhabit it.

Faith writes daily as a committed member of the Sarah Selecky Writers’ group. Over the years her writing skills have been honed through creative writing courses and by never giving up.

She holds a Master’s degree (MSN) from the University of British Columbia, Canada.

Dreamers Creative Writing, Café Lit, Half and One, and Shorts Magazine have published her work.