Holy Grail

“Is that what you’re looking for?” Whiff asked.

“That’s exactly it. Damn, I didn’t think you would actually know where to find one,” Crash replied. “What kind of shape is it in?”

“Hell if I know. Been sittin’ there for years. That’s Old Man Thompson’s place, though. I throw hay in that big barn a couple times a year. Should we go talk to him?”

“Let’s do it,” Crash said, hopping back into the seat of the old Empi Dune Buggy.

Whiff and Crash had been friends forever. Since the beginning of time, forever. Whiff was a local, born and raised in northern Michigan. He’d earned the nickname “Whiff” as the star pitcher for the high school baseball team. Fans would yell “whiff” every time he struck out a batter. In other words, a lot.

Crash, on the other hand, had lived in half a dozen places. But every summer, he came back to the lake. And to Whiff. The two had been playing and hanging out together since their first summer… their parents put them together in a playpen. Crash lived his live at full throttle, sometimes with crashing results. The nickname stuck.

Now, verging on adulthood, they still hung out together. The games were different, though. As kids, they played with trucks in the beautiful sand beach in front of their lake houses. Tonka trucks built and destroyed roads and launched toy boats. As early teens, they had sailed Whiff’s Hobie catamaran all over the lake in search of girls. They found a lot of them and broke a few hearts along the way. Later, they waterskied and tubed the lake, paddled the river and ran the old logging and WPA roads in the wilderness around the lake.

Today, as they had been romping through the woods in Whiff’s dad’s old dune buggy, Crash had mentioned the truck he was looking for. He didn’t expect to find one… certainly not one worth buying… out here in the north woods. That thing would be fifty years old and destroyed by rust up here. But Whiff said he knew where one was, and Crash was in.

The little green VW Bug based buggy pulled up in front of the farmhouse. Before Whiff could turn off the engine, a large, grumpy looking old man stepped onto his porch, looking down at the two young men.

“Ain’t time for hay, Whiff,” he said, his voice like gravel rolling in a cement mixer.

“No, sir. My buddy here said he was looking for an old truck, Mr. Thompson. I was thinking about the one you have back poking out of the horse barn.”

“Is that so?” the old man said. “Well…”

He let his words hang there, the sentence unfinished. The two boys waited to hear the rest. And waited. Just when Crash was going to say something to fill the silence, Mr. Thompson lumbered off the porch and down the steps.

“Looking for a truck, are ya?” he said, sizing up Crash.

“Yes, sir. Been looking for a ’46 or ’47 Ford. I love the lines of those old trucks.”

“Whiff ain’t led ya wrong. I got a ’46 back in the horse barn. Solid truck. Bought it new here in town when there used to be a Ford dealer. Probably runs, too. Maybe.”

“Can we take a look, Mr. Thompson?” Whiff asked.

“Sure… but there’s a catch. There’s a car back there, too. Gotta take both of ‘em. Ain’t gonna dick around on the price, either. Been thinkin’ of sellin’ them. Four thousand. Go on and take a look. I’m gonna grab a beer and I’ll be sittin’ on the porch.”

Whiff flashed Crash a thumbs up and hopped back into the dune buggy so they could drive back to the horse barn. “Thank you, sir,” he hollered back as they fired up the buggy to drive back to the barn.

They came around the big barn to the horse barn next to the pasture. As it came into view, Crash spied the grill of the old truck sticking past the edge of the brown structure. The paint was burned off the top of the hood by fifty years of sun and probably no wax in decades. As he got closer, he saw the same was true of the roof… probably the bed rails, too. The paint on the sides was faded, its luster gone, but still good color.

“That looks freaking awesome,” Crash said, hopping from the buggy. “That patina is magical. Seriously… I don’t even want to see new paint on it.”

“Really? Looks like crap to me.”

“No, man. It’s beauty. You can’t make it look like that. It’s perfect. I mean, I wasn’t looking for a ‘tonner’ but that’s ok.”

“What’s a ‘tonner’?” Whiff asked.

“One ton rated truck, not a regular light duty. Flatbed, dual rear wheels.”

“I wonder what kind of piece of crap Is behind it,” Whiff said, walking deeper into the old horse barn. He knew horses hadn’t been kept in that barn for almost as long as he’d been alive, the hay being for other stock that lived in the old barn.

Crash jogged to catch up with him and saw the car under the cover. Immediately upon examining it, he knew the shape. Mustang Fastback. If this is as solid as the other, he thought, wow. He peeled back the cover of the car that sat on the trailer hooked to the old truck.

“Oh. My. God,” Crash said, pulling the cover back further.

“That an old Mustang? Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about,” Whiff said, hopping up on the trailer to pull the cover back some more.

The cover dropped onto the deck of the trailer behind the car. Crash was almost vibrating with excitement. This was beyond perfect. He dropped down onto the trailer to peer under the car. He reached under and tapped the floors, then leapt up and opened the door. He popped the hood and pulled it up next.

“Holy freaking Grail,” he shouted.

“What? I suppose it’s in good shape, but…”

“This is a Boss 429. My favorite color, Acapulco Blue, too. It’s dirty, but it’s a survivor. There aren’t a dozen cars that would make me more excited than this.”

“You have the money?” Whiff asked.

“No, but I gotta get it. I have an idea.”

“Why do I hate when you say that?” Whiff smiled.

“Can we take the buggy to my grandmother’s?”

“Dude, that’s like three hours. Each way.”

“We can be back by six. Let’s roll.”

Whiff shook his head and followed his friend out to the dune buggy. They stopped at the farmhouse and Crash jumped out, ran over the Mr. Thompson and told him he needed to go get more money. The old man laughed and watched the drive away, a cloud od dust lingering in his long driveway from the little green Empi.

***

It was quarter to three when Crash and Whiff pulled into Crash’s grandmother’s driveway. Two windburned, sunburned guys, their hair standing on end, trotted up the front steps of her old Craftsman style home. Crash walked right in like he owned the place.

“Gramms,” he called out. “You here?”

“What on earth are you two doing here?” the old woman said, walking out of the kitchen at the back of the house. “Goodness, look at you two. Don’t tell me you came down in that crazy car of Whiff’s.”

“Yeah…” Crash said, tossing her judgement of the dune buggy aside, “I need to ask a favor. It’s an emergency. Ok, not an emergency, but important.”

“Sure…”

“Can I borrow some money?”

“You drove all the way here for that? Your grandfather and I will be up there tomorrow,” she said, rising and going to the cookie jar. She usually kept a little cash on hand in the jar. Having lived through the Depression, she didn’t believe banks would always have money when it was needed, so she had a private stash. “How much?”

“Five thousand dollars,” he said, his voice as flat as if he were asking for a sno-come at the fair.

“That is a lot of money. Whiff, what crazy idea does he have in his head?”

“It’s a car… and a truck. Mr. Thompson has an old truck, and I took him to see it and…” he blurted out, finishing by telling her the whole story of their day thus far.

“Is it really worth it?” she asked quietly.

“Gramms, I was looking for a truck like that, but when I saw the car.” He tried to tell her about the rarity and desirability of the car, but she was soon lost in the details.

“Go sit in the living room,” she instructed.

The two young men left the kitchen and walked out to the living room and sat down, Jerry Springer playing on the TV. A minute later Crash’s grandmother walked into the living room holding an envelope. She dropped it into Crash’s eager hands. She gave him a stern look before leaning over and kissing his cheek and then squeezing his face. “It better be worth it,” she said. “That’s a lot of money.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Crash said. “I’d love to stay, but we need to get back up there. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He hugged his grandmother again and headed back out to the old dune buggy.

“I thought you already had some money, man? That’s cold taking all that from your Gramms.”

“I have to get the truck running and get all that stuff back to my house, Whiff. I hope I have enough.”

***

The following day, Crash showed up again at Mr. Thompsons. He’d been there the evening before, on the way back from his grandmother’s house, to purchase the vehicles. Now they were there to see if they could get them out. Their work was cut out for them.

The tires on the truck were holding air, but the ones on the trailer were toast. Between Mr. Thompson, Crash and Whiff, though, they had the truck running enough to drive into town. Just after lunch, Crash and Whiff drove the truck back to the horse barn again, trailer tires tied down on the flatbed, and a full tank of new gas, along with new tires on the old truck. A couple of hours after that, the trailer and car were freed from the barn for the first time in twenty years.

***

Crash’s mother stood on her front porch and watched her son back the trailer along their narrow driveway toward the garage. She couldn’t believe that he’d driven a fifty-year-old truck seven hundred miles pulling a trailer with a car on it. She wasn’t sure if she was proud or angry that he’d even made the attempt. And that didn’t even touch on the fact he’d “borrowed” so much money from her mother.

“You have a lot to answer for,” she said when he walked up to the house after parking the truck with the trailer right in front of the garage.

“I know. But you have to see it,” he said. “It’s amazing.”

***

Crash was at work when his mom invited over the deacon. Mr. Jones knew Crash and was one of his mentors. He also knew cars.

“I know a dozen people that will give him ten-thousand as it sits,” the deacon told her.

Crash’s mother’s jaw dropped. “They are worth that much?”

“That was just the truck. Runs, drives, and that patina...”

A few minutes later the deacon sat down with her again. “He got a good deal. In fact, it’s an unforgettable deal.”

Later that night Crash picked up the phone. Deacon Jones was on the line. “You better let me drive that car, Crash. Been waiting my whole life to drive one of those.”

Crash smiled. “Yes, sir.”

This was Summer Fiction Series challenge #1. Check out #2, below

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