Tainted

I struggle to pick apart the plastic and cardboard layers of the decal, searching in vain for a seam that doesn’t seem to be there.  The wind howls down the alleyway between the houses, numbing my wooden fingers, blowing into Gloria’s open back hatch.

“Hey,” says Carmine. “I think you better check your car.”  He thumbs down the street towards Widow Heathcliff’s house, in front of which I have left Gloria.  “You got a ticket.”

“What?” I say, turning on my heel.  “For what?”

“Residential Parking,” he replies, sniffing.  “I seen they marked the tires, and I said, ‘Uh-oh’.  But I didn’t see you to tell you.”

I stalk up the street, still clutching the strap of my backpack, with Carmine trailing behind me.  Sure enough, there is a drizzle of white silicon atop each of Gloria’s driver’s-side tires.  The cops use the stuff to check whether or not the car has been moved since they came by and applied it.

There is also a ticket beneath her windshield wiper.  “What the fuck?” I say, snatching the ticket off of her and staring at it balefully.  Black fumes boil in my chest. “They’re gonna tag me for that?   NOW?”

I have been living on Fifth Street for close to seven years.  Everyone on Fifth Street knows I live on Fifth Street, and where, and that Gloria is my car, just as they knew that Nightshade was my car back before I traded him to the government under the Cash for Clunkers program.  Aside from the fact that there aren’t a tremendous number of Mini-Coopers in Sealand, and that she drew a lot of attention when I got her, she has the same license plate as he did.

None of this is relevant to Parking Enforcement, of course.  They–  “she”, really, because it’s pretty much just this one Latina woman, less-than-affectionately referred to as “The Terminator”, who hangs out with the chicas at the laundromat when she’s off-duty and is notorious for being implacable–  just looks for the parking permit sticker.  And Gloria doesn’t have the sticker.   I couldn’t get the old one off of Nightshade, and I never bothered to get a new one;  it felt like I’d be crapping her up somehow by putting it on her, tainting her with Sealand-ness.  But there is a case to be made for wondering why, after having parked her in this identical manner, on this same street, without the permit, since the past summer, I am now being singled out for such treatment.  I say as much, using a great deal of profanity.

“S’cuz we gotta new City Council,” says Carmine.  He shoves his hands into the pockets of his union jacket.  “People do that.  They come, they drive here and park here, leave it on the street all day, then they take the bus or the train in from here to the City, cuz it’s one zone less?  Two zones less?  Cheaper.   Then there’s no place to park for the people who live here.  It’s a big deal.”  He shrugs.  “But now they got a new City Council, and they ran on that.  That was one of the things they said.  When they came around, door to door, asking me for my vote, I said, ‘So you’re gonna be the new City Council,’ and they said, ‘Yeah, maybe.’  And I said, ‘Well I know you’re gettin’ in, so I’ll vote for you.  But you gotta do one thing for me.’   And they said, ‘What’s that?’  And I said, ‘Enforce the parking laws.’  So now that’s what they’re doing.”

The gas to do what he’s describing probably costs more these days then the savings on the bus fare, or the parking fees at a park-and-ride.  “So… you’re sayin’ this is your fault,” I tell him, holding up the ticket.

“More or less,” he says, grinning.  He claps me on the arm.  “I just wanted to make sure I caught’ya this morning.  Ticket’s one thing, but if they come back and see it’s still there they might tow the car.  Then you got a whole different problem.”

“I appreciate it,” I say to him.  And I really do.

Payment of the $24 fine and procurement of a new parking sticker both required a trip to the Sealand Municipal Center, which, displaying the perversity I have come to expect of this town, is actually an attractive, well-designed place:  glass-walled offices and courts all arranged around a huge, airy central gallery, with a small fountain tinkling peacefully in the stillness.  The women who staff the Clerk’s Office are not friendly, or even really polite, but they are dreadfully efficient, and if you do not aggravate them by being unprepared with those materials necessary to conduct the business at hand, they reward you with the swift completion of that business.  The walk to and from the Municipal Center took longer than it did to actually get the new permit.

I have taken Gloria off the street, and stationed her in the driveway between the landlord’s house and the neighbor’s house while I have accomplished this.   Now the 60-degree temperatures and sunny skies of the previous day have given way to blustery 40s and the threat of rain, and I cannot figure out how to peel the sticker off its cardboard backing, neither of which is doing anything to mitigate my feelings of unjust persecution.

Freaking Faye never bothered to get a parking permit when SHE lived here, I think, frowning.  She just used Flora’s temp permit.  Hung it over the post of her rear-view mirror so long that the stupid thing disintegrated.  And then ignored it after that.  And SHE never got a ticket.  Bitch. I angle the plastic side of the sticker into the uncertain light, searching for guidance.   But then, she knew actually knew the Terminator, didn’t she?  Chatted her up when she was working as a secretary at that doctor’s office, in the center of town?  So why would she ever get a ticket? A fresh breeze pokes its fingers beneath my leather jacket, making me shiver. And why is it so freakin’ COLD?

The glint of an edge catches my eye, revealing the problem:  the sticker is actually smaller than the cardboard, and I have been trying to peel apart the cardboard itself for the last ten minutes.  I hook my thumbnail under the true edge, and it comes off easily.  I slide my butt into Gloria’s back hatch, handling the little curl of plastic gingerly, shielding it from the wind, then eye up the window, invoking the spirit of my dead father, who never placed a decal crooked in his life.  When I’m convinced I’m on target, I slam the top edge home and brush down.

It’s a perfect job, even by his standards:  every edge parallel to its surroundings, surface flush to the glass, no bubbles.  I pull my hands back and sit up, delighted, the cold forgotten.  I stand up from the hatch and slam it closed, circling around Gloria’s back left fender to check my work.  Then I rap lightly on her roof, affectionately.  “See baby?” I tell her.  “Looks good on you.”   The green of the permit and the green of her paint are almost the same color.

I jump into the driver’s seat and close the door, insert her key.  Then I hit the ignition.  The engine roars to life…

…chugs suddenly, and dies.

I blink at the dashboard in the silence.   Gloria never stalls.  Ever.

I lift my finger over the ignition push-button again, let it hover there quizzically in my confusion.  Then I press it a second time, tentatively.

Her engine comes back on.  So does a yellow light on the speedometer, in the shape of an engine.  It stays there after the other indicator lights have disappeared.

I slip the owner’s manual out of the glove compartment, riffle through the pages until I get to the table of warning indicators and their meanings, then cross-reference the table with the display.  “ENGINE MALFUNCTION RESULTING IN EXHAUST SYSTEM VARIANCE,” reads the blurb.  “RETURN CAR TO DEALER FOR SERVICE AT EARLIEST CONVENIENCE.”

I slump back in her seat, let the owner’s manual slide off my lap.

Tainted, I think.