Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

“What’s a cassette tape?”

It wasn’t until the girl behind the counter at the car rental office said it that I realized just how young she was.

“It’s a… you know… you listen to music on them.”

“Is it an old person thing? Like a Boomer thing?”

“No. Yes. I guess.”

“You’re not talking about a CD, are you? My dad still thinks his collection is actually worth something.”

“No, I’m not talking about a CD. Cassettes came before…” A frustrated sigh broke up my sentence. “Can you please just find me a car with a cassette deck in it?”

“Um, ‘no’ is the short answer. They don’t make cars with cassette decks anymore… or even CD players. Everything just gets Bluetoothed to your cell phone now. Are you a Boomer? You look kinda young for a Boomer, but it’s hard to tell anymore. Anyone over twenty-five looks like a Boomer to me. Do you know what Bluetooth is? Do you even have a cell phone?”

“Yes, I have a cell phone.” My voice was more indignant than I intended. I guess there was an underlying tone of rage in everything these days. “Could you please just get me the manager?”

“I am the manager.”

“Seriously? How old are you?”

“A lot younger than you, apparently.”

“Look, I just need a car with a cassette deck. You see, I have this tape that I haven’t listened to yet, but I kinda need to hear it on my drive down to Louisiana, because… well… I’m finally ready to hear it for myself. Do you get what I mean?”

The girl gave me a suspicious look. “Wait a second, is this a prank? Am I being pranked right now?” She started looking over my shoulders for a hidden camera.

“No! This is not a prank.”

“Damn.”

“Can you just check, and double check, and maybe even triple check to see if you have a car with a cassette deck?”

The girl huffed out a sigh. She turned not to her computer but instead opened a drawer and rummaged through it till she found a business card with frayed corners. “Here,” she said, handing it to me.

I took the card and read aloud—“Sid’s second-hand sedans?”

“You want a car that’s older than Jesus? You’re gonna wanna see Sid.”

“Fella, this is your lucky day. Why? Because I got just what you need. Walk this way.” Sid snapped on his suspenders and led me out of his centerfold-covered sales office and across the car lot to an old sedan that looked like a big white box on wheels. “You want the 1989 Dodge Dynasty, classy as fuck, just like the TV show. Leather seats, wood-panel console, a real turn-on for the chicks, yet there’s plenty of grunt under the hood. Yes sir, this baby can go from zero to sixty in just over ten seconds. We’re talking beauty and the beast.”

“Does it have a cassette deck?”

Sid arched an eyebrow, then laughed like I was joking. “You got some Bee Gees tapes you wanna listen to while you go cruising the streets for love? I totally get it.” He jabbed my side with his elbow like we were old buddies, then opened the driver’s door, giving a fake cough to try and conceal the rusty groan of the hinges.

He blew dust off the dash. “Voila. One good-as-new, state-of-the-art cassette deck begging for a little ‘Saturday Night Fever.’”

I had a feeling there would be no Bee Gees renditions on the audition tape that Lovesong Valentin had sent to Joel.

Nevertheless, that didn’t change the fact that I would soon be driving south in this classy as fuck Dynasty, complete with a cassette deck.

“I’ll take it.”

Blaring horns filled our street in Greenwich Village as I shoved my suitcase into the trunk of my newly purchased, double-parked, soap-opera-inspired eyesore.

“Go around, asshole!” I shouted at a driver with his hand laid on his horn.

“Learn to park, asshole!” he shouted back as he sped by.

“Fucker,” I mumbled under my breath as I opened the driver’s door and slid behind the wheel.

There were three things I hadn’t packed in my suitcase and shoved in the trunk.

One was Joel’s urn which sat in the middle seat in back, a seatbelt strapped around it so it wouldn’t topple.

The second was the tape from Lovesong Valentin that I pulled from my jacket pocket and slid halfway into the cassette deck, not ready to push it all the way inside just yet. Instead, I left it jutting out, poised on a precipice, uncertain of when I’d be ready to click the cassette into place and hit the play button.

The third thing was sitting in the passenger seat beside me. With an anxious whimper, Chet put his front paws on the armrest of the passenger door and tried to peer out the high-set window.

“You ready for this, buddy?”

Chet sat back in his seat and gave me a dubious look.

“Don’t worry, we’ll be back. Just as soon as I’ve…” My voice tapered into a mumble. “What the fuck am I doing?”

Another horn blared from behind us, followed by yet another angry motorist. “Get outta the way, jackass!”

“Okay, here we go,” I told Chet.

I jerked the gears.

The car bounced into motion.

I glanced back once over my shoulder, the brownstone that Joel and I had called home for so many years now disappearing between the falling leaves of autumn.

“We’ll be back,” I muttered again.

But even as I said it—with the tape and the ashes and the dog in the car—I wasn’t sure exactly what I’d be coming back for. Only later would I find out.

I hit the indicator.

I knocked the wipers on and swiped a tear with the back of my hand.

And before I could hit the brake and change my mind, we were off.