Queen Of the Road. (standard:humor, 2311 words)
Author: Oscar A Rat	Added: Jul 09 2020	Views/Reads: 1024/723	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
The career of a special old Ford, as told by a junkyard dog.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

A man, one she could remember testing her pedals and kicking her tires
the day before, climbed in and adjusted her seat. He not only started 
her engine but paraded her past all'a other new cars, and out'a the 
lot. 

Bootsy could hardly believe it. She was finally on a street, under her
own power.  She could feel all that energy under her hood, purring away 
like that tiger she had in her tank. 

Feeling her tires gripping the road, she was driven ta a house on the
South Side a Chicago.  It was a one-family dwelling with a grassy yard 
in front and even a well-swept driveway for her very own.  She could 
hardly believe it.  Bootsy even owned her very own garage. It wasn't a 
very big one, and it had a lot'a junk piled in it, but it was her's. 
Bootsy was in seventh auto heaven. 

And she had her own family. Her owner was named Sammy, with a wife named
Ellen and two little kids ta yell and play around and in her.  Best'a 
all, she was ta be driven. Her days a sitting unloved were over. 

For the next few years Bootsy led a happy life. Sammy would drive her ta
his work in the city, where she would sit and talk ta other cars, 
meeting a lot'a new friends. The pay-lot her master parked in always 
had different cars parked, as well as some that were there every day -- 
like her. It was exciting ta hear about faraway places, like Ioway and 
New York. 

But, after years a commuting back and forth on the same streets and
passin' by all those mysterious side streets she never went down, 
Bootsy couldn't help but feel bored and left out. She often kicked 
herself about what happened next, though. It was her own fault. 

*** 

One day -- parked in her regular spot -- she was again bored, staring at
the backend of a dirty Buick. When she saw a strange human sneakin' 
along her row, trying car doors, Bootsy flipped her locks up -- just ta 
see what would happen. It was exciting ta watch him get closer an 
closer, finding all the vehicles locked and hearing them mutter in 
fear.  Brave Bootsy, however, wasn't frightened -- well, maybe just a 
little. 

“Damn, found one.” He opened her up, looking around. Getting in, he sat
for a minute, checking out her glove compartment and under the seats. 
She felt a pain as he used a screwdriver on her ignition switch, 
fumbling around until he got her engine started. 

Bootsy felt a thrill, though, as the new human pushed down hard on her
accelerator and roared out'a the lot, even busting a thin plank 
guarding the gate ta splinters. She could see the parking lot attendant 
running out'a his booth behind her, the image fading fast -- then out'a 
sight as the man roared her around a corner. 

It was a wild ride for Bootsy. On one hand, she enjoyed a racing
squealing trip through previously unknown streets. On the other, she 
was both frightened and excited by the danger, one hubcap popping off 
at a hard right turn. The strange feel of a breeze on bare lug-nuts 
only intensified her thrills. Screw those hubcaps, she thought. 

She found herself cruising down an expressway, her first. The man had
slowed down ta the speed limit. Soon, as they got off on'a two-lane 
road, she could see cornfields on both sides. It was still strange and 
exciting ta see those other cars whiz by her in the opposite direction, 
only a few feet separating them from her. Sure, she was used ta it in 
town, but not at those speeds. 

Bootsy tired from all the excitement, trusted her new driver ta steer.
She was half-asleep when he slowed down, coming into a small town. A 
sign over a store said, "East Detroit Auto Shop" when they pulled in. 
She had come full circle, back ta Detroit. 

“Another fucking Ford, Alfie?” A man in dirty overalls chided the
driver. “Can't you get me an Olds or a Caddy? I got too damn many Fords 
now.” he told her driver. “Just park it in the corner, over there.” 

They were in a big long room full'a cars. Some had their hoods up and
others were torn apart. Some looked scared ta her, and others sat there 
unconcerned. 

Alfie parked her between two other Fords about her age, and left her. It
was the last she saw a him -- or her old master and his family, for 
that matter. 

*** 

During the next week, Bootsy thought she was in Auto Hell. A car on one
side'a her was being stripped down for parts. She could hear him 
sobbing as they took things off his chassis. By the time the mechanics 
were done, the other car was nothin' but a lonely frame; a dead frame.  
There was a lot'a screaming in the room, as more a the cars were being 
stripped and losing their identity -- the same as dying for a machine. 

Bootsy feared she would soon join them. Especially the afternoon a
mechanic raised her hood and left it open. She was sure she would be 
next. 

The next day, two men in three-piece suits came around ta the shop.
Bootsy could hear them arguin' with the owner. Through her headlights, 
she could see one a the men slap the shop-owner in the face, an hear 
the slapper yelling. 

“I don't give a shit.  I need a good getaway car.  You ruined mine, now
you give me another one. And I mean right now, asshole.” 

The other man sounded placating, but Bootsy couldn't understand him. 

“Lose money?  Gerry, show him what losing money means,” the first man
said. Another guy brought out what Bootsy would learn was called a gun. 
He fired two rounds into a brand new Chevy behind the shop-owner, close 
ta hitting him and almost causing him ta collapse from fear. 

“Okay. Okay, Mr. Capone. Take any of them.  My gift to you, Al.  Please,
any of them," the owner said in a shaky voice. 

“Gerry, go get one.  Your choice. Not a new one though, one a few years
old,” Al told his friend.  "We'll soup it up later, in a friendlier 
shop." 

Anxiously, Bootsy watched Gerry walk down the line a cars, looking
inside them and checking their tires. He stopped at her and looked in 
her open hood, then walked farther up the line. 

“Hurry up, Gerry, we ain't got all day here. I got business I gotta
attend to.” 

Gerry came back, closed Bootsy's hood, climbed in and started her up.
They drove back ta where Al was still cussing the shop-owner.  Al 
climbed in and they were let out onto the street. Later, Bootsy learned 
her new owner was Al Capone, a big-shot human. 

She spent more time in a repair shop, that time getting tuned up and a
lot'a fancy stuff ta make her faster and turn corners better. Even a 
nifty new transmission. If she thought she had a lot'a power new -- she 
had twice as much then. 

*** 

Bootsy got her wish, an exciting life. Al and his minions soon had her
hauling illegal alcohol from Canada, racing ta outrun the law. At 
times, she had either machine-guns filling her back seat or dead humans 
decomposing in her trunk. 

It was exciting ta park at fancy restaurants, sensing the other cars
edging away from her in fear. The change in status felt wonderful. She 
raced down the road, bad and beautiful, living the wild life as the 
cat's meow. 

Before long, half the cars in Chicago went out'a THEIR way ta stay out'a
HER way. Even noisy autos would fade ta silence as Bootsy pulled up 
behind them at traffic lights, not wanting ta annoy her or her driver. 

That's when she changed the name she called herself from Betty ta
Bootsy. She loved the life and the notoriety a being a bad girl in her 
mind, scoobie doobie doo. 

It ended, as all things must, one day when she took Al ta a small hotel
on the outskirts a town. He didn't want his friends ta know he was 
seeing a girl there, so he went alone. Bootsy waited outside, in front, 
as he tended ta business inside. 

While Al was in there, Bootsy felt someone underneath her, fooling
around.  After a few minutes, the man wiggled back out and left Bootsy 
curious as ta what he had been doing. Al came back out. He started 
Bootsy up and put her in gear. 

Bootsy felt herself being lifted up and bounced on her springs, as
something exploded beneath her.  Still bouncing, people began shooting 
her, bullet holes blossoming along her right side. Two a her tires were 
hit, one even exploding. 

Al dove out'a the driver's door and shot back, his bullets zinging past
Bootsy's undercarriage. 

After that, Bootsy found herself alone again -- in this junkyard. After
a while, she calmed down from years a being high on her own importance 
and found she had a lot'a old friends here. 

She enjoyed only a short life, compared ta some others -- like Harry
over there, over by the fence -- but a violent and exciting one.  
Bootsy still regales us with her stories as Queen, abdicating at the 
height a her reign. 

All you see is a mangy junkyard dog lyin' under a old rusted hulk. Me, I
look up over my head ... and see a Queen a the Road. 

The End.


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