Chapter 9

?xml:namespace prefix o ns "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /

"Please?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Joshua!"

"Did you just stomp your foot there, Donnatella?"

"I hate you."

"You've mentioned that."

"Please…."

"No."

"But this could be my last time." The whining is really becoming pathetic.

"Face it; you've had your last time."

"But…"

"What did we discuss yesterday?"

"That you're a mean, mean man who's keeping my car hostage?"

"No, good try though."

"That you're a mean, mean man who's forcing me to buy a car I don't need?"

"No…"

"That you don't appreciate The Beast for the vintage piece of machinery she is?"

"Nope."

"That…"

"That you're never driving this piece of crap, falling apart, virginity stealing, gas guzzling, no odometer, no power steering, no turn signals, broken air-conditioner, seventeen year-old, ten dollar bucket of rust again."

"Oh… that."

"Yes, that."

"You found out about the air-conditioning, huh?"

He shakes his head and sighs. "I just guessed."

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

So Josh doesn't let me drive to the dealership, even though I beg and plead and whine, but he loves me, so although I continue to give him a hard time about it the entire way there, I forgive him. As we pull into the parking lot, I remind him that I'm leaning towards the cheaper Accord, but he ignores me and says, "Let's get you a car!" He gets out and it takes twelve seconds for a shark to bombard us. Josh shakes them off and asks for Chet.

"Who's Chet?"

He claps his hands together once and bounces on the balls of his feet a little bit. He's very cute when he does that. Our kids are gonna do that some day. Focus, Donna. "Chet's our guy."

"Our guy?"

"He sold me my car."

"That was like four years ago. How do you know he's even still here?"

Just then, a man in his late fifties comes outside and Josh walks up to him. That's Chet? That family man in a nice suit with a clean, respectable haircut is Chet? Don't you picture Chet as the guy at the ocean resort with the bleached hair and dark tan who rents out the wave-runners and takes people out on scuba trips, and walks around all day wearing no shoes and no shirt? The guy at the beach bar later that night wearing an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt and old worn-in jeans that sit low on his hips, who knows everyone there, drinks tequila shots off women's stomachs, and goes home with one of the blondes from his scuba trip earlier that day? That's Chet, right? This guy? He's like… Steve. Or Bob. But not Chet.

"Josh, how are you?"

Josh shakes his hand. "I'm well, thanks. And you?"

"Good. It's nice to see you, I'm glad you made it."

They start walking towards cars and I stare after them for a few seconds before walking quickly to catch up with them.

"Sorry we didn't make it out yesterday. We got a little behind schedule. Donna insisted we eat."

My mouth drops open and I hit him on the shoulder. Chetshark just chuckles and turns to me. "It's nice to finally meet you, Donna. We're looking for an A4, huh?"

My eyes widen. It's nice to finally meet me? "Well, I'm in the market for a car," I say, shaking his hand.

He smiles and turns back to Josh. "I still don't have any used ones, Josh. I called around to eight other dealerships this past week, but you know how popular this model is. I have a couple demos, but to be honest, they aren't marked down that much."

Josh nods. "I figured as much. Thanks for checking." What's going on? Am I in the twilight zone?

Chetshark walks us up to a specific car and turns to me. "You need to keep the options limited to make this fit into your budget, right?"

I look over at Josh and then back to Chetshark. "Yes."

He nods. "This," he says, pointing to the car we're standing at, "Is the A4 2.0. It has cloth seats instead of leather, forgoes the upgraded audio package, the rear side airbags, the headlight washers, as well as a few other things, and comes in just under thirty thousand. I think I can get you a small rebate as well."

Under thirty thousand? For an Audi? What else does it forego? The engine? The hooks? "Do I still get the hooks in the trunk for the groceries?"

Josh cuts in. "She needs the airbags and any other safety options."

"Josh…"

He ignores me and talks to Chetshark. "She needs them."

"Right, sorry," Chetshark says, nodding at him as though he already knows this. He takes us over to another car. "This one has all the safety options and the upgraded stereo, and after rebates is going to be about thirty-two. Or we can always go inside and build one. It'd be ready for pick up in a few weeks."

"You've got the 1.9 percent financing for five years?"

Chetshark nods. "Yes, just like we discussed. But you have to put a thousand down for that."

Josh looks over at me with questioning eyes and I pause and stick my bottom lip out before nodding reluctantly. He smiles and looks at Chetshark. "Let's take it for a spin!" He's doing the bouncing thing again.

Chetshark takes down the VIN number and heads back inside. "You talked to Chet?" He shrugs and mumbles something. "What?"

"He's been keeping and eye out for a used one."

"For how long?" He ignores me and walks around looking at some other stickers. "Joshua?"

"Don't worry about it," he says, walking over to a convertible and stopping suddenly.

Chetshark comes back out then and walks up to Josh. "Nice, isn't it?"

"Is this an A4?" he asks in awe.

Chetshark nods. "It just came out last year. It's great, isn't it?"

Josh walks up to it and looks inside. "Nice," he says in almost a whisper.

"Yeah." He opens the door and Josh sits down in the driver's seat.

Hello… car shopper right over here. "Can I get that in my price range?" How cool would a convertible be? Oh yeah.

Chetshark looks over at me. "These start about forty."

"So, no."

"You want to take it out?" he asks Josh, who's off in his own world of Audi-ism, pulling down the visor, messing with the seat, opening the glove compartment, arranging the rearview mirror, things like that.

"Huh?" He asks, looking up at Chetshark. "Nah. We gotta…" he trails off and points to me.

Chetshark nods and opens the door for him and we all walk over to the car I'm going to be driving. It's white, not dark silver, but seeing as the dark silver one next to it has a sticker price of thirty-nine five, I'm just gonna go with white. Chetshark opens the door for me and then gets into the back seat, giving Josh the front seat. We pull out and start driving, and I feel like I'm driving Josh's car. "So Donna, I was happy to hear you're ready to buy."

"It's really more of a case of Josh being ready for me to buy," I deadpan.

"How's it handling?" Josh asks me.

"Great." Awesome, amazing, perfect. Maybe if I moved out of my apartment and lived in it I could afford it. Think about it… I could get a PO Box for mail, a gym membership for hygiene, drop my land line and use cell only, and start going to the laundromat. Granted, it'd be hard to have people over, and I'd have to give up Alias, but look at the flip side; I could read more.

"I'm sorry I haven't been able to find you a used one. I know you've been hoping for one," Chetshark says to me.

I raise my eyebrows. I have been? I look at Josh but he ignores me and continues with his questions. "Are you comfortable? How about the controls?"

"It's very nice, Josh. It's like driving your car." I focus on Chetshark again. "I didn't realize you were helping Josh find a used one," I say cryptically.

Josh answers before Chetshark has a chance to. "He's just been keeping an eye out. Chet, how different is this from the one I have?" Hmm… does it seem to you that Josh doesn't want Chetshark and me discussing this used car search, or is it just me? Maybe I'm imagining it.

"Well you have the 3.0, so you have more horse power and more options, plus you got it fully loaded. But as far as the overall car, it hasn't changed much in the last four years. A few cosmetic things here and there, there's more room in the trunk, the speakers are a newer model, that's about it."

"How often do you get used ones in?" Because really, if I could get a used one…

"She doesn't have much of a trade-in," Josh says out of nowhere. Ok, I'm not imagining it, he's definitely trying to avoid the used car discussion.

Chetshark laughs a little, which The Beast and I don't appreciate. "I noticed. As far as used ones, if we haven't gotten one in the last year, do you really want to keep waiting?"

A year? I jerk my head to Josh, who's wincing and looks like he's in pain.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

We pull back into the lot about twenty minutes later and Chetshark starts to take us inside. Every other time this has happened, Josh has stepped forward and thanked the shark for their time, telling him or her that we're still considering our options but that we'll be making a decision this weekend and we'll let them know if we're interested. This time, he starts following Chetshark into the building. "Uh…" What's going on?

Josh turns back to me. "What?"

"I…" I point towards The Beast. What the hell's happening?

"Come on. Let's get you a car," he says, nodding towards the building with the smile of a ten year-old. No fair bringing out the dimples.

"But…" I'm panicking. I can't breathe. Help.

He turns to Chetshark. "Can we have just a minute?"

Chetshark nods. "I'm going to return a call and I'll be right back."

"Thanks." Josh waits until he's gone to say anything. "What?"

"Josh, I can't afford this car," I say quietly.

"You don't know that."

"I can do the math. I know the Accord's nine thousand dollars cheaper!" I scream in a whisper sort of way.

"But this is the safest car made."

"I'm aware of that, but the Accord's safe too. The e-mail said so."

"You read it?" he nearly screeches.

I roll my eyes. "Have you ever met me? Of course I read it."

He takes a deep breath and looks down at the ground before looking up at me. "I thought we'd decided on this one."

I stare at him for a second. "I don't know what led you to that conclusion, seeing as how a half hour ago I told you I was leaning towards the Accord."

"But this is better. You loved this car, Donna."

I nod. "I did. But…"

"Let's just see what kind of payments he can offer you. He knows you're on a budget."

I take a deep breath, ready to tell him no. It's my checkbook, it's my life, it's my decision. Then I see his puppy dog eyes begging me. "Fine, but if the payments are too high, I'm getting the Accord." His dimples come out and he starts bouncing again. "I mean it Josh. I'm not going to bankrupt myself for a car. "

"Uh huh," he says, smile growing. He's not listening to me at all.

"We're gonna talk about Chet and the used car search later, by the way."

His eyes get big and the bouncing stops. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"A year?"

"He was exaggerating," he says, his voice getting really high on exaggerating.

"By what? Eleven and a half months?"

He shrugs. "Something like that."

I shake my head in mock frustration and bite my lip to keep the 'Josh loves me' smile from forming. We start walking around the cars, waiting for Chetshark, who's standing over by The Beast on the phone. You know why he returned the call there, don't you? So we can't sneak out on him. How sleazy! Still, I find it hard to fault the man who spent a year keeping an eye out for a used car for me, especially considering that in about fifteen minutes I'm leaving to go to the Honda dealership down the road.

We come to the convertible again and Josh starts drooling. He circles it, one eyebrow up, pausing when he comes to the sticker on the window. He gets inside again and I get in the passenger seat. "It's nice," I say to him.

"Uh huh," he says, ignoring me completely. I think he's in love.

We sit there waiting while Josh pretends to drive the convertible. I'm ok with that as long as he doesn't start with the car noises. One "broom" or tire screech sound and I'm having him committed.

Chetshark comes back a few minutes later, chuckling at him. "It's hard to resist, isn't it?"

Josh doesn't really register Chetshark there for a few seconds, then he looks up at him. "It's… nice."

Chetshark nods. "You sure you don't want to take it out?"

"Yeah, I'm…" then he stops talking and tilts his head to the side. A second later, he looks over at me and smiles wickedly. "Sure, why not?"