Anne Tyler - Earthly Possessions

"Of course not," I said.

"I called her house. Her mother says, Too late, Jake Simms.' Took me three full weeks to track her down. I had to ask her Cousin Cobb. Then I wrote her a letter. I wanted to know if she was okay and needed anything sent. And she wrote back, "What I need is out. Please come and get me.' "Well, I could do that.

Question was, where to put her after I got her. If she was just older she might have some married girlfriend or such that she could stay with, but I don't guess she does and so I thought I would take her on to Florida and look up O. J. Him and me have always kept in touch, you see. He sends me these Christmas cards.

And I like to think about him a lot and him reading his books no matter who locks him up.

"I figured Mindy could stay in Florida till the baby comes and then we'd give it out for adoption. I don't think Mindy would make such a hot mother anyhow. Then she could go on back but I might stay in Florida. They have very fine derbies in Florida. Maybe Oliver and me could room together, like the old days.

"But to get to Florida first you got to have the money, right? And I didn't have none. I was unemployed; this body shop where I sometimes work had fired me unfairly. Derby season was over and I hadn't done so good there anyhow. I was having to hang around the house, just rising late and hunting in the icebox and watching TV. Soap operas. Game shows. People winning a thousand tins of cat food or a heart-shaped bed, and all you got to fill your mind is, Wonder where they'll find the sheets to fit it?' Stuff like that. I'd always been the kind to spend what I got when I got it and now I didn't have no savings, couldn't even help on the groceries. It was sorry times.

"And friends? Used to be you could borrow from your friends, but I don't know, lately it seems to me like all my friends have gone and married on me.

Some of my coolest, finest friends have up and married. I can't get over it.

Leaving me right lonesome, and you know how little cash a married man would have free to lend. Seems like they're always saving up for a automatic grill and such. There wasn't no hope there.

"Well, I tell you what I did. I went to my brother-in-law, Marvel Hodge. He runs Marvelous Chevrolet. I'm sure you've heard of him. Anytime anything gets to happening on the "Late Show' they break it off and here comes Marvel, wide-faced man with scalloped hair, grinning and slapping a fender. Why my sister married him never know. I can't stand the sight of him, myself.

"But I went to him. I drove in to see him in Mom's old Ford. (Has he ever given her a free Chevy? No. No, nor not even a used one.) I found him out on the lot, kidding around with some customers in this ho-ho way he has. I said, 'Marvel, like to talk with you a minute.' "He says, 'Go ahead, Jake.' "Right in front of all those people, that's the kind of man he is.

"I said, 'Marvel, even though you're supposed to be some relation to me I'm not such a fool as to ask you for a gift or a loan. I do need money bad but I ain't going to ask that. All I want is a job, fair and square. Just to tide me over,' I said. 'You know full well I'm smarter when it comes to cars than any three men you got. How about it.' "Know what he did? He started laughing. Starts laughing and shaking his head. Right in front of these customers, whole family: man and wife and two little girls and some kind of uncle or something. 'Boy,' he says, 'now I've heard everything. A job, you say. Give Jake Simms a job, that never was out of trouble since the very first day he was born. Why, I'd have to be a total fool.' "I kept my temper, I will say that. I said, 'Marvel, I may have done one or two hasty things in my younger days but you got no right to hold that over my head. I'm a grown man now,' I said, 'and never get in no more trouble than taking a extra drink or two*on a Saturday night. I'd like you to reconsider your words, if you please.' " 'Grown?' says Marvel. 'Grown? I doubt live to see the day,' he says. 'Go on, boy, leave me to these good people here.'

"Well, I still kept my temper. Walked back to my Ford, real quiet-felt like I was about to burst but I didn't say a word. Climbed in, started the engine, fixed the rear-view mirror a little straighter so as I could prepare to back out. But I didn't back out, I went forward. Well, I don't know how it happened.

I mean I did intend to do it but I didn't know I was going to do it. I just raced full forward into the car lot, and Marvel sprang left and his customers sprang right. Hit a new Bel Air, buckled in the whole right side. Backed off and hit a Vega. Set on down the row of them, crushing everything I come upon.

Fenders was crumpled like paper, bumpers curled, doors falling off-and this crunchy feeling every time I hit and everybody screaming and dancing. Of course my own car got dented some too, but not what you would expect. I believe I could've drove her on home, in fact, till I took this notion to hit a Monza head-on. See, in a derby you just don't hit head-on. The rules don't allow it.

So I got this urge. I hit head-on and the two of them cars went up like the Fourth of July, and I rolled out as quick as I could and was picked off the concrete by three cops." I laughed. Jake glanced over at me as if he'd forgotten I was there.

"Later they all tore into me," he said, "even Mom, asking how come I hadn't held my temper. But I kept telling them I did hold my temper, for I could have mowed down Marvel and his customers as well but I restrained myself.

"I restrained myself in the jail too and tried hard hot to escape. I had determined to be a reasonable man, you see. I just sat tight and waited for my trial. No one that knew me would bail me out, and my mom didn't have no cash. I had to stay in. It wasn't easy. I had these funny kinds of sweats at times and hives come up over nine-tenths of my body, but still I held back from escaping.

"Now, this lawyer they got me said I ought to plead guilty. He said there wasn't no question about it. I said I would be telling a falsehood if I did that. I said I had been forced to wreck that place, had no choice in the" matter whatsoever; Marvel Hodge just drove me to it. 'Call that guilty?" I said. No sir, I'm pleading innocent.' We argued back and forth some over that. And time was passing. Understand that every day was just stretching me one more inch beyond the breaking point. But I held tight, I held tight.

"Day before the trial, Mom brought me this letter. She was my only visitor, see. Sally, my sister, she wasn't speaking to me. And naturally Marvel didn't come. If he had of I'd have killed him. Broke out of my cell and killed him.

"Mom brought this letter from Mindy, one I showed you. Addressed to the house. Evidently Mindy hadn't heard about my trouble. Her mother either didn't know or hadn't passed the news on, one; though I can't imagine her missing the chance. Anyhow, here's this letter, asking if I wanted for my son to be born in a prison. That tore me up, I tell you. Seems like I just went wild. How come this world has so many ways of tying a person down? Now there is no way I would sit by and let that happen.

"Next morning they come to take me to the courthouse and on Harp Street I slipped loose, with this one guard's gun handy in my pocket. Nothing to it. They watch you less careful on the way to a trial; they know you're thinking far ahead, got some hope of being cleared. Except me. I didn't have no hope at all.

I was like, barred, boxed in. Everybody carried such a set notion of me. I knew the only hope I had was to get away.

"How did I go so wrong? I thought I would clear a thousand at least, hitting that bank. Thought I would be free then and unencumbered. But here we are. Seems like everything got bungled. Every step was stupid, every inch of the way. Every move I made was worse than the one before."