Driving the King by Ravi Howard Page A

circled Montgomery without me, racking up 97,000 miles and change. Pete had repainted the checkerboards and the orange with an oyster gray, and the paint carried as much light as the chrome did. Seats in taxis lasted only for so long, so Pete and Marie made decent money in car upholstery. Marie had asked me what I wanted, and I told her charcoal with pinstripes. I wanted the insides to look like a good suit I could wear anytime I had somewhere to go.
    â€œCan’t have you headed to Hollywood looking any kind of way. You need to look like you came from somewhere.”
    â€œYou outdid yourself,” I told her. “Both of you.”
    I leaned into the window to get a better look at the floorboards.
    â€œRedid my mama’s house back in April, and we had some extra heartwood.”
    My Packard came off the assembly line looking like the next one, but the touch of my folks had it looking like no other. I leaned farther into the window until the toes of my shoes were only partly touching the gravel.
    â€œYou do know how a car door works. I know you been gone for a while but, damn.” Pete opened the door while I was still in the window. “See, just like that.”
    Dane had given me the money Skip Tate had left, and I took five twenties off the stack and gave them to Pete. He stopped his laughing, and his face changed. He looked like a man with a hundred dollars in his hand.
    â€œGo on, Pete. Fold it up. Put it in your pocket. For the paint and the engine work. I’ll send you some more when I get set up.”
    â€œYou know you don’t owe us a dime,” Marie said. Pete was quiet, already spending that money in his head.
    â€œPete, you better fold that and put it in your pocket,” I told him.
    â€œMarie’s right. You don’t owe us a dime.” He didn’t say it like he meant it.
    I peeled off another hundred dollars and put it in Marie’s hand. She tried to pull her hand away but I wouldn’t let her.
    â€œHere, now. For the seats and for the bookkeeping and the whatnot.”
    I had been charity for my family for too long. The hours they spent with me were empty ones that they would never get back. I wanted them to have something from me on the books.
    â€œHad my eye on that television at Gray’s.”
    â€œEvery time he walks by, he slows down and stands flat-footed for ten, fifteen minutes.”
    â€œThey got a sign in the window says you buy a set on your lunch hour, and they’ll deliver to your living room by supper time.”
    Marie held the keys in her hand. Rubbed them with the piece of lamb’s wool she’d run along the chrome.
    â€œThey give you your license back?”
    â€œI don’t need anything else they can give me. Nat’s folks got me a California license.”
    I’d be a bootleg cabbie at best in Montgomery, and whichever cop pulled me over would want my till. If they wanted to pull cabbies over, they waited until a shift wasjust about done so they could shake somebody down for every dime. Pumping gas and washing windshields was the best I could expect. I saw Johnnie Beechum, the attendant who had worked there years before Marie and Pete bought the place, still cleaning dead things from the windshields, mosquitoes every summer and lovebugs every fall, and I was glad I didn’t have to take the offer. I prayed that I’d never have to.
    â€œYou want to drive it now, with your California license and all?”
    â€œI’m not through stretching my legs.”
    When Pete came back out of the garage, his coveralls were off and he had his hat on. The oil was gone from his hands, and he was brushing off the soap flakes that had stuck to his forearm.
    â€œYou got a date?” Marie said.
    â€œAbout to head to Gray’s to buy that Zenith,” he said, patted the pocket he’d put the money in like she needed proof.
    â€œWhen you get through, go buy a new hat. Looks like you wore that one