THE CRAZY ONE IN THE CAR -- episode 32
Going to college 1964-1968
Senior Year - Spring Break 1968
As Mark and I are leaving the apartment for class, he says, “Wanna drive to Fort Lauderdale for spring break with me and Senders and Nadler?”
It takes almost twenty-four hours of straight driving and on the radio Lady Madonna’s the soundtrack. Mark and Nads and Chip Senders are fun and I can relax as there’s not much chance of anything of consequence happening with them.
Driving through Georgia, we’re caught in a speed trap and it costs fifty-nine dollars and my share almost wipes me out. When we get to Lauderdale we discover that every hotel and motel room is taken. Newspaper ads for room rentals in private homes lead to a couple of phone calls before we find a house with empty beds. It’s a one-story ranch with two bedrooms.
I watch the homeowner sizing us up. Behind him on the narrow hall table stands a brass statue of a fertility god demon with an oversized uncut hard-on. Homeowner Todd says Nads and Mark can share the bed in the guest room; I get a day bed on an enclosed porch; and Chip will bed with Todd. Am I the only one who is hearing alarm bells?
When Chip writes out the check, we learn that Todd spells his name with only one ‘d’. Tod with one ‘d’ is tan, built, in his early forties, and I’m betting the blonde-white streaks in his brownish hair do not come from the sun. He puts the check in the pocket of his short shorts. “Anybody who can get a hard on comes to Fort Lauderdale,” he says.
We take our bags to our rooms. I sit on the day bed and as I look around the room I’m hearing the Psycho soundtrack as Lila Crane looks around Norman Bates’s house. The cover on the day bed has pale blue and pink flowers. White curtains on the window with pale blue flowers. (Lila sees the indentation in Mrs. Bates’s mattress.) On the wall are two paintings, each a clown or a man in a clown suit. (Camera zooms in on the brass hands on the table.) Between the paintings a small bookcase. On one shelf, a framed photo. (Close-up of the Eroica record on the portable player in Norman’s room.) In the photo, five people. Hand-tinted, so mouths are a bit too bruise red, eyes fake blue. A young man in a brown army uniform sitting, straight of spine, looking directly and without a smile at the camera. A young woman standing next to him. A slight smile. A white dress with pale blue flowers like the curtains. Next to her, two girls of elementary school age. Curls. Bows. Smiles. Sitting between the girls, the youngest. A boy. Shorts. A tentative smile for the camera. Eyes big. Tod.
Next to the photo on the shelf is a book. Sex in America. I take it down. (“Mrs. Bates. Mrs. Bates.”) There’s a section darkened by frequent handling and I open it, certain it will be the chapter on homosexuality. And it is. (In the doorway, Norman in mom’s dress, knife raised, violins screeching.)
“Mark’s beach train leaving in five minutes,” Mark says in the doorway, keys raised, no violins.
We explore Fort Lauderdale. We all laugh when we find out that we all think Tod’s creepy. But, hey, it’s Lauderdale. The beaches are packed all day and every night the bars are packed. Ocean View Bar is always packed. By the time we get back to Tod’s house each night, the lights are out and he’s asleep.
Three mornings in, as I’m going down the hall to the bathroom, the door opens and a young guy — mid teens — comes out. He’s wearing tight jeans and a leather jacket. A leather cap on his head and he’s carrying goggles. He grunts and goes down the hall and out the door. A motorcycle sputters. Roars. And the sound carries down the drive and away.
Tod appears. “My ward. Buddy. He doesn’t talk much.”
I try to sound unfazed. “He surprised me. I didn’t realize there was another bedroom at the end of the hall.”
Tod smiles to show he hears my unspoken thoughts. “I run an alternative school for boys who’ve been thrown out of their families. You boys got everything you need?”
*****
Everything’s more expensive than we thought. One afternoon Mark and I sell blood. There’s a waiting room full of college kids. We all laugh.
That night we go to a new place, Lenny’s A-Go-Go and an old man buys us drinks.
We come back to Tod’s house at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning and I decide to take a walk around the block by myself. It’s warm. Humid. It’s a residential area and quieter than the beach front ever gets. Not sure why I’m walking, what I’m walking off; I just need to be alone. Not sure how long I’m gone, but when I get back, the house is dark. The door opens without a creak. Everybody’s already asleep. I step in, turn to close the door carefully. This little foyer can echo. I may even literally tip toe to my room.
“There, that’s a tight spot.”
I freeze. It’s Tod in his room.
“Relax.” His voice is gentle, intimate and yet objective, professional. “That’s better.”
I sit on the bench in the hall trying to breathe soundlessly and I look across at the fertility god. Or demon.
“What’s this?” he says as if to a four-year old. Who is he talking to?
I count two beats before, “That’s my cockaroo.” It’s Chip. My mouth drops open in a quiet gasp.
“Aha,” from Tod.
Silence.
I don’t want to risk being caught. I stand and literally tip-toe to my room.
And I fall asleep.
When I awake, it’s to the sound of the door opening and daylight fills the room. They’re in the doorway.
“We gotta get out of here,” Mark says.
Chip’s laughing. “You are not going to believe what happened last night.”
Nads laughs, too. “Or why Senders slept on the floor in our room.”
The Crazy One in the Car is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely co-incidental.