The dream machine (standard:other, 1302 words)
Author: Drusie	Added: Nov 21 2001	Views/Reads: 3345/2151	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A bright red Mercedes is the "dream machine" for everyone but the teenager who owns it. However, the little car helps her escape the dreams of other people in pursuit of her own.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story


Then one of them asked, "Can you  pop the hood?" 

"Wonder if we could have a ride?" the most courageous of the boys asked,
wistfully. 

"Well, OK," she said.  One boy got on the back and one in the seat
beside me. 

Soon, Chimera was sitting in the storage space behind the seats and two
boys were in front driving, cutting up and chatting with each other. 

Her mother had told her that it was proper for a young lady to give her
keys to her "escort" so he could drive.   She wasn't sure whether she 
had asked these boys to drive or whether they were her  "escorts."   
However, they were certainly willing to take the wheel. 

Vicarina was pleased when Chimera rode up with the boys in the car.  
While Vicarina wasn't sure who they were but she thought her daughter 
finally had some beaus.   She could still remember when she was 
sixteen.   She could scarcely juggle all the nice young men who wanted 
to dance and flirt with her at parties. 

Vicarina's scrapbook from her prep school days occupied a prominent
place on the family bookshelf.   She had carefully labeled each  
photograph with the names of those pictured, the date and the party.    
She spent a lot of time showing  her daughter her pictures and 
explaining her early life. 

That fun apparently ended when she married Rufus when she was 19.  He
was older than she, at 27. 

"I was so young," she said of her youthful marriage, "You hardly know
what you are doing when you are so young.  Yet, it affects your whole 
life."   She looked seriously at her daughter and said, "I don't care 
if you never marry." 

Chimera didn't think she would ever have to choose.  At least, she
hadn't had any offers so far. 

Soon, the Mercedes and Chimera were driving two or three boys home from
school every afternoon.  One of them offered to give her his letter 
sweater if he could just drive her car.  Another looked lovingly at the 
Mercedes and said "If I had a car like that, I would eat off it." 

A third told his mother that Chimera was his girlfriend.  She saw
Vicarina at a dress shop and told her.  The information was news to 
Chimera.   Actually, she barely knew his name.  The only link between 
them was that once the Mercedes spun out when he was driving it.  They 
wound up in a ditch but the car remained upright, a miracle of 
engineering. 

Another time, the naïve Chimera was riding with couple of boys and, when
they passed a truck with a ball waving wildly on the end of a chain, 
she called to the driver "Hey, your ball is loose."  For a reason 
unknown to her, the boys riding in the car found that funny. 

One day, a couple of the boys changed the procedure, letting Chimera off
at her house and taking off in the Mercedes.  They returned it but they 
had stripped the gears.  The gear shift was so loose it was barely 
operative. 

Rufus took the Mercedes over to the neighborhood service station for
repair.  Bill Gilliam, the mechanic there, told Rufus frankly that he 
should stop the neighborhood boys from driving the car before they 
ruined it. 

The next morning, as she snuggled beneath her comfort, Chimera could
hear her mother and father whispering in the kitchen.  "This is been so 
good for her," her mother was saying.  "That car has made a lot of 
difference in her social life. She's bringing home boys, now." 

Mr. Brown never was one to argue with her.  So, he retreated to the
garage.   He was happy working alone there.  He could make most of the 
repairs to the Mercedes himself.   His tools were all there, nicely 
organized.    He really had a handle on life when he was there.  He was 
in control. 

Chimera escaped the house and the watchful eyes of Vicerina by getting
into her roadster and driving around the city by herself.  She had 
learned from the boys how to corner when going around the mountain 
curves in her city.  She spent hours just driving and driving, enjoying 
the open road. 

That fall, she got in her Mercedes and hit the road to the state
university, a place where she could dream of her own future. 


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