CHAPTER THREE (3)

There were numerous accounts similar to these, each indentifying their own scuff on the car. The cumulate of these produced a spotted black surface. But what was most stirring about the LeBaron was the convertible option. The huge one and a half ton machine exposed its innards after about seven minutes of adjusting and re-adjusting its rasping leather top, revealing torn leather seats and sullied carpet upholstery. Tiny plumes of dust and debris poofed from the unfolding leather as it slowly made its way to the open position, extending the cracked and dry canvas into a taught arrangement, while various elements here and there moaned under duress. Despite the contraption’s pain, Squirley watched with pride.

The University was located at the opposite end of the city from Corrotto’s, which meant that Ryan would have to go through a sketchy part of the city in order to make his collections. Since most of his debts were from people at work, and most of the people at work attended the University, it was easy as they were all rounded-up into one two-by-one mile span. Like a shepherd, Squirley rounded his unfaithful black sheep and would reprimand them according to how much he was owed by each. The merriment of the chase is what Squirley saought with an unprecedented commitment to justice and capitalism, and by-god, he was going to get his money.

He jumped into his car and began the engine. No, no good. He tried again, without despair; this had happened before. The rummm, rummmmm of the engine signaled its distaste for that which had recently mounted it. Defiance rang through the air, but Squirley was wearing his he-man wife beater today, and who in the hell – even a damnable machine – would want to mess with him today? At last the faulty engine started the climb out of the unusually quiet apartment complex, each ride over a speed bump causing it to lose considerable weight as the dusty particles accumulated by under-use fell from the car. Squirley reached for the sunglasses, always finding their way under the passenger seat, without taking his eyes off of the street. Barley missing the sign that read: Welcome to the Monte Vista Apartment Complex: Studio Apartment Blowout!!!!!! with an unconscionable number of exclamation points, he swerved out of the complex hoping to burn a little rubber (he was, after all, in his wife-beater) but failing.

He drove south, hitting no more than the normal amount of red lights. He wasn’t particularly paying attention; there would always be at least one person whom he could track down like a mad-hungry animal and squeeze at the University. Besides, he had nothing to do today – it was Collections day. It was hot, but the air conditioner hadn’t worked for years. Niether did the speedometer, or the AM stations. The black and dusty radio in the center console emitted some incoherent hard-core rap, in Spanish or English. This is what one must play when entering through the little burro Little Mexico.