Cars - Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Ch. 7 (Skull, Lauren Bacall, Library)

Even the car I drove was purely for shopping. I only bought it because I was already buying too much stuff to carry home by myself. I was lugging a shopping bag when I happened to pass a used-car dealer and went in and saw all the different cars they had. Now I'm not particulary crazy about cars, nor do I know much about them. So I said sim-ply: "I want a car, any make, nothing fancy, nothing big." The middle-aged salesman started to pull out a catalog, but I didn't want to look at any catalog. I only wanted a car for shopping, I told the guy, pure and simple. It didn't need go fast for the highway, didn't need to look smart for dates. No family outings either. I had no use for a high-performance engine or air-conditioning. No car stereo, no sun roof, no super radials. All I wanted was a decent compact that cornered well, didn't belch exhaust, wasn't too noisy, and wouldn't break down on me. And if it came in dark blue, so much the better. The car the guy showed me was yellow. I didn't think much of the color, but otherwise it was just what I described. And because it was an old model, the price was right. "This is how cars were meant to be," said the salesman. "If you really want to know, I think people are nuts." No argument from me. That's how I came to own my shopping car.

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Ch. 21 (Bracelets, Ben Johnson, Devil)

To the right of us was a white Skyline. In it sat a young man and woman, on their way to or back from a night on the town, looking vaguely bored. Duran Duran blared from the car stereo. The woman, two silver bracelets on the hand she dangled out the window, cast a glance in my direction. I could have been a Denny's restaurant sign or a traffic signal, it would have been no different. She was your regular sort of beautiful young woman, I guess. In a TV drama, she'd be the female lead's best friend, the face that appears once in a cafe scene to say, "What's the matter? You haven't been yourself lately."

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Ch. 33 (Rainy-day Laundry, Car Rental, Bob Dylan) My prize retrieved, it suddenly struck me, you don't go to out to dinner lugging gym gear. Instead of carrying it around, I decided to rent a car and throw the bag nonchalantly in the back seat. Make that a smart European car. Not that I was such a fan of European cars, but it seemed to me that this very important day of my life merited riding around in a nice car. I checked the yellow pages and jotted down the numbers of four car-rental dealerships in the Shinjuku area. None had any European cars. Sundays were high-demand days and they never had foreign cars to begin with. The last dealership had a Toyota Carina 1800 GT Twin-Cam Turbo and a Toyota Mark II. Both new, both with car stereos. I said I'd take the Carina. I didn't have a crease of an idea what either car looked like.

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The nice lady who'd served me came out of the office and came over to the car to ask if anything was wrong. She smiled a clean, fresh TV-commercial smile. NFo problems, I told her, I was just checking everything before hitting the road. "Very good," she said. Her smile reminded me of a girl I'd known in high school. Neat and clear-headed, she married a Kakumaru radical, had two children, then disappeared. Who would have guessed a sweet seventeen-year-old, J. D. Salinger- and George Harrison-fan of a girl would go through such changes. "I only wish all drivers were as careful as you. It would make our job a lot easier," she said. "These computerized panels in the latest models are pretty complicated." "Which button do I push to find the square root of 185?" I asked. "I'm afraid you'll have to wait until the next model," she laughed.

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Ch. 35 (Nail Clippers, Butter Sauce, Iron Vase) "Is this your car?" she asked. "Nope, a rental. What do you think?" "Okay, I guess. Though it doesn't really seem to be your style." "I wouldn't know. It was what they had at the car rental." She inspected the car outside and in, opened the ashtray and checked the glove compartment.

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Ch. 39 (Popcorn, Lord Jim, Extinction)

"As you see fit. I sure won't know," I said. "I'm going to head out to Harumi Pier, so you can come and collect me there. I'm driving a white Carina 1800 GT Twin-Cam Turbo. I can't describe the model, but there'll be Bob Dylan on the stereo."