by GrayDog via Comments

My buddy John was the first of us to get his drivers license and his dad, an older father and somewhat naive about teenagers, bought a 67 Charger and handed John the keys to his beloved 61 Oldsmobile. A grandpa car. Couldn’t get no girls with that thing, that’s for sure. It was as long as a parade and just as slow. Still, to 4 teenage boys it opened up a world that was beyond reach on foot or bicycle. It would do. We piled in and entered the high school parking lot to the pointing and laughter of our fellow students.

One day we were exploring the gravel back roads of the coastal mountains when one of us had a fun idea. How about we turn off the engine and coast down this hill? Another one of us thought that was a very bad idea, but he was outnumbered. John stopped the car turned off the engine and put the automatic transmission in neutral. We were at the top of a long gradual slope down, that curved to the left and disappeared behind a corner of the mountain. There was a deep ravine on the right side. The beast did not move. OK, one of the guys in back jumped out to give a push. He may as well have been pushing against a building. Presently the rest of us got out, including the driver, and our combined efforts – the might of four teenage boys in their physical prime – got the thing to budge. You know that sound that tires make on gravel? This was one piece of gravel at a time, then two, then four. Slowly the behemoth awoke from its slumber. We jumped back in and slammed the mighty doors shut. Three of us were laughing gleefully at the beginning of this new caper; one of us was still moaning that this was a bad idea. There’s one in every crowd, right? 

In a few seconds our speed was increasing at a pace that was concerning. Hey John maybe tap the brakes, eh? John tapped the brakes and then immediately leaned into it with all of his strength. I felt the back of the seat deflect rearward. I instinctively tried to help by pressing my foot into the firewall in front of me as hard as I could. Our combined effort had no effect. It was a warm afternoon so we had the windows down. The air went rushing by. The rear doors suddenly opened and the guys in back bailed while the getting was still good.

I hopefully suggested to John that maybe putting it into gear would help slow it down. I had my door open just in case. The grinding was an awful sound; The transmission was going to remain in neutral. The matter was now out of our hands. John began to panic, the left curve ahead was rushing toward us; he tested the steering wheel in preparation for it. It might as well have been welded in place. We would later learn that power steering and power braking needs a running engine to operate the hydraulic fluids. I did however suggest to John that he might try starting the engine. The engine would not start unless the transmission was in park; the transmission refused to move out of neutral while the car was moving. The car was gaining speed, the curve ahead was getting closer, the deep ravine was still on the right side, and we were running out of options. 

John weighed his own options. He figured he was going to die in the car or he would die at his father’s hands later that evening. His prospects were grim no matter what he did, so at the moment he decided to go down with the ship. He was my best friend, but there are limits. I wished him well and then I jumped. I hit the gravel and rolled. It didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would and I didn’t break anything. While I rolled I saw that John had changed his mind about dying alone: At least death at his father’s hands would be in the company of his father. His feet were a blur on the gravel but momentum won out and he, too, rolled. By the time we got to our feet, our two cowardly friends had caught up to us. The four of us stood in the middle of that gravel road watching the adventure-turned-nightmare play out in slow motion before us.  

We expected the behemoth to continue going straight when it reached the curve and to disappear forever into the depths of the ravine on the right side. But strangely it stayed on the road and followed the curve to the left and disappeared around the corner of the mountain. A few seconds later we felt, rather than heard, a thump. We walked as one, in bitter silence, expecting to see a smoking ruin on the other side of the curve. What we found was the behemoth resting quietly in the left edge of the road, left front tire in the ditch, bumper nuzzled against the side of the mountain as though it had gotten tired and rested its weary head on the shoulder of an old friend. Maybe this wouldn’t end in disaster after all!

John slid in from the passenger side, moved the lever to park, turned the key, and the engine rumbled to life. The three of us stood on the road as though the unpredictable thing might explode and burst into flames at any moment. The transmission eased into reverse like it always had, and the behemoth idled out of the ditch and back onto the road as though nothing unusual had happened.

We examined it for damage: surely the front end was bashed in. It had just crashed into a mountain! But it had fenders thick enough to drill and tap (h/t Ol’ Remus), and bumpers as thick and heavy as the steel plating on a battleship. But even that wasn’t enough back in the old days. This thing had bumper *guards*. Remember those? Guards to protect the bumpers that were there to protect the fenders. The guards were chrome sentinels at each corner, standing tall and proud. You wanna hurt my bumper? You gotta get past me first, punk. The driver side bumper guard was deflected inward about an 8th of an inch. That was it, that was the extent of the damage. We had crashed the car into the side of the mountain and the car shrugged it off like it was just a gentle shove, another day at work. Huzzah! No teenage boys were going to die that evening! Our dread immediately turned to maniacal glee. In our relief, we dubbed that huge ugly car “The Tank.” The thing was unstoppable, we would be safe in it no matter what! In that moment it had become our friend, a part of us.

About a month later we were walking back from playing basketball at the nearby junior high outdoor court. We were goofing around like teenage boys always do, when we got close to John’s house and saw his dad crouched down in front of the front bumper. Eyeing it with concern and suspicion. We stopped as a unit and instantly became silent. His dad was lost in thought looking first at one bumper guard and then the other. He was comparing them: Something was off. We slowly retreated and went back to play another round of basketball.

The next school morning we met at the rendezvous, John’s house. He came out with keys in his hand and a grin on his face and unlocked the Charger. What??? Score!!!

That 383 roared to life, its four barrel sucking air like a demonic vacuum. Little did we know that it meant the end to our quartet. While The Tank had been our protector, the Charger was a chick magnet. Turns out once the chicks discovered the Charger, it had room for only two people – John and a chick. The other three of us were pedestrians again until one by one we each got our driver’s license and acquired something with 4 wheels. And John’s dad once again drove The Tank to work every morning with the look of reclaimed love in his eyes.