the last couple of months. You've gotten downright peculiar."
"Let go of me," Arnie said, struggling in his father's grip.
Michael didn't let go, but he loosened up. "I'll put it in perspective for you,"
he said. "Yes, the airport is a long way to come, but the same quarter that
closer in, but there are more incidents of theft and vandalism in the city. The
airport is, by contrast, quite safe."
"No public parking lot is safe."
"Second, it's cheaper than a downtown garage and
much
cheaper than
Darnell's."
"That's not the point, and you know it!"
"Maybe you're right," Michael said. "But you're missing something too,
Arnie. You're missing the
real
point."
"Well suppose you tell me what the
real
point is."
"All right. I will." Michael paused for a moment, looking steadily at his son.
When he spoke his voice was low and even, almost as musical as his
recorder. "Along with any sense of what is reasonable, you seem to have
totally lost your sense of perspective. You're almost eighteen, in your last
year at public school. I think you've made up your mind not to go to Horlicks;
I've seen the college brochures you've brought home—"
"No, I'm not going to Horlicks," Arnie said. He sounded a little calmer now.
"Not after all of this. You have no idea how badly I want to get away. Or
maybe you do."
"Yes. I do. And maybe that's best. Better than this constant abrasion between
you and your mother. All I ask is that you not tell her yet; wait until you have
to submit the application papers."
Arnie shrugged, promising nothing either way.
"You'll be taking your car to school, that is if it's still running—"
"It'll be running."
"—and
if
it's a school that allows freshmen to have cars on campus."
Arnie turned toward his father, surprised out of his smouldering anger—
surprised and uneasy. This was a possibility he had never considered.
"I won't go to a school that says I can't have my wheels," he said. His tone
was one of patient instruction, the sort of voice an instructor with a class of
mentally retarded children might use.
"You see?" Michael asked. "She's right. Basing your choice of a college on
the school's policy concerning freshmen and cars is totally irrational. You've
gotten obsessed with this car."
"I wouldn't expect you to understand."
Michael pressed his lips together for a moment.
"Anyway, what's running out to the airport on the bus to pick up your car, if
you want to take Leigh out? It's an inconvenience, granted, but not really a
major one. It means you won't use it unless you have to, for one thing, and
you'll save gas money. Your mother can have her little victory, she won't have
to look at it." Michael paused and then smiled his sad grin again. "She
doesn't see it as money flying away, both of us know that. She sees it as your
first decisive step away from her… from us, I guess she… oh, shit, I don't
know."
He stopped, looking at his son. Arnie looked back thoughtfully,
"Take it to college with you; even if you choose a campus that doesn't allow
freshmen to have cars on campus, there are ways to get around—"
"Like parking it at the airport?"
"Yes. Like that. When you come home for weekends, Regina will be so glad
to see you she'll never mention the car. Hell, she'll probably get out there in
the driveway and help you wash it and Turtlewax it just so she can find out
what you're doing. Ten months. Then it'll be over. We can have peace in the
family again. Go on, Arnie. Drive."
Arnie pulled out of the dry cleaner's and back into traffic.
"Is this thing insured?" Michael asked abruptly.
Arnie laughed. "Are you kidding? If you don't have" liability insurance in this
state and you get in an accident, the cops kill you. Without liability, it'd be
your fault even if the other car fell out of the sky and landed on top of you. It's
one of the ways the shitters keep kids off the roads in Pennsylvania."
Michael thought of telling Arnie that a disproportionate number of fatal
accidents in Pennsylvania—41 per cent—involved teenage drivers (Regina
had read the statistic to him as part of a Sunday supplement article, rolling
that figure out in slow, apocalyptic tones: "
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
