Chapter 7

I was passing by a yard sale in one of the nicer parts of Huntington Beach, on my way to the beach, It was already October, but the temperature was supposed to get up to the eighties later in the day. I liked to run at the beach, along the wet sand. It was the one part of boxing training that I still kept up with. Having good wind and stamina is important to a fighter.

I stopped at the yard sale because the whole driveway to the house was filled up with furniture. There was a very big black couch and three large matching black chairs, all in leather. There was also a nice dark wood coffee table, and four matching end tables, along with two black and orange fancy table lamps. It all looked like it was in new condition. I stopped my car.

"How much are you asking for that living room set?" I asked the middle aged woman standing near the open garage door.

"For all of it, or for part?"

"I was thinking the couch, chairs, all the end tables, and the coffee table."

"Not the lamps?"

"We have dark green carpet in our living room. I'm not sure that orange glass would go well with it."

"I paid twelve hundred for all of it. I'd be willing to let you have it for two fifty, but you'd need to come pick it up. I don't deliver."

"Are you moving?"

"No, I'm just redecorating the house. My ex-husband liked leather furniture, and I'm getting rid of anything he and I had together. Except for my house. I've got a real nice bedroom set, with a Hollywood Queen mattress and bed frame. The wood matches the mahogany pieces in the living room set. It comes with three chests and nice vanity with mirror. Take it all, and I'll let you have it for five hundred.

"I can only afford four hundred, and I'd need to go back home to get it."

"Let me take down my signs then. I wasn't looking forward to sitting out here all day anyway. How soon could you be back with the money and something to move it all?"

I drove home, got some money, and called one of the short haul moving people in the phone book. I had to call three different companies before I found one that had a truck and helpers ready to go. We agreed on a price of twenty five dollars an hour, with a three hour minimum charge, and I gave the man on the phone the address where I'd meet them.

When I got to the lady's house again, the truck and two movers were already parked in front of the driveway. I gave the lady the four hundred dollars, and the movers started taking the bedroom set apart first and then decided to load the couch and living room chairs first, to clear the driveway so they could bring out the bedroom set pieces.

The bedroom set was gorgeous. The wood was very dark, and looked freshly polished. The bed itself looked very big, and had a head board and a footboard. I was tempted to keep the bedroom furniture for myself, but then I realized I'd never be able to fit it all inside my room. I was starting to worry that it wouldn't fit inside my parent's bedroom either.

The movers were almost finished when the woman asked me if I wanted to take her ex-husband's tool boxes and tools too?

"How much for them?"

"For nothing. What would I do with a bunch of tools? I just want them out of my garage. Take that jack thing too. Anything in there you might want or need. They were all his things, and he just left them here. I don't want any of it. Just close the garage door when you're finished."

The tools in the garage alone, were worth three times what I had paid for the furniture. There were nine big metal boxes of hand tools, including a whole box filled just with different wood chisels. There was a tap and die set, another one filled with plumbing wrenches and other tools. A professional snake set for clearing drains. An automobile jack like they have in garages. Hundreds of sockets and small wrenches for working on cars. There was almost too much to name. All of it went into the truck, and the movers grumbled because they needed to shift what was already packed, to put this new, heavier load, in the back of the van. When we finished loading from the garage, there was very little remaining. I closed the garage door and told the movers to follow me back to our house.

My parents were back home again by the time I got there with the moving truck, and so were my brothers and sister. Kevin wound up with my parents old bed, and one of their old chests. Willy got their other large chest of drawers, and the new sofa that my parents had just bought less than a month before. Our two old living room chairs and the coffee table went out in the garage.

My father nearly had a stroke when the movers started unloading all the tool boxes and started putting them in our driveway. My mother supervised where she wanted all the new bedroom stuff put in her bedroom, and I thought she was going to cry when it turned out there wasn't room for all the furniture after the new bed was set up. I got the biggest mahogany dresser, the one with the big mirror attached to the back. The mirror was about five feet tall, and seven feet wide. I had to move my own bed around in order to make room for it.

After I paid off the movers, my father and I spent at least another hour out front, going over all the tools and things I'd been given. He seemed to know what everything was for, including three or four fine measuring tools that I had never seen in any of my shop classes. I told him I'd gotten everything for four hundred dollars.

"That was a real steal, Jimbo. These tools are worth several times that, by themselves. You must have a lucky horseshoe up you butt."

"More like being at the right place at the right time, then having the money to be able to take advantage. The lady was selling her Cadillac too, I should have asked her how much she wanted for it."

"Cadillac? What the hell would people like us be doing with a Cadillac? We aren't doctors or lawyers, Jimbo."

"The car doesn't know or care who's driving it, or what they do for a living, Dad. I should go back there and at least find out how much she wants for it. Maybe she's selling it as cheaply as her other things."

I drove back to Huntington Beach and rang the doorbell to that ladies house. She wasn't home, at least she didn't answer the door bell. The Cadillac was still parked out front, on the street, with a for sale sign on the front windshield. I looked inside the windows, and everything looked perfect inside. The odometer showed 19,562 miles, and it had an automatic transmission too, so there was no clutch pedal. I wondered if my mother could learn to drive a car like this one. My father had tried to teach her to drive, but she kept having problems learning to use the clutch to shift gears. They had both given up in frustration. I knew my mother hated always having to wait for my father to come home so she could go to the grocery stores and get her shopping done.

I was getting ready to get back in my car to leave when the lady pulled her car into the driveway.

"Did you forget something, young man?"

"No. I just thought I should stop by and look at that car you're selling. How much are you asking for it?"

"It was his, but it was registered in my name, because he was originally going to get it for me. I told him I didn't want to drive anything so big or ostentatious. He decided to keep it for himself. He only left it with me because I refused to sign it back over to him when we got divorced. How about a thousand dollars for it? It has to be worth that much to you?"

"What year is it?"

"I'm not sure. I think he's had it for two years, and it was new when he bought it. It has about twenty thousand miles though. He drove it everyday. I'd like to get rid of it, so make me an offer. How about seven hundred?"

"It's worth more than that. I wouldn't feel right, getting it so cheap from you."

"You're still in school, aren't you? Give me the seven hundred and take it. I'll just be glad to see it driving away from here. Every time I see it parked there, it just reminds me of the terrible mistake I made marrying him. Let me get the keys to see if it still starts. I haven't started it in over a month. There are some more of his things in the trunk, some of his camera equipment, and his golf clubs. You can take those as well."

"I feel like I'm taking advantage of you."

"Not of me. Him maybe, but that just makes it better for me. You have no idea what I had to go through to get him to finally leave. You aren't going to get a better car for the money. Let me get those keys and the ownership papers. You do have the seven hundred to pay me, don't you?"

"Yes, I do. All I have is tens and twenties though, is that okay?"

"You have seven hundred in cash on you?"

"Yes, Ma'am. I brought my money with me, just in case."

It took a few more minutes, for her to find the keys and for me to start the car up and get it charging the battery up again. It was a 1954 model, a Series 62, 2 door coupe. It was a beige color, with a lot of polished chrome and little fins in the rear. It was a very large car too. I paid the lady and drove it to a gas station to see about maybe getting some of the dust and grime washed off before driving it to our house. I left my ford parked in front of her house, right behind where the Caddy had been parked before. She had signed the ownership papers and dated the sale on the pink slip.

After I'd gotten the car cleaned off, it looked a lot better. I'd found a few small ding's and scratches around the driver's side door, but nothing more than you'd normally expect to find with a well cared for and faithfully maintained car. When I got home with the car, my father laughed at it. He drove a '37 model Ford, and he was laughing at the new car?