Aftermath

January 28th, 2025

It was cold and windy in the motel parking lot. Flakes of fluffy snow were swirling in the breeze. I watched traffic flow by on the highway. It was almost 4:00 PM, and cars had their headlights on already. I was waiting in the cold for the locksmith to arrive. I was standing next to a 2009 Buck Lucerne with a shattered window on the passenger side. Except for the driver’s seat, the car was mostly filled with junk; empty energy drink cans, food wrappers, and that sort of thing. The inside handle on the driver’s door was broken. A person had to roll down the window and use the outside handle to open the driver’s door. I knew this from experience. The car was unlocked. Nobody was going to steal it.

I needed the locksmith to make me a key for the ignition. It wasn’t my car. It belonged to somebody I knew. That person had been staying at the motel and was now in police custody. I had no legal responsibility for the vehicle. I was doing the incarcerated person a favor, and I was doing it reluctantly. I had done this sort of thing for the person often in the past, and I was tired of it. However, at some point, the car needed to be moved, and I thought that I might as well get this over with.

It wasn’t like the management of the motel was in a big hurry to get the Buick off of their property. There were cars and trucks on the lot that looked like they had been there for years. Shipwrecks on four wheels. The motel was in the same general condition as the Buick. The place had seen better days, and it seemed like many of the guests had made the motel their permanent residence. Living in the motel was better than being homeless, but not much. Online the motel was described as being “charming”. I guess it is, if you call Gaza your home.

Getting a key to move the car was the last step for me in a day-long treasure hunt. The incarcerated person needed me to find their phone and wallet. I did. Those things were in the motel room. The person needed me to find their car key. I didn’t. Even if I had been able to contact the person in jail, they wouldn’t have been able to tell me where the key was. They couldn’t remember.

This whole episode reminded me of the movie “The Hangover”, where some guys have a wild party and wake up unable to recall any of it. The movie is funny. This experience was not. In the past, I have sometimes gone on a binge and wondered what I had done afterward. I know how that feels. The incarcerated person has done this kind of thing more than once. In fact, this individual’s version of the movie has endless sequels. Only a couple weeks ago, the person wound up in a hospital in Illinois unable to remember where their car was or their credit cards or their winter coat. Somebody else needed to do some detective work.

The locksmith pulled up in his van. I told him that the Buick was unlocked. He asked for my ID. I explained to him that it was not my car. He asked the name of the owner. He did some research online and decided that I was probably legit. He said, “Let’s hope that the door key and the ignition key are the same. If so, I can make it. It will be $215 plus tax.”

Fine. Go for it.

He pulled out a spray can of lubricant and some kind of locksmith tool. He probed the door lock for several minutes and then went back to his van to fabricate a key. He returned with the key and inserted it into the ignition. The lights went on. He pulled out a computer and attached it under the dashboard.

I asked him, “What does that actually do?”

Without looking at me, he replied, “This tells the computer in the car to turn on the fuel pump with the new key.”

He placed the computer on the driver’s seat and said,

“Okay! This will take twelve minutes! We don’t open the door! We don’t close the door! We don’t do nothing for TWELVE minutes!”

Then he slammed the door shut.

I stood in the cold and watched the snowflakes. I waited and waited. The locksmith sat in his van.

He came out and checked on his computer. Then he turned the key. The engine sprung to life.

He said, “Let it run for at least ten minutes. How are you paying?”

I pulled out a credit card and he rapidly removed money from my account. I got into the Buick as he pulled out of the lot. It was only a five-minute drive back to my house. I parked the car near the barbwire fence, well out of the way. When the car had been running for over ten minutes, I turned it off. I waited a moment and cranked it up again to make sure the key would work a second time.

I went into the house and took off my coat. Then I settled down for an hour-long Zoom session with my therapist. I needed that.