Fleeting Luxuries
B. P. Gallagher
The electric yellow Lamborghini Aventador SVJ Roadster crouches catlike on its haunches. A masterclass in Italian engineering; sleek feline form sculpted for speed, and housed within, somewhere between the exhaust ports and driver’s seat, a fine-tuned 770-horsepower engine that warrants the aerodynamic profile and black spoiler. A special-edition model, one of a handful in existence. Performance and exclusivity like that run upwards of a million dollars, easy. Well over a grand per horsepower plus tax. Not a bad deal for horseflesh, maybe, but for a motor vehicle? Astronomically expensive. Aspirational in every sense of the word.
Alec is admiring through the tinted passenger-side window the luxurious interior—supple black leather and Alcantara suede and lightweight carbon fiber trimmings in shades of grey—when the engine kicks on and the headlights and the windows roll partway down. He starts and an apology forms on his lips before he remembers that the car is, in fact, empty.
“You like it?”
He starts again at the lightly accented voice and finds its source watching him from the sidewalk. The Lambo’s owner is a clean-cut Indian man wearing distressed designer jeans and a maroon blazer over a blue-and-white checkered dress shirt. An expensive-looking silver watch on his right wrist makes him a leftie. Alec can’t identify the brand. He has an almost encyclopedic knowledge of cars, but timepieces are a different matter. Never been very good at guessing age, either. He places the guy in his mid-thirties or early forties. For that matter, he may not even be Indian.
He backs away from the car and mumbles, “Sorry. Just looking.”
“No need to be sorry,” the man says. He repeats his question. “Do you like it?”
“Yeah—I mean, yeah. It’s fucking awesome. Ah. Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize for expressing yourself strongly. We all spend too much time being sorry, I think.”
“Um. Sure.”
“What do you do? For work.”
“Me?”
The sports car’s owner casts about and says sardonically, “Who else?”
Alec flushes. “I just deliver pizza.”
“No just. A noble profession. And is this what you want to do?”
Now that it seems clear the stranger has no intention of scolding him, Alec lowers his guard. “It’s okay,” he says with a shrug. “I like driving well enough. But I’d rather have a job where I can get a ride like that someday.”
The man grimaces as if in real pain before his face smooths. “I think you might find it is not all it’s cracked up to be. In many respects.”
Easy for you to say, Alec thinks. What he says is, “Can’t know until you get there, I guess. Do you got any advice for a guy like me still coming up?”
At this the man laughs. “You don’t want my advice.”
“The Lambo says otherwise.”
“Yes, well. Wisest not to judge a book by its cover.”
He has yet, Alec notes, to approach the vehicle or even unlock its door. Remote starting the Aventador—a custom feature, surely—appears to have been as much conversation starter as anything. A man-on-the-go who today, seemingly, has nowhere to go. An air of the lost about him, as if he’d just woken up and discovered himself standing in these tailored clothes beside this stunning piece of automotive engineering and speaking to a young man about the pitfalls of success. “How old are you?” he asks in his light, almost musical tone.
“Twenty.”
“At twenty I was in college.”
Alec almost guffaws. It’s like the punchline from one of those ironic t-shirts: I Met a Real-Life Gazillionaire, and All I Got was the Same Lousy Advice my Mom Gives me Every Day. Granted, that would be pretty longwinded to fit on a t-shirt. Split between front and back, maybe.
“It’s still in the cards,” he says, a touch defensively. “Maybe.”
“Well, look where it got me.” The atonal inflection with which he says this makes the statement ambivalent. “Let me ask you this: If you should decide that delivering pizzas is not the career you desire, and make your fortune in whatever field you choose to enter, would a car like this be an end unto itself, or a means to an end? A validation, perhaps?”
He does not, Alec notes, even dangle the prospect of climbing the corporate ladder to a high-paying position in the pizza chain. Not that Alec harbors any such illusions. The terms of self-advancement have changed. In today’s job market it’s mostly about staying afloat until a better opportunity happens by. Today slinging pizzas, tomorrow slinging…well, mortgages or something. Whatever makes him the big bucks. He thinks hard before answering. “Honestly? I just love cars, man. So, the first one, I guess. But couldn’t it be both? Like, assuming I’ve made it to the point of owning a Lambo, I don’t see how I couldn’t feel pretty satisfied with myself.”
Another wave of sadness furrows the man’s brow, smoothed as quickly as the first. Alec gathers that even these ripples represent uncharacteristically naked displays of emotion. Slips in a poker face that must serve him well in the boardroom or on the trading floor or during whatever high-stakes negotiations play out in the lofty climes he occupies. Only then does it occur to him to ask, “What do you do, anyways?”
“I’ve dabbled in many ventures. But I made my fortune in pharmaceuticals.”
“Huh. Any I’ve heard of?”
“Oh yes. But I should be going. It’s been nice speaking with you—”
“Alec.”
“Alec. Good to meet you, Alec. I’m Kareem.” He offers his hand to shake, granting a good look at the brand name etched on the face of his watch. Rolex.
Might’ve guessed.
Pedestrians stream around them on the sidewalk, Bostonians in a hurry with their jacket collars drawn up against the early-autumn chill. Kareem releases his hand and steps back into the flow of foot traffic, seemingly adrift. He meanders a step in the opposite direction as if caught in the wake of the nearest passersby.
“Um, sir?” Alec says. “Kareem? Your car?”
“Oh, that. I only wanted to drop something off.” Drifting back to the idling Lamborghini he removes an envelope from an inner pocket of his blazer and deposits it through the cracked window onto the passenger seat. From the breast pocket of the blazer’s opposing lapel he fishes out his key ring and stands for a moment with them swinging pendulum-like from his pointer finger. Then he turns to Alec and says, “Here. Take it for a spin. Just put it back where you found it when you’re done. And leave my papers alone.” He tosses the keys underhand.
Alec snatches them from the air on reflex and stands gawping in disbelief as the million-dollar sports car’s owner pivots on his heel and disappears into the lobby of the nearest skyscraper. At the security turnstile in the lobby Kareem has words with a pair of stern-faced security guards. The guards let him pass after he flashes his ID card. But they exchange meaningful looks after the fact.
Rather than test his good luck, Alec walks around to the Aventador’s driver side and climbs in through the vertically-opening scissor door. It closes with a whisper of hinges and latches with a soft click. The engine is already on but he inserts the key for the full experience. Then he puts the car in gear and pulls away from the curb.
He takes the Lambo for a spin. The wagon-wheel streets of Boston rush past in redbrick and slate grey, the roadster accelerating like a dream through intersection after intersection. In a blink he’s gone eight blocks. Ten. Twenty. The engine purrs with pleasure as he upshifts, more for the tactile sensation than any need imposed by the conservative city speed limits.
Wait till the guys hear about this.
He blows through a yellow at seventy and brakes down to a butter-smooth forty which he maintains as he looks for a suitable turnaround. Getting pulled over in this dubiously borrowed car would be no bueno. No sooner has he thought this than a sense of unease runs through him and he regrets it.
He is twelve blocks away when he hears the sirens and the feeling of dread redoubles. His blood runs cold, every hair on his body standing upright. Did he take too long of a drive? Did the guy change his mind and report the car stolen? Gazillionaires can be fickle like that, or so he’s heard. But the sirens are fading, not growing in volume, and now the full-throated horns of firetrucks and shrill of ambulance claxons join the chorus. A pit of a different sort forms in his stomach.
When he circles back around to the street where he started his drive the entire block is cordoned off. Ambulances and firetrucks and police cruisers with their lights flashing crowd the intersection and grim-faced EMTs and cops turn pedestrians away.
He could look for the guy, but he just has a feeling.
He pulls the car back around the block and parks it illegally where it is sure to be found and shuts off the engine. Worst-case scenario (best-case scenario, growing in the back of his mind) its owner pays a ticket or tow bill. Unless, that is—
Only then does he remember the envelope in the seat beside him.
Nope. Leave it.
Acting on a paranoid or pragmatic instinct he draws the cuff of his hoodie sleeve over his palm and scrubs his fingerprints from the steering wheel and paddle shifter and key fob. The driver’s side door swings open upwards and he steps out on shaky legs and wipes the door handle too, for good measure. Locking the keys in the car’s front seat and ignoring the implications and impulse to run, he walks away with his hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans and his chin lowered and his heart in his throat. An otherwise normal day in an otherwise normal week stretches out before him. His shift starts at three and there will be pizzas to deliver, and his Mazda could use an oil change and a wash.
B. P. Gallagher
B. P. Gallagher is a social/personality psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychology and Culture at Nazareth University. His writing has been published in Flash Fiction Magazine, Stone Canoe, and elsewhere.