My Dear Cousin - The White Car

11^th May 2021

My Dear Cousin,

After the first time I lost my job back in two thousand and two keeping a job turned out to be harder than I thought. I was with my next company for months until they sold and some mishandled paperwork left me unemployed again. The company I worked for after that kept me in and out of work for many a reason.

All of this time I plodded along in college not taking my education that seriously, because I was waiting for help from my family. As I said, my two siblings got help, (Pony Girl) money every month for four years and (Pickle) every dime of his education covered. My stepbrothers even had their education paid for from what I understand. They went to trade school to become surgical techs.

The truth there was that any assistance I ever got bothered two people. The first was (Pony Girl) because that meant less for her, the second was my stepmother. I’m not sure about the story there, but the stepmother was a thief who ran off with anything she could get her hands on from my house.

I can tell you, once the old man walked up to me, said he was mad at his wife, and because of this he was giving me money. I guess he had paid for two of her kids and two of his own and anything pass that was just too much for his old bag.

Well, I started having car trouble being too poor to keep the car up, pay for school, keep the house up, and deal with the demands of my two siblings living with me and always trying to push me to buy them something or other.

In any case, the old man got himself a new car and wanted to give me the old one. I said no because I knew he would just hang it over my head. This went on for a month or two until my car finally died, and I just had to take him up on the offer.

This thing was a white 1997 Saturn SL2 with a moderate amount of body damage. It was bad enough so that people kept mentioning it to me, and a few times the cops pulled me over. He also gave it to me so filthy that no one wanted to sit in the back seat.

I remember I called him up and said “So what happens to my car?” He said “that’s none of my business.” And I said “I can live with that.” As soon as I got the white car home (Pony Girl) screamed “he gave you that car” out of nowhere. Then she went about making it clear that this would be her car that I paid for.

Naturally, I didn’t like that idea but the first time I was going to drive it anywhere she took my keys. I remember she was with her boyfriend, eventually husband, and she was saying “I don’t trust your driving”.  

Finally I snapped and screamed at her to give me my keys back. She threw them on the ground and walked off. I went to the store alone. Taking that car turned out to be a deal with the devil. It would only get worse from there.

Best,

 

Richard Leland Neal