Road Trip

The car was fucking beautiful.

My jaw dropped, it was like it wasn’t even my car anymore. Chris pulled up in front of us, and I glanced at Max, who had a similar expression on his face.

My eyes marvelled at the new car, it was no longer a horrible mouldy green, it now glistened red under the sun. The rims on the front and the wheels were no longer brown and orange with rust, they now gleamed sliver, so clear you could see your face in them. It actually had 2 windscreen wipers, and a windscreen free of dust. The seats were restored, with new red leather coverings.

It was amazingly beautiful.

“You like?” Chris beamed, his good deed done for the day. I leaned into the car, checking out the mirror, all shiny and silver plated. The smell of fresh leather filled my nostrils, and I grinned. No inexplicable veggie smell.

“Chris, not only do I like, I love!” I marvelled, running my fingers across the dashboard, which was still the same shape, but it was painted and polished, smooth under my touch. “How are we ever gonna pay for this?!”

“You don’t have to, you got breakdown cover remember?”

“This is classed as a breakdown?” I stared into Chris’ chubby face in disbelief.

“Believe me, it does,” Chris smiled. “What about you Max?” We both turned to Max expectantly, who stood staring at the beautiful car, he hadn’t moved since Chris had pulled up.

“What have you done?!” Max shrieked, exhaling quickly and clasping the hair on his head in his angry hands. I stood erect, shocked. Then remembered. He liked the battered look.

“This is insane, dude! I didn’t want the car fixed like this!!” Max shouted, beginning to pace along the sidewalk behind me. “Craig, did you have this up your sleeve?”

“No! This is a surprise to me as it is to you! Chris’ done this outta the kindness of his heart, not only did he fix our piece of shit, he made into a the demi-god of cars! You gotta at least be grateful for him fixing it even if you don’t like the look,” I pleaded, seeing Chris watching us both, bemused behind the wheel.

Max sighed, approaching the car door beside me.

“Chris, thanks for fixing the car. You really, really didn’t have to do this.” Max grimaced, patting Chris’ shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” Chris said. “I thought you would like it,”

“I do! Chris, dude I’m so sorry, ignore Maxxie here, he will come round eventually. It’s too early for him,” I stared at Max, begging him with my eyes to humour me. Max’s lip curled at the corners, and he sighed again.

“Yeah, it’s okay. I’ll learn to love it I guess. At least it’s still looks kinda vintage,”

“And technically it’s the same car,” Chris smiled, cutting the engine and getting out. “I just spruced it up a little.”

“A little?” Max muttered, and I elbowed him in the stomach.

“I don’t know how to thank you, Chris,” I smiled. “Perhaps you’d like to come out drinking with us tonight? On Us?” I heard Max sigh behind me, and I refrained from kicking him in the crotch.

“Thanks, but no thanks Craig. I gotta work,” Chris shook his head, dropping the keys into my hand with a jingle. “I’ll see you around though. Good luck with your trip,”

“Thanks again,” I said, patting him on the back, as he began to walk across the car park.

“Later!” He called back, jogging away. I turned to Max, raising my eyebrows in disappointment.

“What is your problem, Green?” I asked, arms crossed, leaned against the new and amazing car.

“You know I didn’t want it pimped like this, despite how shit it was. We’re not on fucking MTV’s Pimp my ride.” Max sighed. “More like fucking Punk’d. Any minute now Justin Timberlake or some dickwad will drive around the corner in our real car shouting ‘You‘ve just been Punk‘d!’”

“I didn’t know he was gonna do this Max, you could at least be grateful that we can carry on the Road trip with barely any damage done,” I sighed, getting in the drivers seat of the car. “Grab the cooler and lets go,”

----Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 10.21am, June 4th----

Secretly, I think Max does like the car. I fucking love it. But I think that secretly he’s enjoying our little joyride here.

As soon as the cooler was in, we sped off into Philadelphia for a ride, trying out the CD player’s speakers. They were definitely a lot louder…We drove around the breezy streets, between the high-rise buildings with the sun reflecting off the millions of windows scattered about above. I kept howling in happiness, and Max just sat in the passenger seat with his arms crossed, but I could tell he wanted to smile and love it. I could see him eyeing up the dashboard, his lips curling at the sight of a new CD player. He just didn’t wanna admit defeat.

“C’mon Max, admit it. You love it,” I smiled, speeding around a corner to a eerily quiet street with a squeak of the new tyres. Max stared at the rear-view mirror for a second or two, contemplating.

“Just a bit,” Max admitted, turning to me and smiling, blushing slightly. I chuckled, and turned back to the road, taking in our new surroundings.

“What’s with this street?” I asked, looking at all the bolt-locked steel doors, the neon lights either smashed or switched off. Most windows were boarded up. There were some posters scattered about the walls with dates from years ago on them, naked women with huge breasts draping themselves over a pole, or in some cases, another woman.

“These are all strip clubs,” Max stated, drooling over the faded naked women on the posters.

“Remember my promise?” I asked, slowing down a little, as the smashed neon lights, and the boarded-up clubs became more high-class ones, just closed, and with wooden-bolted doors this time rather than tacky steel.

“I do,” Max stated. “But you have to promise me something?” Max met my eyes, pleading. I nodded.

“That you won’t let temptation overtake me, I really wanna save myself for Holly. Got it?”

“I’ll keep an eye on you, as long as you promise to let temptation overtake me,” I winked, smiling.

“Sure, I’ll be pushing you toward some of these women, you deserve it man,”

“Thanks, well, do you wanna go sightseeing for a while and we’ll come back when this is open?” I glanced up at the club’s name, memorising it. Animal.

“That’s fine with me, I saw a bowling alley on the way here?” Max suggested

“Sounds like fun, let’s roll,”

----Animal Strip club, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 10.17pm----

As soon as Max and I walked into Animal, we were greeted by 2 dark haired women, who gave us a little eye mask each. I looked at the mask, eyebrows raised. It was a tiger eye mask, with little ears and everything.

“We have to wear these?” I called to one of the women over the music.

“Yes,” She simply said, taking it out of my hands and pulling the thin elastic around my head, securing it around my eyes and smiling. I found it all a little weird…

I looked over at Max, who had it a lot worse off that I did. He had a kitten one. He looked over at me, laughed, and fell into step beside me as we went for a look around.

It seemed that there were 2 floors to this place, the bottom contained was a big room, a long bar going the whole length of the room, with several women in lingerie prancing around serving the drooling men. In the middle there were 3 poles, with, of course, women dancing around them, and then there were just tables scattered everywhere, which of course were for lap dances…This was your generic strip club, okay, so what’s upstairs, I wondered.

The top was an empty corridor, strangely. It would be silent, except for the moans coming from each and every door along the corridor, each with a red star on the door, saying ‘Occupied’ apart from 1 that was a blue star that said ‘Vacant’. I didn’t really fancy opening any of the doors to see what went on in them, but I just deemed them ‘Private rooms’

“Those private rooms are a fucking good idea,” Max concluded, as we descended down the stairs. I nodded in agreement, deciding what to do next.

“Drink?” Max asked. I shook my head, catching the eye of a hot red haired girl who danced on the middle pole, the centre of attention, the middle of the room.

“No, I wanna go watch her,” I licked my lips, lust filling my brain before I even got chance to think about pulling my wallet out for a fist full of dollars. I saw Max walk toward the bar, and I felt bad for not following but this red haired girl pulled me in with her sexiness…