Shine and Her Buick '59

It was so out of place I had to turn around and go back. Surrounded by weeds and vines, occupying a patch of gravel, was a 1959 Lido Lavender Buick Electra. It glistened in the sun, not a speck of dirt nor scratch marred its veneer. The thick white walls on the tires were the color of snow. Delta wings on either side of the trunk thrust sharp tail fins to the sky. Its quadruple headlights and front grill gave it a toothy, lecherous smile. With cupped hands to the sides of my face, I gazed into the driver’s side window at blue-grey leather bench seats. The chrome on the dash and steering wheel had a factory shine.

 It all began the day I was driving to a small eastern Carolina town for a book signing. The best way there was through nearly deserted country roads. Ancient, abandoned homesteads littered the landscape between fields of cotton, corn, and tobacco.

Twenty feet behind the parked auto was the porch of a decrepit bungalow. Catbrier vines trailed up the posts and along the roof defying any other weed to challenge it. Taking its own space, languid Virginia creeper grew through the wooden planks of the porch, tickling a rocking chair with several missing spindles. One arm rest was gone. Bees and wasps had made residence through holes in the home’s decaying clapboards. Above the crescendo of the cicadas was music coming from inside. The rickety door was ajar. Impulsively, I knocked.

“Hello?”

Got an eight-cylinder motor and jet-propelled overdrive. Buick ’59-Buick ’59…

My eyes adjusted to the dark. Standing in the open doorway, I faced a living room—or it once was. There was a couch and a chair, but they were torn, and dust ridden. Cobwebs littered with the shells of long dead bugs decorated them. Yellowed newspaper adhered to the bare walls. A fireplace graced one side of the room; thick ash crusted below mostly burned logs.

“Hello? Anyone home?” I called again. No answer. The house appeared empty. I had to find the source of the music and stepped inside. Beyond the dingy room was an entryway flooded by sunlight. It guided me to a kitchen straight from the fifties. The floor was a clean black and white checkered linoleum. White lacey curtains waved in the open window to a fresh early fall breeze above a copper sink. A square table with chrome legs and a red Formica top surrounded by four chairs covered in matching upholstery sat in the middle of the room. It all seemed new.

A lime-green transistor radio on the counter blasted the song. Don’t be mad at me boys if your buggy don’t ride like mine. Buick ’59-Buick’59… A young woman the color of the sink had her back to me while chopping vegetables. I wasn’t sure what to do next. I walked right into this woman’s home. Do I try to sneak back out, or…

She turned, spotted me, and jumped, holding up her knife. “Oh, my word!”

“I’m sorry…I thought…” I stammered, “I knocked, but…”

She patted her heart. “I didn’t hear y’all come in. I love my music.” She gave me the once over with her eyes, then turned the music down. “Thank the Lawd you don’t liken to a robba’. Nothin’ here to steal anyways.” She placed the knife onto the counter.

“Except for maybe your Buick ’59.” I smiled in an attempt to show her I wasn’t a threat, but regretted the statement, sure she would think I came to steal it.

She glanced at her radio before her eyes widened with realization and laughed. “Oh, that, right. I was all lost up in thought.” She thumbed toward the front of the house. “That’s my baby. Ain’t no one takin’ her offa my hands.”

“She’s beautiful. I had to stop to admire her. Do you put her in shows?”

She shook her head, no, vigorously. “Oh no, never. I earned that car. No need to show her off all over the place.”

“You earned it?” I couldn’t help but ask.

“Listen, I’ll be happy to tell you more after some vittles.” She turned back toward the counter. “Join me?”

“I don’t want to be a bother.”

“Sugar, you already been a bother, but I rarely get company. I have plenty here for the both of us. Have a seat.”

It was generous since I was the one who barged in on her. I had to know more about this woman and her Buick ’59, so I sat. She hummed while finishing her dish, the ties of her blue apron swung along with her hips as she worked. Her hair wasn’t a natural kinky, but well coifed and shiny.

She turned, proudly holding up a big bowl of collard greens and pinto beans. Full lips surrounded perfect white teeth. She couldn’t have been older than thirty. She held up her index finger for me to wait while she retrieved a set of Melmac bowls and scooped the dish into each of them. I studied the green of the collards against the ruby red of the bowl.

She sat across from me and placed her hands on the table. “Hungry?”

I lifted my head and struggled to show enthusiasm. “Oh, yes, thank you very much. By the way, I’m Victoria.”

“Howdy ma’am, they call me Shine.” She smiled before picking up her spoon to wolf that dish down.

She must have been starving because she couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds. I stirred the collards and beans around in my bowl. I never tried it before, and it looked like spinach. I hate spinach.

Shine spoke with her mouth full. “If’n you’re searchin’ for meat, there ain’t any. I don’t like hurtin’ animals.”

“Oh…sure.” Show enthusiasm. “No, it’s good.” I pretended to take a spoonful, needing to change the subject. “Shine. What a pretty nickname. How did that come about?”

She leaned back on her seat with both hands on her stomach. “Woo, that was good. I could eat that every day for eva’.” Shine stood, collecting our dishes, and spied mine.

I shrank in my seat. First, I barge into her house, then I don’t partake in her hospitality. “Sorry, I…I wasn’t really hungry.”

She stared at my bowl in total stillness for what seemed to me an eternity. “Because that’s what I do.”

“Sorry?”

“I shine. I shine no matter what they do…what he did. My mama lost her shine. She worked day and night on the tobacco to support Pa and me. He had a bad back, but not so bad he couldn’t whop me. He whopped me good. Wanna see?” Before I could answer, she lifted the hem of her dress to expose reddened scars streaked across a thigh. “But I shined. Pa wasn’t gonna take that from me.”

She opened the back screen door and tossed all the leftovers outside. Surprised, I stood. Shine waved for me to sit. So, I did. “They’s for the pigs. They love my collards and beans.” The dishes went into the sink, and she quickly cleaned them up. Drying the last bowl with her dish towel, she sat with it at the table across from me. Her eyes drifted toward the ceiling in thought. “My mama. My mama was the world to me. I would do anything for her. She was the best mama in the world. I have no earthly idea why she loved Pa so.” She lowered her head shaking it, dabbing at one eye with her towel. “Mama died in a farm accident. The insurance man came with a whole passel of money compensatin’ our loss. Pa spent it on booze and…” she tilted her head. “That car.” Shine jumped to her feet and slammed her hands on the table. “He gave it to me! He said, Shine, you deserve it. I was a bad father. You take her and make her shine like you. Then, he jus’ up an’ left. I’ve been here eva’ since, puttin’ my shine on her, my Buick ’59.” She pirouettes and sings, “Got an eight-cylinder motor and jet-propelled overdrive…” and stops mid-spin. “I’ll take you for a ride if’n you like.”

My heart thumped with thrill, the thought of an adventure. “Sure.”

Shine reached into a pocket on her apron and tossed me a set of keys. “You go ahead an’ start her up.” She untied the apron and tossed it onto a chair. “Let me clean up a bit, an’ I’ll meet you outside.” She ran out of the kitchen into an adjoining room, a bedroom perhaps?

I was giddy with the idea of riding in a 1959 Lilo Lavendar Buick Electra in pristine condition and hoped she would let me drive. I imagined what the interior would smell like; old leather, mixed with oil and ancient Bakelite. Or maybe it had a hot new leather aroma. It was possible. I weaved my way through the dusky living room to the front door and opened it. The afternoon sun surged inside.

I adjusted my eyes to the light. The Buick seemed to gleam even more. I gazed at the keychain. Three red shields overlapping one another were secured in the middle of a metal ring with the word, Buick, in block letters below them. Two keys were attached, both resembling the keychain. One key was slightly larger than the other. I began to place the larger one into the lock, but it didn’t fit. I realized these old cars had a separate key for the trunk. I really wanted to see the trunk. I imagined how big it was. I placed the key in the keyhole in the back of the car, and it worked. I lifted the lid, and there, curled in a ball, was a skeleton. Bits of denim overalls covered its frame. I screamed and jumped back, dropping the keys. The racing in my mind made me dizzy. Shine was such a sweet person. I was sure she was unaware of the body.

“Shine!” I ran back to the house. “Shine,” I called out, returning to the kitchen and stopped in the doorway and blinked, unbelieving what was before me. I swallowed, but there was nothing to swallow, only acrid dryness in my throat.

It was abandoned just like the living room. There was no black and white checkered linoleum, no table and chairs, no curtains, and the copper sink had a bright green patina. There was a gaping hole in the ceiling. Boards, and insulation batting hung down from it. Water had rotted the floor. Huge tatters lolled from the boarded screen door. Then, I saw it. The knife Shine had used. It lay on the counter where she placed it. A sunbeam pierced the ashen window and rested on the blade. It shined.

I ran outside. The Buick was gone. Where did it go? I went out into the street and looked both ways. It was nowhere in sight. A hot lump bloomed in my throat. The keys were where I had dropped them, only they were rusted and dirty. The larger key had been snapped in half.