The Best Or Nothing At All

I remember my first day on the road.

The salesman shook Burt's hand and gave him the keys.

"Enjoy the ride, Mr Burnside! That's one hell of a set of wheels, gonna turn a few hot chicks' heads cruising in that baby!"  

"Haha! Just don't tell the wife!" Burt salutes at the salesman before sliding his aviator glasses from his slick black hair on his head to rest on his aquiline nose. He pulls up his cream-coloured baggy chinos by the knees and glides onto the leather driver's seat of his new black Mercedes 560 SEC. He stroked me lovingly like a cat before picking me up for the first time. "Is she hooked up yet?"

"She sure is. Just push the buttons, sir, and she's ready to go."

He looked at me with a wondrous, childlike gleam in his eyes and rubbed his thumb over my Mitsubishi logo. His mischievous grin grew with the loud beep of each push of my buttons. He pressed me gently against his cheek, and I heard a phone ring. I could feel his warm breath on my receiver as I waited in anticipation for my first conversation.

"Honey, there's been a holdup with the new car. I won't be back until late."

"Oh no, Burt. How late are you going to be?"

Burt tilts his head at the salesman. "Well, it's hard to say sweet cheeks. I might need to wait until after rush hour. I'll call you on the car phone when I'm, say, 15 minutes away?" He winks at the salesman, ignoring his wife's protests on the phone. He cheerily responds, "Bye then!" before putting me down.

"A James Bond in the making sir, we do hope you enjoy your purchase."

"Oh, I will." Burt winks at the salesman, turns the key, revs the engine, and turns on the radio. Billy Ocean's "Get Out of My Dreams" plays. He turns the volume up and waves at the salesman before screeching out of the courtyard.

My first call. My virgin radio waves, like my own personal OM moment. Tarnished with deceit. A lie that would fly the frequency highway to the communication tower, transform into microwaves and be beamed up to a satellite in the stratosphere to be bounced back down to Earth. A lie. Not the greatest start for the most sought-after car accessory.

Over the years, the conversations went from twisting and fingering my plastic winding cable to violently slamming me down. I should not have expected more from the Burnsides.

"Sweet cheeks, you know you are my everything. I am so sorry about the other day."

"Hmm, and how do I know you mean that?"

Burt looks down at the glossy black gift box tied with a red ribbon. He rubs the ribbon between his fingers and thumb.

"Let me show you. Come for a drive."

"I can't. I have plans."

Burt tugs the ribbon and lifts the lid. He pulls out a pair of bright red lacey knickers. "Plans that are more important than me? Sweet cheeks?"

He pleads as he lays the red knickers out on the passenger seat.

"Come on, let's go for a drive. I can take you to this amazing place with views over the rolling hills. It'll be romantic. What do you say? Let's be spontaneous and liven things up a bit."

Saturdays were shopping days, and Mrs Debbie Burnside lived to shop. She ditched her silver Austin Metro and borrowed her husband's sleek new Mercedes, complete with a car phone. There was no stopping her now.

"Stella!... Guess where I'm calling you from?"

"Eh, I dunno, home?"

"Naha!" she replied teasingly. "The car!" She squealed. "So, I was thinking, maybe we should shake things up a bit and go to the Boulevard for brunch?"

"Oh yeh, that wouldn't have anything to do with the fact you want to cruise it with the new wheels, now would it?"

"You know me too well!" Debbie bounces in the driver's seat with excitement. "Meet me at Park View Bistro at 11am. I'll call Laila and let her know the change of plans."

"No need, Laila already said she can't make it."

"What do you mean?"

"She called last night, something to do with that guy she's been hooking up with."

"How dare she brush us off for some guy she won't introduce us to."

"You know what she's like. She never introduces us. They shower her with gifts, and she moves on when they get serious."

"Yeah, I know, but it's been like nine months now!"

"Well, he ain't proposed yet, and that bracelet she wore last week must've cost him a few hundred quid."

"Well, us girls, we're worth it. See you at 11."

The bangles on her wrist jangle as she clicks me back into my holder. The overpowering Anais Anais now clung to me with its sickly scent of orange blossom, blackcurrant, and lily of the valley.

She reaches into the glove compartment for what she calls her "car lipstick." She has only ever worn one colour, coral peach, which the woman in the make-up store told her complimented her pale freckle face and strawberry-blonde curls. Pouting in the rearview mirror, she reapplies her lipstick and straightens out one of the many lace layers on her blue prairie blouse. She turns up the radio's cassette player and blasts Madonna's Material Girl before sliding back into the black leather seat and pulling out.

It hurt my rubber buttons when she dialled, piercing me with her fake nails. Her high-pitched squeals pained me. But when she found the pair of used red lacey knickers stuffed into the glove compartment—the screams! That day, I wished someone had just cut my wire.

The car then became Burt's home. All his telecommunication correspondence came through me. The bickering calls, the pleading calls, the calls of despair. Some evenings, I thought I might overheat and explode.

Then, on that fateful day, when Burt was loading his washing into a machine at the laundrette. He heard Kenny Logan's "Highway to the Danger Zone" blasting from the built-in speakers of his car parked outside. He watched helplessly as two men speedily screeched his car from the parking bay.

The handful of coins in Burt's hand, destined for the washing machine, were quickly redeployed into the laundrette's pay phone.

"If you don't return my car immediately, I will call the police!"

The thief in the passenger seat laughs, looks at the driver and lifts his eyebrows. "I think you've got the wrong number, mate."

"Bring back my car right now!" Burt can hear the engine revving above the loud music and the tyres screeching. He shouts, "Right, that's it. I'm calling the police right now!"

"And how will you do that when you're on the phone with us?" The thief taunts him, smiling at the driver.

Burt slams the payphone receiver down before picking it up to redial.

But we're still connected.

"Hello... hello…" Burt sounds confused.

"Hello, this is Robbie robbing your car. Calling from his new Merc. I'm sorry, I'm not home right now. Please leave a message after the tone."

The thief laughs, throws me onto the back seat, and then high-fives his mate.

I can hear Burt pleading, slamming the phone, and redialing the three-digit number for the police. But he can't call them because we're still connected.

Burt had been struggling financially since he split with Debbie. His calls to attempt reconciliation, made in the car, were $3 a minute. The fuel in the tank ran out before the coins in Burt's hands.

The joyriders drove the car into a field as the fuel in the engine petered out. Now silent, Burt's mouse-like pleas could be heard coming from my earpiece. Picking me up to listen in, the joyriders laughed at Burt before yanking my wire out and throwing me into the long grass to be lost for eternity.

I watched as the men rummaged through Burt's belongings before leaving. I watched as inquisitive dairy cows surrounded the abandoned car, the red lace knickers hanging from the rearview mirror.