He looked at me very curiously. "I suppose. I know they offer them to the employees first, but then I suppose they auction them off. Where are you going with this?"
"Is it only when you turn them in, or can you buy one at other times?"
He crossed his arms and stared at me. It was obvious he had figured out what I was up to. "It's a big leasing company. Every month they send out a list of cars and prices. Tell me why you're asking."
"I'm going to need to buy a car, and I figured a corporate model might be better than going to Honest Abe's Used Car Emporium out in Timonium."
As expected, the room erupted in nonsense. Mom said I wasn't old enough to drive, and besides, I didn't have a license or money. Hamilton protested I wasn't allowed to - I guess it was in the rules somewhere. Suzie thought it was a great idea. Nana didn't understand. Dad just sat there staring at me.
This was not at all a crazy idea. Way back when, Hamilton and I had driven that poor Dodge Dart to death, and it finally gave up the ghost in 1976. When that happened and Mom needed another car, Dad bought one from the leasing company. It was located in Youngstown, Ohio, so he loaded me on a shuttle to Pittsburgh and then on to Youngstown, and had me drive it home. Why couldn't we do the same thing now?
Dad silenced the room and then said, "Everybody be quiet and give him a chance to talk."
"I will not! This is ridiculous and I won't stand for it!", replied Mom.
Dad gave her an aggrieved look and said, "Shirley, let the boy talk. You'll get a chance later." Mom huffed but crossed her own arms and waited in a bad mood. Dad looked back at me and motioned for me to continue.
I took a deep breath. "Okay. First, I am going to need a car by January. I will be starting to take college courses over at Towson State then. I will need to get back and forth between Towson High and Towson State. There is no bus service. I could take a bus from Towson State to here, but it would take at least one transfer and then it dumps me up on York Road. Unless of course one of you wants to leave work and drive me back and forth."
Dad lifted an eyebrow at that but didn't stop me. "There's no reason I can't buy a car. I will pay for the car, gas, and insurance. It won't cost you anything." I glanced over at Mom and her face was getting red. "Finally, as long as you sign off on it, I can take driver's ed now, before I turn 16, and then can take the tests in November. If we time it right, I can get it all done that first week in November."
"Shirley?", Dad said, inviting her response.
"No. We're not buying you a car. That's the end of it."
"Mother, you wouldn't be buying me anything. I already have the money to pay for a car. It's like I said, I'll buy the car and pay for gas and insurance."
"Where did you get money to buy a car? Answer me that!", she demanded.
"From the lawsuit three years ago, remember?"
"That's for college. You can't have that."
Mom was really pissing me off, because even after three years, she still thought of that money as her own. It was a damn good thing I had Dad's name on the account with me instead of hers. "Mom, I have already tripled the money I kept in the brokerage account. I can afford just about anything this side of Harvard already. In two years I'll be able to afford that." Even including room and board, you could go to Harvard for about ten grand a year in the early Seventies. This was before tuition increases began to rival the increases in health care costs. "Would you like me to write a check, or do you prefer cash?"
"You tripled it?", interjected Dad incredulously.
I turned to face him. "Large cap stocks such as ITT and LTV are changing growth modes from stock acquisitions to cash, increasing market volatility. Volatility is opportunity." My Advanced Finance Professor at Fairleigh Dickinson had taken us through the conglomerate formations and breakups in the Sixties and Seventies, and as I worked at ITT at the time I had followed it keenly.
Dad shook his head in amazement. "What about driver's ed?"
"I can go to a night school in Towson. They advertise in the Yellow Pages. I need 10 hours instruction and another 10 hours of practice, and then I take the written test at DMV and the driving test. We do that the week I turn 16. I'll pay for the classes and the cost at the DMV."
"Darn right you will.", he replied.
"Charlie! This is ridiculous! We're not letting him have a car! The next thing you know, Hamilton will be demanding a car, too!", Mom said. Hamilton perked up at this, an eager look to his face.
"Yeah, well when Hamilton can pay for his own car, we'll talk about that. Besides, he's only 13." Hamilton's shoulders slumped at this, and he looked daggers at me. Like I cared. "Besides, you know he'll need a car at Towson State. I can't drive him back and forth and neither can you. Be realistic!"
"No!"
Dad rubbed his face and excused all of the rest of us. Suzie helped Nana up to her room. Nana was in the early stages of senility and needed a fair bit of help. Nobody had invented Alzheimer's yet, so we were all ignorant and called it dementia or senility or natural causes or old age. Within a year, Nana would be in an old folk's home. Hamilton and I went downstairs, although I stayed in the family room, so I didn't have to put up with his horseshit. He was already fuming about how I was getting a car and he wasn't. Jesus Christ, he couldn't even see over the steering wheel yet!
Mom and Dad argued over this for the rest of the night. Mom's biggest problem was that this didn't fit her neat and tidy plans for the lives of her children. She was very proud that I was going to college, but otherwise I was still a little boy. She couldn't have it both ways, but wouldn't accept that. This was just like my quitting band, taking aikido, or taking home economics. You did what the school and society told you to do and nothing more and nothing less.
On the other hand, the logic was relentless. I needed to be able to drive if I was going to go to Towson State, and I needed my own car. I wouldn't be able to get away with driving her to work and using her car, when I might have morning classes that would mess this up. By the end of the week, Dad brought home a list of cars available from the leasing company. "This is this month's list. It changes every month, so we'll have a new list in October. Sometimes the list is good and sometimes it isn't."
"What do I do if I see one I want?"
"You make a bid. It has to be at least as much as the figure on the list. If somebody else beats you, you can try for a different car. This just gives you a figure on how much they will run."
"Do I do this now, or do I wait until I get my license?", I asked.
"Probably be easier to wait. You won't have to horse around getting it in my name first and then yours. That would be the November list."
I nodded. "Then that's what we'll do. I'll do the driver's ed and tests with Mom's car, and then buy this as soon as I pass."
He smiled. "You sound awfully sure of yourself."
I grinned. "If Pop-pop could get a license, so can I." Mom's father had been a notoriously poor driver.
He rolled his eyes. "I think he started driving before they even had licenses. You'd better just hope you drive better than he did."
"Maybe he learned driving a horse."
Dad laughed. "That was my side of the family, not his!"
Maryland had DMV offices that were open on Saturday mornings, so we went over that weekend and picked up the paperwork and applied for my permit. I also went into town and registered with a driver's ed school. Classes would be twice a week, an hour a night, for five weeks. I also signed up for the live training, where a driving instructor would come out to the house after school and I would get behind the wheel of his car.