Back in June, I wrote about seeing Top Gun: Maverick, disturbing displays of movie fandom, and my stint working for Mann Theaters during the summer of 1996. What I neglected to mention was that The Mann wasn’t my only employer that summer. For the final two weeks of that summer, before heading back to college, I also worked for a man named Jeff, who owned an auto repair shop. Like all great gigs, this one came to me through nepotism.
After The Mann canceled employee perks like free popcorn and soda, I quit. If The Mann wanted to be petty, I could be petty too.
“What are you going to do for the rest of the summer?” my dad asked.
I didn’t have an answer. Actually, I had an answer, but somehow I knew my dad wouldn’t appreciate my plan to watch old movies on cable, raid the kitchen for snacks, and generally fuck off for two weeks.
“If you don’t have a job, you can work with me,” Dad said.
I had worked for my dad plenty of times. He always needed a production assistant, or an extra hand in the shop to coil cables and help load the truck with audio gear. But The World’s Best Sound Man paid even less than The Mann, so I told my dad I had it covered. Then I called my friend Norm to see if he had any ideas.
A word about Norm. Some people are just plugged in to the nooks and crannies of society. Need a repo man for an out-of-this-world assignment? Norm knows a guy. Looking for an underground dinner club that serves panko-crusted Komodo dragon? Norm’s got the hookup. Got big trouble in little China? Norm’s on his way with the Pork Chop Express, if you get my drift.
“I’m gonna give you Jeff’s number,” Norm said. “He own this auto garage that’s kinda messed up, but also kinda rad. You’ll love it. Jeff needs drivers, and he pays cash.”
I knew how to drive, and I liked cash, so this opportunity seemed like it was right up my alley. But then I remembered that lots of people like cash, and driving isn’t exactly a rare skill in Los Angeles.
“Any tips for the job interview?” I asked.
“Yeah, when Jeff asks if you’ve got a criminal record, tell him no.”
I called Jeff and told him Norm had sent me. Jeff, the proprietor of Jeff’s Auto Repair, explained that he needed drivers to shuttle cars back and forth from dozens of Enterprise Rental car locations around Los Angeles.
“We service the rental cars,” Jeff said. “Mostly LOFRs.”
“LOFRs?”
“Lube, oil, filter, rotate the tires.”
“Oh. LOFR is an acronym. I thought you were talking about shoes. You know, loafers.”
The line went quiet. I worried I had blown my chance right out of the gate. But I guess Jeff was distracted by something happening at the garage because he yelled something about the need to “stop playing grab-ass” and “go out on a run.”
“Morons,” Jeff explained. “I’m surrounded by morons. You’re not a moron, are you?”
I answered in the negative.
“That’s good. I have too many morons. Do you have a criminal record?”
Thankfully, Norm had prepared me for that one. I told Jeff my record was clean. Jeff accepted my claim at face value, then told me to report to work tomorrow morning.
Right away, I saw what Jeff meant about the morons. The other drivers weren’t exactly firing on all cylinders.
There was Tiny, who was humungous. And there was Tiny’s friend, Marlon, who was even bigger. On my first day, Tiny and Marlon saved me from a parking ticket by threatening to “fuck up” the meter maid. I told them there was no need to threaten violence on my behalf, but they insisted that it was “no problem.”
There was Ernie The Pothead, who said he had zero fucks to give. Ernie The Pothead wasn’t kidding. On my second day, while stopped at red light, Ernie told me not to inhale, before lighting a joint. But when Ernie The Pothead went to roll down the passenger window, I noticed an LAPD cruiser next to us. “Don’t exhale,” I said. Thankfully, the light turned green before Ernie The Pothead turned blue.
Then there was The Gigolo. I never caught his real name. The Gigolo told me the “smart move” was to “screw your girlfriend’s mom at least once or twice.” I told The Gigolo his ethics were suspect, but he insisted that his logic was flawless. “It’s like a sneak preview of how your girl is going to be in the future,” The Gigolo said. On the next run, The Gigolo scored a Jaguar and disappeared for the reminder of my time at Jeff’s.
Next to lazy drivers, disappearing drivers were Jeff’s biggest problem.
“If one of these morons gets a luxury car,” Jeff told me, “they’re gone for weeks, playing grab-ass. But you’re different, kid. Someone hands you the keys to a BMW, and you bring it back. You’ve got a future in this business.”
The only other reliable driver was a part-timer known as The Old Man. He inhaled cigarettes like air and smelled of stale coffee. On our lunch breaks, the other drivers speculated that The Old Man was a contract killer.
“They call him The Butcher,” Tiny said.
“He’s killed more people than cancer,” Marlon agreed.
On a long run from Downtown to Venice, The Old Man set the record straight. He told me he used to be a butcher before retiring a few years ago.
“Never retire,” The Old Man advised me. “It’s boring. I drive for Jeff just to keep my shit tuned.”
Darren’s job was to dispatch the drivers. If we were slammed, he’d drove too. But usually Darren moved with the urgency of the DMV. He’d send three or four drivers out on a run, then use the quiet time in the garage to read Hustler and Screw. At the end of my first week, Darren gave me permission to borrow his magazines because a “college boy” like me knew how to put the smut back in alphabetical order. Darren was a surprisingly organized pervert, but he had to be. The garage’s porn library boasted more than one thousand periodicals.
On my last day, Jeff pulled me aside and made me an offer.
“Have you thought about making a career out of this?” Jeff asked.
“This?”
“Yeah, this.”
Jeff spread his arms wide, as if he meant to give the entire garage a bear hug. This wasn’t just a dirty auto garage on a derelict corner, in a bad part of town. This was an opportunity, according to Jeff.
“One go-getter like you, plus a couple good mechanics, and I can fire these morons,” Jeff said. “No more LOFRs for Enterprise. Just regular customers. Maybe restore some classic cars and sell ‘em. What do you think?”
Before I could answer, Darren interrupted.
“We’ve got a big run,” he said. “Four cars.”
I looked at Jeff.
“Think about what I said, kid.”
Darren grabbed the keys to a red Infiniti, so that he could drop us off at the Enterprise location, then take the car for the weekend. Ernie The Pothead called “shotgun.” Marlon and Tiny told me to take the “bitch seat,” then they pilled into the backseat, squeezing me between their massive frames.
“Friday night,” Tiny said as Darren drove us toward the Enterprise location. “Any plans?”
Darren tapped the steering wheel as if to say that whatever he had planned it would surely involved a “borrowed” Infiniti.
“A buddy of mine just got out of Chino,” Darren said. “We’re getting some hookers and an eight ball.”
Immediately, Tiny and Marlon expressed their approval for Darren’s weekend plans. Prostitutes and cocaine are post-prison celebratory classics. To show solidarity Ernie The Pothead said, “fuck the po-po.” Not wanting to be left out, I shared my take on Darren’s plans.
“Hookers and coke,” I said. “I guess he’s planning a return trip to Chino.”
Suddenly, the car went quiet. I had stuck my foot in my mouth, figuratively. But wedged between Tiny and Marlon, I knew that they wouldn’t think twice about sticking my foot in my mouth, literally.
Thankfully, Darren got the joke, albeit on a delay. He laughed. Ernie The Pothead laughed. Then Tiny and Marlon laughed too.
“The kid is funny,” Darren said.
At the Enterprise location, they gave Ernie The Pothead a Cadillac. But Darren, seeing an opportunity to upgrade his plans, took the Cadillac and gave Ernie The Pothead the keys to the Infiniti.
Tiny and Marlon each got a Ford Aspire. I asked if they had anything else, not because I had a problem with the Ford Aspire, but because I had spent enough time with Tiny and Marlon to know that they liked to play “bumper cars” in traffic when shuttling the rental chain’s budget model. The Enterprise clerk gave me a Nissan Altima.
As usual, I was the first driver to return to the shop.
“Where are the other guys?” Jeff asked.
I shrugged and played dumb. Jeff didn’t need to hear that Darren was on his way to pick up an ex-con, some hookers, and and an eight ball of cocaine in a borrowed Cadillac. He didn’t need to know that Ernie The Pothead had taken the Infiniti to an In ‘N Out Burger near his dealer’s house. And he really didn’t need to know that somewhere out there on the wild streets of Los Angeles, Tiny and Marlon were playing bumper cars with a pair of Ford Aspires.
“So this is it,” Jeff said. “Unless you want to stick around, kid, make a career out of this?”
Jeff took out his billfold and peeled off $100. My paycheck for the day. In two weeks, I had earned $1,000 cash driving for Jeff. That was a king’s ransom for a college student in 1996, and roughly half the amount of money I had made working for The Mann for two months.
“The money is tempting,” I said. “But I’m not looking to make a career move just yet.”
“No?”
“Sorry, no. This was just one crazy summer.”
Stick around and chat about the story!
I love hearing from readers like you because it makes writing Situation Normal so much fun! If you enjoyed this story, please let me know by leaving a comment below. Or, if you’re the type of person who likes a prompt, consider the following questions:
As far as summer jobs go, driving for Jeff wasn’t bad. What was one of your memorable summer jobs?
Did you ever consider making a career out of your summer job?
Rental cars get a lot of abuse. What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done to a rental car?
One thing I forgot to mention was the old hearse at Jeff’s garage. Sometimes Jeff liked to put on a clown wig, blast classic rock at full volume, and drive around the neighborhood just to “mess with people.” Now that you know this fact about Jeff, do you see his hiring practices in a different light? Explain.
Years later, my dad needed to rent a car. He chose an Enterprise location near our house in LA. My dad told the clerk that his son drove for Jeff. The clerk gave him a 20% discount. When my dad told me this, I didn’t believe it. Do you?
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