“Jake and his Hot Trans Am” Part 3

So it was another boring ass week and then Friday night would come around and Jake would want to go cruisin’. 

Before he had met Donna, it was just the two of us cruisin’ around Santa Clara Valley. We’d smoke Marlboros, bullshit about chicks, and just drive all over the place. After driving for hours we’d stop at Bob’s Big Boy on El Camino Avenue and drink coffee, smoke cigarettes like mad, bullshit some more and leave sometime after midnight. Usually, it would take me hours to come down off the caffeine and nicotine buzz from all the crap I had ingested. So I would lie in bed just staring at the ceiling, listening to my younger brother, Matty, saw logs for hours on end.

Jake started going out with Donna at some point, and I have to say he really lucked out. She was a cute chick, who had dirty blonde hair, she was smart, funny, had a buxom body that wouldn’t quit, and she loved Jake. Quite a departure from the skanky girls Jake usually dated.

So with Donna in the picture, it now was the three of us hanging out, going cruising on Friday nights. Doing the same thing except…

Jake would go into his Evil Knievel mode of driving. He’d patch out, race like a demon down streets, take turns at hair-raising speeds. One time he braked so hard around a turn the car lost two hubcaps, so we had to stop for half an hour just to search for them in the weeds. It was as if he had Deep Purple’s “Highway Star” playing in his head whenever Donna was in the car with him. Donna might have been impressed, but I just hung on for dear life, yelling at him to slow the hell down.

So it would be VRRRROOOOOOM! “JAKE! NO! LOOK OUT GODDAMMIT! THERE’S A TREE!  A TREE! LOOK OUT! AHHHHHHHH!” SCREEEEEEECH! The Trans Am’s brakes screaming in protest. Jake laughing maniacally, spinning the wheel around another turn, Donna going Wooohooo!! Then – VRRRRRRAAAAMMMMM! EEEEEEEEE! “JAKE! TRUCK! TRUCK! LOOK OUT THERE’S A DAMN TRUCK IN MIDDLE OF THE ROAD! OH GOD NO!” SCREEEEEEEECH!  “WE’RE GONNA DIE! AAAAAAAUUUUUUGH!!! RRRRRRRRRRRRERERERER! 

Smoke was pouring from the engine and brakes,  the brake pads were sizzling like bacon n’ eggs on a hot griddle by the time we got to Bob’s Big Boy I staggered out of the car white as a sheet, my legs jellified from terror. I wasn’t sure if I was alive or dead –  if I was alive, then Bob’s was heaven on earth ’cause I didn’t think they served burgers in Hell.

Then were times Jake would want to go parking. Which meant I’d get booted out of the back seat – and made to sit up front. While Jake and Donna would go sit in the back, so they could fool around as I sulked, smoked, and fiddled with the radio trying to drown out their moans, sighs, and kissing noises by playing KYA or KFRC AM radio stations loudly. 

OOGA SHAKA! OOGA! OOGA! OOGA! SHAKA! OOGA! OOGA! I CAN’T’ STOP THIS FEELING, DEEP INSIDE OF ME… The Group Blue Swede’s “Hooked on a Feeling,” blasted out of the radio, and their OOGA! OOGAing! seemed to be a perfect musical accompaniment to the tag team wrestling match ongoing in the back seat.

Once in a while, I’d get kicked by someone’s sneaker in the back of the head. “Oww! What the Hell? Watch it you guys!” The car shook like it was an airplane experiencing extreme rhythmic turbulence.

Eventually, the faire la’ amoure in the back seat would end, the two sweaty, disheveled occupants would move up to the front, and I’d go sit in the back on a clammy, sweaty seat. Nice.

This went on for about six weeks until I finally put my foot down. Two is company but three was a crowd, and if Jake wanted to bring Donna, maybe she could bring one of her friends along too. That way it would even things up.

“Dude, I can set you up with someone, I know a lot of foxy chicks,” Jake offered. “No Jake, I’ve seen some of your “foxy ladies” – so ixnay on the ateday!” I countered “Let’s ask Donna, alright?” “Yeah, ok…sure no problemo bro” answered Jake sulkily. I guess he was kinda miffed that I didn’t trust his taste in chicks.

You see the way I figured it – Donna was actually cute, had a nice personality, a great figure, so logically she must have a cute friend who’d like to double date with us. How she ended up with Jake was beyond me? Like I said before – the dude had gotten lucky.

I also knew if Jake was in charge of finding me a date – She’d probably have more facial hair than him, outweigh me by a good one hundred pounds, and probably could bench press two hundred and fifty pounds in the Gym. Or He’d set me up with some anorexic skank, who suffered from bulimia and had questionable hygiene. So it was either a chick that was friends with Donna or we could just forget the whole thing.

So at Bob’s, we all sat around a table drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes and had a little conference.

Well, it seems I was in luck. Donna did have a friend, who was nice and had recently broken up with her boyfriend.

“Her name is “Peggy,” Chuck…you’ll like her,” said Donna.

So a deal was struck, battle plans were made for next Saturday. The double-date would be the four of us – Jake and Donna, Peggy and I, and we’d be all going to see a double feature playing at the ol’ Monte Vista Drive-In in Mountain View. They were playing a bitchin’ Horror Combo of “I Eat Your Skin” and “I Drink Your Blood”! Oh Boy!  Even if the date was a bust – I loved horror movies – these flicks sounded like real so-bad-it’s-good cheapies.  Perfect.

Ok, I was in. But, in for just what?

But, that Amigos, is a tale for later on.

To be continued…