Wednesday, November 9, 2011

The Red Convertible

This story starts off with the author telling us about how him and his brother went in together and bought a red convertible, "Red Olds." But he went on to say that they both had owned it, but now his brother owned it to himself and he didn't know why. Lyman (the narrator) was really good at making money. He once owned a restaurant called the Joilet Cafe. He started off working there as a busboy and then became part time manager, then he fully owned the whole place. But that all went down hill because a tornado came threw and tore the place all to pieces. Lyman and his brother went into town one day with all their money and that's when they saw "Red Olds." Before he knew it they had bought her and were driving around everywhere. One summer they decided just to drive where ever the road took them and they would stop and take breaks along side of the road. One day they were driving and they saw a girl standing aside of the road so they picked her up. Lyman asked her where she was from and she told them "Chicken" which was in Alaska, so thats where they went. The girls name was Susy and her family took them in like they were their own children, they even had their own tent beside their house. But it began to grow cold outside and it was time for the two brothers to leave. The night before they left Susy went into their tent and they broke the news to her. She told them that they have never seen her hair and she unpinned all of it and her hair reached the ground! Henry picked her up and put her on his shoulders, because he always wondered what it would be like to have long, pretty hair. The next morning they left the family and headed towards home. They got home in time for Henry to be deployed to be a Marine in the services. He only came home once for Christmas and then he was off again, but he did write letters. He only got two letters written before the enemies caught him, so he had to stop. But Lyman kept writing him letters hoping that he would get them and he told him all about the things he was doing to the car. Lyman kept referring to it as Henry's car, even though Henry gave it to him when he was deployed. When Henry returned home, he had changed dramatically. He wasn't the same person anymore and Lyman wasn't happy about the change. He couldn't joke around with his brother anymore and I guess it was just hard for him the accept the fact that he brother wasn't the same person anymore since he had come back from overseas. One day Henry and Lyman were watching TV, when Lyman heard a clicking noise and looked over at Henry and he had bitten through his lip and blood was running down his face. Lyman tried to help Henry but he just pushed him away and tried to act like it was nothing. After supper that night when Henry left the room, the family was talking about how they needed to get Henry some help but they didn't want to take him to the hospital because all they would do was give him drugs. Lyman figured maybe if he destroyed the "Red Olds" that Henry would pay some attention to it and it might bring the old Henry back. Henry finally noticed after a month that Lyman had let the car get beat up and run down. He fussed at Lyman about it and Lyman just kept his mouth shut and didn't say a whole lot because he wanted Henry to go back to his old self and maybe the car would do the trick. After that day, Henry was always working on the car..day and night. He even strung a lamp outside to be able to see at night to work on the car. He was much calmer now and he was getting back to himself, but Lyman still wasn't happy. Lyman was used to him and his brother doing things together and now Henry was a loner. One day, Henry asked Lyman to go for a spin in the ole car and their younger sister took a picture of them outside of the car. Lyman hung the picture up on the wall but after a while the picture creeped him out. One night he was drunk and high and had to leave the room because of the picture and his friend came over and they put a paper bag over it. Lyman then goes on to explain the drive that him and his brother took. Henry was calm and quiet which made Lyman happy but all of a sudden Lyman lost it and grabbed his brother and yelled wake up, wake up and Henry knew exactly what he was talking about. He said he knew it and he knew that Lyman had destroyed the car on purpose, but that Lyman should take the car for himself. They get into a fight over this stupid car and start hitting each other and after a few hits, Henry starts laughing and says "you take it" and finally Lyman agrees. They drink the beers that were in the cooler and then Henry decides to go for a swim in the river to cool off. The current starts to get a hold of him and suddenly he's gone. Lyman took the car to the edge of the bank, put it in first gear and got out, and slowly let it roll into the water.

Woahhhhh I did not expect this to be the ending of the story. After reading this story, the quote that comes to my head is "Appreciate the things you have in life, because one day..they could disappear. I feel really bad for Lyman throughout the whole story because he feels like he's lost his brother completely since he went off overseas. But when he finally gets him back to his old self, the river current takes him away again. I can't imagine what was going through Lyman's head as this was happening, that poor kid. This story just really teaches you that you should always appreciate the people and things you have in life, because one day you might not have those things anymore.

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