Alex Opalstone and the Window of Heaven's View: Life 101 Part 2, Page 2

  As Alex stepped out of Meredith's car, Meredith leaned over to remind her when she’d be back. "I'll pick you up in an hour. Tell Mrs. Lilly I said hello."

  "Okay," Alex responded over her shoulder as she ran up to the door. Meredith waited in her car, made sure the car doors were locked and watched to make sure Alex was safely inside the Lilly home before she left. As Amelia let Alex in the door, she waved goodbye to Meredith.

  "Hey, Alex!" Leena said cheerfully as she ran down the stairs to greet her. "Come on upstairs." As Alex followed Leena to her bedroom, Amelia left to go answer a ringing telephone after she shut and locked the front door.

  "I think that's my mom's friend, Miriam calling. Miriam is my mom's best friend. Miriam, just moved a few days ago to another state. She used to live just a few blocks away so they're really going to miss each other." Leena then sat down in her chair next to her desk but moved it to make sure it faced Alex.

  "So what's the big deal? They can stay in touch over the phone. You're mom can just fly out to see her from time to time," Alex said as she plopped herself down to sit on the edge of Leena’s bed. She then set her backpack next to her on the floor.

  "No, Alex, it's more than that. They really, really love one another," Leena said as she looked at Alex to see if she understood.

  After a few moments, Alex became wide-eyed. "Oh, I see. You're mom is…"

  "Please don’t tell me you’re thinking of the counterfeit version," Leena plead in tired disappointment.

  "You don’t even know what I was going to say," Alex scoffed in defense.

  “And what were you going to say?”

  Alex shrugged. “Why don’t you just tell me why it’s a big deal that Miriam moved.”

  Leena was annoyed that Alex didn't get it. "Really?"

  "Why are you all upset? You just said that your mom and Miriam 'really, really' love each other. That's two 'really's' you used. What am I missing here?" She then folded her arms defensively across her chest.

  Leena held her head in her hands and sighed before she looked up and said, "I can't believe that you, of all people, wouldn’t get it."

  "Get what?" Alex asked in a tone of increased irritation that Leena would think Alex might be dumb enough to miss something that she shouldn't.

  Leena threw her hands up in the air in exasperation. "I can’t believe I have to explain this to you.” Alex simply smiled sarcastically as she sat.

  “I’m listening.”

  “Let’s clarify something first. Do you agree that immoral behavior between a man and a woman outside of the holy bonds of marriage is the counterfeit of the moral behavior inside the bonds of marriage?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then does it make sense to you to also believe that immoral behavior between two women outside of a deep friendship is the counterfeit of moral behavior inside the bonds of deep friendship?”

  “Sure.”

  “Really?” Leena squinted her eyes in skepticism.

  “Yes! It makes sense. Immoral activities are the counterfeit of the good activities. I get it. I get it.” She then relaxed her arms at her side and listened patiently.

  “Just wanted to make sure.”

  “So your point is…”

  “My point is that what my mom had with Miriam was the real thing, not the counterfeit.”

  “And just to clarify, the real thing is…what?”

  “An R. A. F.”

  “Never heard of it.” Alex said disinterested as she checked her fingernails to see if she should get a manicure.

  “A Refined Affectionate Friendship. You’ve never heard of it before?”

  “Not a clue.”

  “We discussed this at Julio’s, remember?” Leena didn’t believe Alex would actually forget so she gave Alex a look that told her she didn’t believe her.

  “Yes!...I almost forgot.” Alex smiled sheepishly. “I looked at the website. It’s like a close personal friendship.” Alex smiled hoping Leena would change the subject but it was clear Leena wanted to talk about it. Alex gave in. “Okay. Tell me about R. A. F.s again.”

  “Have you ever heard someone say they love their RA-BFF?”

  “No.”

  “Well, an RA-BFF is a refined affectionate best friend forever. That’s what my mom had with Miriam. So they were super close friends. I mean, really close. As in really, really close.”

  “There you go again with the two ‘really’s.” she said as she threw her hands up in the air.

  “So are you saying you have no interest in the benefits and heart-filled joy that can come for women in an RAF?” Leena asked as if she were about to lose hope for all mankind. “Do you have no interest at all in love?” Alex looked at Leena’s face. Leena was wearing her heart on her sleeve telling Alex how much she cared about the value of close friends. Alex finally began to understand. She was quickly learning that Leena had a much better perspective on love than she did.

  "I'm sorry, Leena. It's just that, well...that's the world we live in," Alex said humbly. “This world is either totally hot or totally cold. There’s not much to offer in between those two extremes.”

  "Not everyone sees it that way. My mom doesn’t. Miriam doesn’t…and I don’t.”

  “Okay. That’s good.” Alex shrugged.

  “This isn't the world people lived in over a thousand years ago! People could be affectionate without being ‘hot.’ Purely and openly affectionate in close friendships.”

  “I see your point. The counterfeit often closely resembles the pure original.”

  “Have you heard the stories of David and Jonathan or Ruth and Naomi in the Old Testament?”

  “Sure.”

  “I hate that in this 'modern' world, at least here in the U.S., that we think we all have to be macho all of the time and keep our distance as if none of us is able to control our hot desires or actually distinguish between affection that is meant to sooth and express love rather than to only arouse for satisfaction of lust," Leena said in disgust over the coldness of society. Alex was surprised to see this side of Leena.

  "You're right. We live in an oversexed society. I've always found the latest fashion magazines to be significant contributors to that mentality. They don't have their cover models covered up enough. They show too much skin. That's why I don't subscribe to them," Alex said thoughtfully as she tried to convince Leena that even though Alex had a lot to learn about what Leena was talking about, Alex was on her side.

  "I never buy them either," Leena replied as she calmed down more and sat next to Alex on her bed. "Anne of Green Gables probably wouldn't either. She knew what a close, affectionate friendship was. She and her best friend never changed it into a counterfeit version of it."

  "Why did Miriam move away?" Alex asked curiously.

  "Her husband got a better job and so they had to move. He knew how hard it would be on my mom and her. He even asked his new employer for an extra thirty days and acted like it was for more time to pack up and move but really it was just so Miriam and my mom could spend more time together before Miriam had to go," Leena shrugged.

  "Did he get the extra time?"

  "Yep."

  Alex sighed. "Well, that was really nice of him."

  "Yeah. It was," Leena smiled thoughtfully.

  Leena brought it up because she hoped Alex would help her to have her aunt Meredith agree to a close friendship with Amelia. But when Leena saw how quick Alex was to sexualize it, Leena thought she had best keep to herself the idea of Meredith and Amelia becoming closer friends to help ease the loss of Miriam's close proximity of a mutually close and affectionate friendship.

  "Well I'm sorry your mom is having a hard time with it. I mean, it's not like we can just hook her up with someone else. The best of friends usually just choose each other naturally. Hopefully your mom will meet someone else who will be like Miriam. Then they can both enjoy the closeness because they both freely choose it together."

  Leena looked dumbfounded that Alex seemed t
o have read her mind. "Can you read minds?" Leena asked warily.

  "What?" Alex was confused.

  "I was just thinking that same thing. That maybe my mom could find another best friend," Leena said in some excitement.

  Alex shrugged. "She probably will. Maybe that could be Julio's mom. Or maybe it could be with my aunt Meredith." Leena gasped. Leena was starting to think Alex was able to read minds.

  "But I'm not going to make anything happen that isn't supposed to. And neither should you," Alex said. "And no, I can't read minds. At least not without my ESP baseball cap on, which as you can see, I didn't bring with me," Alex smiled.

  Leena chuckled. "Extra Sensory Perception baseball cap. Yeah right," Leena said as she figured out that Alex couldn't really read minds. Leena was grateful Alex hadn't figured out what Leena was hoping to do by hooking up her mom with Meredith so Leena didn't have to be openly embarrassed about Alex's suggestion to just let things happen naturally in friendship as an unintended rejection of Leena's idea to be more of a matchmaker in the process. Then Leena could see Alex was momentarily deep in thought.

  "What are you thinking?" Leena asked with a curious smile. Alex liked Leena's attentiveness of her and Leena's observant friendly inquiries into the workings of Alex's mind. Alex smiled a bit before responding.

  "I couldn't help but to think that both Miriam and your mom wouldn't be in this situation if Miriam's husband had more command over his income." She then grabbed a pillow and set it against the wall to lean back more comfortably on.

  "Here we go again. Don't you ever think about anything else other than money?" Leena sighed.

  "According to you, just a few minutes ago, I also think about sex," Alex said matter-of-factly.

  Leena looked shocked and then she decided to give a rather disarming smile as she said, "Okay. Let's not fight.”

  “But that’s what you assumed I was referring to earlier, right?”

  “I don’t want to fight.” Leena smiled again and went back to the subject of money. She walked over and grabbed her laptop and asked, “What were you thinking about when you said he should have more rule or whatever over his income?"

  Alex chuckled and shook her finger at Leena. "Gotcha!" Alex smiled. Leena remained silent as she simply folded her arms across her chest and waited for Alex to answer her question. "I also think about love too, ya know," Alex smiled more charmingly. Leena tried to hold back a smile but was unsuccessful. She then sat back down at her desk and powered up her laptop.

  "Are you going to explain the income thing or aren't you?" Leena asked as she tried to maintain her own resolve to not give into a possible opportunity to go back to an argument over love and sex. Alex didn't hesitate to respond.

  "Miriam's husband could choose to live and work wherever he wanted had he owned his own successful business and been a successful investor. Then Miriam wouldn't have had to move because her husband wouldn't have needed to move his family away for money. There are a lot of advantages of being wealthy. That's all I was trying to say."

  Leena nodded. "That makes sense."

  "Exactly," Alex said as she threw her hands up in the air to make her point. "And I don't think about sex nearly as much as I think about money, by the way," Alex added. "In fact, I hardly ever think about sex."

  "I know," Leena responded now less defensive. “But I think I understand why you might be more…cold.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My mom was talking to your Aunt Meredith and…I overheard a few things.” Alex swallowed heard and waited for Leena to tell her what she may have heard. “I didn’t catch all of what she said but your brother Dex…well…he wasn’t very nice to you, was he?” Alex quickly grabbed her phone and began dialing.

  “Can you get me the number for an attorney? A really good contract attorney.” She then began to quickly write down a number. “Thanks.”

  “Who are you talking to? Why do you need an attorney?” Leena asked confused. Alex began to quickly dial the number she was given.

  “Hello? Yes. How much would it cost to get a contract to make someone keep their mouth shut?” The man who answered was quick and confident in his response as an attorney.

  “Do you want an attorney to get a gag order on someone? Or are you looking for a nondisclosure agreement? And if it’s a nondisclosure agreement, I need to know if you’re looking for me to adjust one you’ve already got off the internet.”

  “I don’t know. What’s the difference?”

  “Wait a second. If you don’t mind my asking, how old are you? And what’s the relationship of the person you’d like to have bound to the agreement?” The man suddenly sounded more hesitant as he asked.

  “Thirteen. I want my aunt to sign it so I can have some privacy back in my life. It didn’t know she was a big into gossip until today.” Alex was confident she was getting good help so far.

  “Thirteen? Are you kidding?” The attorney began to chuckle.

  “No.”

  “You can’t sign any contract and expect it to be legally binding unless you’re at least eighteen years old.” The man could no longer control his laughter. “And if Simon put you up to this, tell him that was a good prank. No. That was a great prank! Wow! You really sound thirteen!” The man laughed even harder as he hung up the phone. Alex tossed her phone down onto the bed in embarrassed anger.

  “What was that all about?” Leena asked raising her brows as she wasn’t sure if she was about to see more of Alex’s anger.

  “I want my aunt to stop talking to your mom about me. A legal document can force her to shut up.”

  “Wait, wait, wait. Are you serious? A legal contract?”

  “Yes! My past pain is no one else’s business!”

  “And you think that making your aunt–– one of the nicest people I’ve ever met–– that making her sign some paper that says she can’t talk about you…will help you guys get along better?” Leena scoffed.

  “She has no right to talk about me behind my back!”

  “Come on, Alex. Really?” Leena couldn’t believe what she was seeing in Alex. “You think that your aunt was finding…entertainment in talking about you to my mom?

  “Well, I don’t know.”

  “I didn’t overhear everything. But what I did overhear was how much your aunt really cares about you and how glad she is that you’re living with her.” Leena paused to see Alex’s face soften. “It was good. She complimented you on how strong you were to deal with what you had to deal with. I don’t know what it was you had to deal with. I just know that if your aunt hadn’t taken you in then… you and I wouldn’t be friends. I’m so glad we’re friends.” Alex felt embarrassed for overreacting.

  “So…she’s not a gossip.”

  “Neither your aunt nor my mom is a gossip.”

  Alex wanted to forget how she had just embarrassed herself by overreacting. "Let's get to work on the Triple-C," Alex politely suggested.

  "Okay."

  "One of the things I was thinking about was that financial pitfalls in life are a lot like crime. Crime happens to all kinds of people. It happens to men and boys and women and girls. But since women and girls are more often victimized than men and boys, females have more to watch out for and guard against. Women even have greater financial needs than men do –– especially if they are single mom's through no fault of their own.

  “Now crime is a hard fact of life. But studies prove over and over that women and girls will be less traumatized by falling victim to a certain crime, which means they may recover faster, if they know a certain crime is a reality and thus possible to become a victim of that specific crime than had they never known the possibility actually exists. They will also be more motivated to take the right actions toward prevention thereby significantly reducing the chances of them ever becoming a victim in the first place. Now since crime is like unexpected money problems people have got to start seeing some of these problems coming so they can do whatever they can to avoid them and
keep it from happening to them. So hopefully we can help people see some of the pitfalls of retirement planning so they can avoid as many of them as they can. By the way, how's the website coming? Did you get more done?" Alex asked eager to see Leena's work.

  "Yep! This is the latest I've done for our website," Leena said as she cheerfully turned her opened laptop around so Alex could see the screen with her. She was glad the attorney issue was over with.

  "And I have more information for you to put up on the pages," Alex added as she hopped off of the bed and grabbed a chair to sit by Leena at her desk.

  "Here's just a few of the images I showed you before. I figured if I only use no more than maybe five or so images per page then the pages will look less cluttered and therefore cleaner," Leena said. She continued as she pointed to the screen. "Most of the content will go here and we'll put links over here and down here.

  "This is looking really good so far," Alex said as she patted Leena encouragingly on the back. Leena heard her cell phone jingle to let her know a text had just arrived in her in box. She checked her phone.

  “It’s Julio. Don’t worry. I’m not going to be rude to you and sit here and text with him for the next twenty minutes.”

  “Good. Because we’ve got work to do and the last I heard, he’s allergic to work. Unless, of course, it helps him to get rich so he can buy whatever he wants without having to hope his parents will approve or be able to afford it. He asked me about that once.” Alex jested.

  Julio’s text read: Alex will help us get rich! I just know it! C U later – J

  Leena then texted back: A lot of adults will get rich too. Got 2 go now. She then tossed her phone onto her bed.

  "Are you sure you can’t read minds?” Leena asked after hearing Alex talk about getting rich just before Julio texted about it.

  “Where are you getting that idea from?” Alex asked in frustration.

  “Never mind.” Leena answered as she rolled her eyes. “Where's the information you wanted to give me to add to the site?"

  Alex dug through her black and white checkered backpack and pulled out a small USB drive. "Here. I'll make a copy of my notes for you," Alex said. She then copied a part of her Triple-C file onto Leena's laptop. "One of the things I was thinking of to help people prepare for retirement, is how they can come up with more money. They can either cut back on expenses and put the difference of that savings into their retirement plan, or they can sell off assets and use the money from the sales to put towards retirement. Ideally they'd do both," Alex said.

  "I don't get it. What do you mean about using the difference of something for savings?" Leena asked perplexed. Alex tried to explain.

  "Let's say that a family, who we'll call the Stein's, owns two cars. One is a really expensive car that they bought new one month ago for eighty thousand dollars, and the other car is one they bought three years ago for only forty thousand dollars. Let's also pretend that both cars were financed which means that the Stein's had to go to a bank or other lender such as the car dealership's lender to get loans to pay for the cars. Now, if the three-year-old car is a good, reliable car that isn't likely to need any major repairs anytime soon, and if their loan payments are only three hundred dollars per month for the older car, and if the auto insurance is only one hundred and fifty dollars per month, and if gas and maintenance is about one hundred and thirty dollars per month, then it costs the Stein's about five hundred and eighty dollars a month to drive and use the older car. Are you with me so far?" Alex asked.

  "I get it. The older car costs the Stein's roughly five hundred and eighty dollars a month to use and that includes gas and basic maintenance, like, say, for occasional oil changes and tires," Leena replied.

  "Right." Alex continued. "Now let's pretend that the new car, the one just bought by the Stein's a month ago, has a monthly loan payment of five hundred dollars and an insurance payment of two hundred and twenty five dollars per month with gas and maintenance costing one hundred seventy five dollars per month. That's about nine hundred dollars a month to use the newer, more expensive car."

  "Wow! That's almost a thousand dollars a month just for one car," Leena said dazed.

  "So with the new car, that means that the Stein's pay the bank five hundred dollars a month to use the car and that the Stein's also pay an insurance company two hundred and twenty five dollars a month since most states have a law that requires you to pay for auto insurance to drive a car."

  "I know that the bank gives you a loan to help pay for the car and that the monthly payments to the bank are to pay the bank back while you use the car, but what's the auto insurance for?" Leena asked.

  "It's used to pay unexpected costs up to a certain limit if you get in a car accident. So if you get hit by another car, and if it's the driver's fault for hitting your car, if they don't have enough of their own money to pay to repair your car and to pay for your medical bills if you are badly hurt from the wreck then you can call your auto insurance company and say, 'hey, please pay for my car repairs and hospital bills' and you order that because that's what you've been paying for as a customer. As long as you pay your insurance bill on time, also called a 'premium', then the insurance company is obligated to pay for car repairs and medical bills you have if the person at fault doesn't."

  Leena looked perplexed. "But didn't you say that the insurance has limits for what they'll really pay? What about that?"

  "Okay, let's say that the cost of the wreck is only five thousand dollars to fix your car, but your hospital bills are two hundred thousand dollars. So that mean's you need a total of two hundred and five thousand dollars to pay for your car repairs and medical bills. Now let's say that the driver who hit you can only afford to pay five thousand dollars. That means that you still need two hundred thousand dollars to pay for the rest of your bills. If you, the victim of the accident, only agreed to pay for an auto insurance policy that will only cover one hundred fifty thousand dollars for your bills, then you would have to use fifty thousand dollars of your own money to pay off the rest of your bills so you don't create credit problems that can ruin your reputation with banks if you ever needed to borrow money in the future. But if you don't have any money at all, then you'd have to pay two hundred thousand dollars of your own money to pay for your medical bills. Unless, of course, you decide to sue the driver and make him or her pay for your bills since he or she was proven to be at fault for hitting you and causing the car wreck."

  Leena was dumbfounded. "Wow. How do you know all of this stuff?"

  Alex just shrugged. "I called around to three or four auto insurance companies and asked them to explain it to me really simply as if I were an eight-year-old." Leena chuckled. She was clearly impressed. Alex continued. "So back to the example of the eighty thousand dollar new car. Remember, the new car costs five hundred dollars a month to pay back the loan, two hundred twenty-five a month for auto insurance and approximately one hundred and seventy-five a month to cover gas and maintenance. So that's a total of nine hundred dollars per month.” Alex wrote down a few figures on some paper and then continued.

  “If the Stein's aren't really ready for retirement even if they still have another twenty years left before they actually retire, then the smart thing for them to do is to sell the newer eighty thousand dollar car, pay off its loan and buy another car that costs a lot less to use per month. Then they use the difference in costs to put towards their retirement. So if they sell the new car and buy a lower priced used car, like a two-year-old car for only forty-five thousand dollars, then if the cost to use the two year old car happens to be the same amount for the three-year-old car to use maybe only five hundred and eighty dollars a month, that's about three hundred and twenty dollars saved per month compared to the previous eighty thousand dollar car. I get that figure since they used to pay nine hundred dollars a month for the new and expensive car, but now that they're only paying five hundred and eighty a month for the second car, nine hundred minus five hundred and eighty equa
ls three hundred and twenty in savings.

  “Now they can put that three hundred and twenty dollars a month towards their retirement savings every month instead of paying for a new car they don't really need, since a less expensive one can be used just as well for their everyday common needs."

  "So how did you learn all of that?" Leena asked curiously.

  "I called a few investment companies that sell retirement plans and asked them to give me a few simple examples on how to cut expenses. I asked them to explain it to me in really simple terms. Some of them hung up on me since I was a kid. But a few of them were nice enough to help me learn a few things. I wrote the names of the ones who hung up on me so I don't recommend them to others. But the ones that took me seriously and were nice I'll remember to call in the future."

  "Did you say, 'please explain it to me as if I were an eight-year-old?'" Leena chuckled.

  "Yeah. Something like that," Alex chuckled cleverly. "But there's a problem with that example," Alex added.

  "Like what?"

  "Depreciation. That's when something that was once worth a lot of money isn't worth as much anymore. New cars have a fast depreciation which means that within a few minutes of buying the car, when you drive away from the car sales lot and act as the new owner of it, the car starts losing its value right away. So the new eighty thousand dollar car isn't worth eighty thousand anymore because the car is now considered 'used' since it has a first owner who has used the car and driven it. Once it's considered 'used' it's only worth about seventy-five thousand dollars and the value keeps dropping from there with each and every additional mile that the car is driven. Amazing huh? Ten minutes earlier it was worth eighty-thousand but just a few minutes later it's only worth seventy-five thousand or less once it's bought and driven by an original or first owner. So when the Stein's go to sell it, they may only get someone else to agree to pay seventy thousand for it. So that's a quick loss of ten thousand dollars for the Stein's."

  "So how can you tell how much value a car has lost once it's used?" Leena asked.

  "I don't know," Alex said thoughtfully.

  "A lot of cars now a days have a high tech display on the dash board that tells you how good your gas mileage is so you can track gas costs. Maybe there's also a car value display on the dash board," Leena guessed.

  "Maybe. Let's go check," Alex suggested excitedly as she jumped off Leena's bed. They both ran eagerly down the stairs.

  "Mom? Mom?" Leena called out as they looked for her mom. "I'll ask my mom for the keys and we can go check out the dash board of one of my parent's cars out in the driveway," Leena added. As they continued to walk around the house looking for Amelia, they both began to hear the sound of Amelia's voice out in the backyard. As Leena went into the backyard to get her mom's attention, Alex followed close behind. "Mom?" Leena called over to her as Amelia talked on the phone. "If it's Miriam, tell her I said hello," Leena smiled.

  "I'm talking to your dad now. Is it important? Because I need to talk with him," Amelia responded trying to quickly assess which conversation for the moment might be more important. Leena's father, Steve, was a hard man to reach and Amelia wanted to talk with her busy and often absent husband while she could.

  "Never mind. It's okay," Leena replied. Amelia then continued her phone conversation as Leena and Alex walked back into the house. "I'll just go get the keys. I know where she keeps them," Leena said as she led the way and Alex continued to follow. Leena then went into the kitchen. On the wall near the entry closest to the garage was a set of pegs where the Lilly's often kept the extra pair of car keys. "There's only one set of keys here. Usually there's three," Leena said bewildered. "Oh well. I guess we'll just have to use these," she said as she reached up high and took the keys down off of the wall. Leena studied the keys and said, "I'm not sure which car these go to."

  Alex reached for the keys and said, "I can figure it out." Leena simply shrugged her shoulders and handed Alex the keys.

  "Good luck figuring it out. I don't even remember seeing either one of my parents use those keys before," Leena added rather skeptically.

  "They look like old keys," Alex said studying them briefly before she led the way. Leena followed close behind as Alex headed over to the side door and out to the driveway. Leena closed the door behind them once they arrived outside. It was a beautiful day outside. "I bet that's the car," Alex said as she pointed at a crisp and clean, cherry red, nineteen sixty-five Shelby GT 350 in mint condition parked peacefully in the driveway. She then began walking towards it. Alex approached the driver’s side and unlocked the door as Leena went over to the passenger side door.

  Alex hopped in and leaned over to the passenger side door as Leena said loudly, "Unlock the door." Alex looked at Leena, held her hand behind her ear and pretended she couldn't hear or understand Leena. "Alex! Unlock the door!" Leena repeated in frustration. Leena was not amused as Alex mouthed, 'What? What? I can't hear you.' Alex finally smiled as she unlocked Leena's door. "Very funny," Leena squinted sarcastically at Alex. She then sat down in the passenger seat while Alex smiled and sat in the driver’s seat and they closed their doors. "How did you know those keys worked for this car?" Leena asked curiously as she had quickly forgiven Alex.

  "Old keys. Old car," Alex shrugged. "I'm not seeing anything that looks like it might be a value display anywhere on the dash," Alex said as she studied the variety of older gauges along the dashboard.

  "Maybe they didn't have those back then," Leena suggested.

  "Or maybe they did and they just look older or it's in a different spot," Alex added. "New cars have a gauge that helps drivers track things that are usually an improved feature based on older model cars." Alex then leaned over towards the passenger side floor and picked up a large envelope. "Maybe this is an owner's manual," she said as she opened it up to look inside. Alex's eye's got wide as she saw a copy of a collector's certificate inside. "Oh, no."

  "What?" Leena asked.

  "This says this is a collector's car. That mean's it doesn't depreciate but instead, it appreciates."

  "So?" Leena looked confused.

  "That means this car is a lot more expensive than when it was first bought. This is a rare car," Alex smiled nervously. “Why isn’t this car in the garage in a climate controlled environment?” she wondered. She listened for a response by Leena but she was focused on something else.

  "What's that say over there?" Leena asked as she pointed towards the driver’s side.

  "Over where?"

  "Over there," Leena said as she got up out of her seat to point at the dashboard and accidentally fell over onto Alex and unknowingly released the car's emergency brake. Quickly Leena apologized and got up off of Alex and the two kept studying the dash. They were looking so closely at the dash that neither of them realized that the prized collector's car was now slowly rolling backwards.

  "I don't think that's it," Alex said.

  "But what is it?" Leena still wondered. The car began to pick up more speed as it continued coasting backwards.

  "I think it's the..."

  "AAAH!" Leena screamed before Alex could finish her sentence. Leena suddenly noticed in the driver's side mirror the reverse motion of the car which caused her to quickly look out the driver's side window and begin screaming. Leena grabbed Alex's head and held on tight as Alex looked up to see the garage moving further and father away with increasing speed.

  "AAAH!" Alex also cried out as both she and Leena screamed together. Amelia overheard their screams as they rolled faster backwards down the driveway. She hurried out to the driveway to see what was the matter and to try and help. Alex pushed Leena's grip from off of her head as she and Leena turned to look behind them to see what it was they were about to run into and this frightens them even more.

  "AAAAAH!" They both continued screaming as they saw they were coasting faster and faster backwards right into the traffic of other cars driving along the street. As they neared the end of the driveway, other drivers s
ee that Alex and Leena aren't stopping and the drivers begin to honk their horns and slam on their brakes. As Amelia ran down the driveway, her arms were flailing as a warning to drivers of other cars that tried to swerve to miss hitting any other cars as brakes screeched loudly and neighborhood dogs began barking and adding to the commotion. Alex and Leena's car miraculously slowed down as it hit a sudden raise in the street's intersection. The car finally jerked to a sudden stop as the back two tires hit the curb on the street by a nearby home. No passing cars hit the Lilly's car or any other cars and after one driver yelled in anger at Alex and Leena from afar, all but one of the drivers drove away. One driver wanted to do the right thing and make sure Alex and Leena were alright as Amelia ran over to the girls to confirm the same.

  Before the adults could arrive, Alex said in a subdued tone, "This...was not a good idea."

  Then Leena replied sarcastically, "Ya think?!"

  Chapter 14: A Very Different Kind of Carnival Ride