Runaway “Their Moment in Time”

By Kathleen Cook Huebbe

When Christopher—known to his friends as “Topher”—receives a letter in the mail twenty-two years after his high school graduation inviting him back to the Oasis, he knows it’s the beginning of a journey through some very tender memories. He returns to his parents’ garage with trepidation, as he forces himself to encounter the one thing he has always avoided....those memories:

It was their senior year of high school. A year of fun, friendships, hot rod cars, racing, and spending time together at their favorite hangout—the Oasis. And it was also their moment...
...their moment in time.

Although the group of friends had grown up together in a small town in Southern California in the 80s, they are constantly reminded of an era-gone-by at their 1950’s-style diner hangout, the Oasis. Curious about the pictures on the walls and the atmosphere of the diner, they want to know more about that bygone era. Runaway, the non-quintessential girl of the group, is especially curious about the cars and racing, and takes on an early role as the trendsetter for the group of friends. By the time they hit their teens, they all acquire their own classic cars and are learning to race.

By their senior year of high school, Runaway’s car club, The Shakers, is the talk of the town. Before they know it, the friends are pushed to their limits with competition from other car clubs that have formed at nearby high schools, and everyone is looking forward to the big end-of-year competition for the Tri-City Championship trophy.

There are some bumps along the way when a friendly competition is tarnished by a horrifying wreck caused by a jealous rival. To get even, Runaway engages in a winner-take-all contest against her bitter enemy, putting her beloved ’57 Chevy at stake.

Will they be able to move past the wreckage of their loss of innocence? Or will they lose everything they’ve ever loved?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brighton Publishing LLC
• Release date: Aug 24, 2013
• ISBN: 9781621831204

Kathleen Cook Huebbe

Kathleen Cook Huebbe was born in Southern California, and grew up listening to stories of street racing in the 1950s from her father, a street racer himself. First envisioned as a daydream, Runaway was in the making for over twenty years. While it took many years and many memories to make, it was one long and desperately loved dream.She has been a high school English teacher for eighteen years. She enjoys writing, gardening, but most of all teaching. Many of her students have inspired and encouraged her to continue writing.Kathleen Huebbe lives in Southern California with her husband, their three energetic young children, and Jake... their ever-patient Golden Retriever.

Book preview

Runaway

Their Moment in Time

A Novel

by

Kathleen Cook Huebbe

Published

by

Brighton Publishing LLC

501 W. Ray Road

Suite 4

Chandler, AZ 85225

www.BrightonPublishing.com

Copyright © 2013

ISBN: 978-1-62183-120-4

eBook

SMASHWORDS EDITION

Cover Design: Tom Rodriguez

All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All the characters in this book are fictitious and the creation of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Dedication

To my Father, for without his memories, stories, and influence on my life this story would never have been written.

Acknowledgements

To Kiese Hill, my friend and colleague. Thank you for your constant support and encouragement.

To Cari Cook Zirbes, who has always understood Runaway better than anyone.

To my husband Chris and my three beautiful children. Thank you for the time you allowed me to take in order to finish my dream, and for taking that leap of faith with me.

To my publisher Kathie McGuire and everyone at Brighton Publishing who had a hand in this. Thank you for your dedication and hard work in making Runaway the best it could possibly be. Ms. McGuire, thank you for believing in Runaway when I thought no one else would.

Prologue

I believe most people would agree that within every lifetime, people are subject to multiple lifelong lessons. There are lessons of love, breakups, or simply growing up—each of us experiences different ups and downs. Some of these circumstances change a person forever.

One of the biggest lessons I learned in my life is that time cannot be replaced—you cannot make it longer, and you cannot make it go back. No matter how badly you want to change the past, our actions are indelibly set in stone once each moment is past.

I have recently reached the ripe old age of forty. It has taken me essentially twenty-two years to learn a lesson I probably should have learned at eighteen, that time is fleeting, and memories are eternal. Time does not hurt, whereas memories do. Time cannot make you laugh, cry, scream, or smile, but memories can.

I have spent a better part of those twenty-two years trying to come to terms with my memories. It always seems that I am haunted by them.

Just remembering my youth is troubling, to say the least, because those memories come with longing and despair, happiness and melancholy. Today, I am melancholy. Today, I am sad.

At this particular moment, as I drive toward my old high school hangout, I am curious regarding what memories I’ll battle today. I fear a revival of memories brought about by a letter that was anonymously and unexpectedly dropped into my mailbox; I thought it may cause these memories to resurface. This letter asked me to meet the writer at The Oasis—our place, a place that was sacred to my friends and me for so long. The letter caught me off guard and forced me to remember times that I’ve tried to forget—or rather, ignore.

Upon receiving the letter, I was forced to remind myself to swallow and to breathe. This was unexpected. This was never supposed to happen. I had given up hope of ever receiving any kind of correspondence. Because of that, I took in a quick breath. Yet without any hesitation, I immediately drove the three hours to my parents’ house, parked, entered the front door, ignored their inquiries, and walked out into their garage… all because of the letter.

There, in the garage, I stood and hesitated. So many times over the years, I had walked into this garage and avoided what I was now walking toward. It used to be as simple as avoiding a song, a place, or an action, but this was entirely something else—this focused in on a part of me I had sworn to myself that I would ignore.

I turned on the light and walked the ten or fifteen feet to where a cocoon sat waiting on the other side of my parents’ three-car garage. Regardless of my better judgment, I took in a quick breath and approached the one thing that I knew would begin the sequence of never-ending memories. I gently pulled a dusty, worn, old cover from my car. A car into which every fiber of my being I had emptied.

The dust poured off her cover and floated listlessly to the ground—she, however, was undisturbed. She sat exactly where I had remembered parking her, all those years ago.

Now her beauty, even in the false, iridescent light, was unmistakable. I walked her length and ran my finger along her side. Her cool, smooth, jet-black body was slick to the touch. In that moment, I realized that I had failed her, too. I gazed down at her perfectly built steel body, her impeccable lines, and I knew that by forgetting and ignoring her, I had put her into a permanent time capsule—one that I wasn’t willing or prepared to open.

Impulsively, I reached for the door handle, carefully opened the door, and slid in. For the first time in a long time, I was anxious to reopen a part of my memory that I thought had been locked away forever. It had been twenty-two years since I last sat in her—twenty-two years since I had last driven her—and sadly, twenty-two years since I last had acknowledged her existence.

I immediately took in the smell of her forty-year-old interior. I grabbed her steering wheel the way I used to and let my fingers wrap themselves around the cold, hard plastic. This, I knew, was where I belonged. This was what I remembered best about life, love, and friendship.

I closed my eyes and let out a deep breath. When I opened my eyes, I let them fall on my left hand as it held the steering wheel, and I immediately noticed the twenty-four-year old scar. I suddenly smiled to myself and felt the scar with my other finger. The once-rough and hardened edges were now smooth from years of growing. Again, I let myself remember.

I honestly believed our story had been told less and less over the years, and I was sure no one at Glendora High School even knew the story at all.

More than that, I was positive anyone who knew about us had moved away or forgotten… or had they? Was I wrong?

In retrospect, none of that mattered—the story, the scar, and the car—none of it. I didn’t fail by not remembering, I failed by not trying. I had failed someone else—a girl, someone I held so close to my heart that, after all this time, no one had been able to replace her. My whole life I had lived alone, loved alone, grieved alone. Just as Sir Thomas Wyatt once noted in his poem, Whoso List to Hunt regarding the lost Anne Boleyn. I had, in my soul, failed to capture the wind, and thereby I punished myself daily.

At this moment I decided to do what the letter requested and go, as it directed, to The Oasis to face what seemed to me my most haunted and protected memory. Now I was at a crossroads. I had to get to The Oasis.

I glanced down at the keys, still in the ignition. Would it start? I hadn’t driven her in so long, I was almost afraid she wouldn’t run. I should have known that my parents would have periodically started the engine and kept her in running condition, hoping, perhaps praying, I would return and take her out. The keys, of which I thought I would never again take possession, remained motionless… like they, too, were waiting.

This was my moment of truth. I took a deep breath and grabbed the shifter. I pushed in the clutch and made sure she was out of gear before attempting to turn the key. I pumped the gas three times before turning the key—she barley turned over.

I pumped the gas once more, still holding in the clutch, and turned the key again, this time applying slight pressure to the gas pedal. I had to make sure her carburetor received enough gas, but not enough to flood her.

On the second turn, her engine caught and she ran of her own accord.

The blood pumped faster through my veins as I listened to her idle, with her body mildly shaking and trembling. I closed my eyes and let her warm up as I gripped the steering wheel harder. It had been exactly twenty-two years since I had driven this car—my car—but it had not changed, aged, or grown weary. It had persevered, where I had failed… but did the car remember, too?

Leaving my parents’ garage, I drove past the maze of streets out of our neighborhood. I listened to and felt my car—she rumbled and shook just as she used to. That brought a smile to my face. I drove to The Oasis, for it was not far, and I finally let my memory take me into the past.

I took pleasure in the shifting—pressing the clutch, moving the gearshift, applying gentle pressure to the gas. God, this was what I had longed for.

On the way to The Oasis, I had to drive through town on the main road. Road… funny—it’s really more a legend than a road. Many in this town now call it Foothill, but some still refer to it as Route 66.

Looking around, I realized that so much about this area had changed. I remembered lemon and orange groves as far as the eye could see, but now houses, unfortunately, had replaced them. It was heartbreaking to see every last one of the citrus groves gone. Towns and cities were no longer separated for miles by these beautiful, fragrant trees. Now the cities ran together in a constant stream, connected by strip malls, gas stations, houses, apartments and grocery stores. Forever gone were the days of citrus, simplicity, and that small-town feel. It’s hard to believe that just a short twenty-some-odd years ago, things were so different.

At one point, The Oasis, our hangout, was owned by a man named George Thompson. He had once lived in a white adobe two-story house that was right next to the diner—both were located on Baseline Avenue. Now, the house and the man were gone. I had no idea who owned The Oasis now—I doubted whether it was anyone I knew. Somewhere in my gut, I knew The Oasis had always persevered—or at least, I had hoped so—but I wasn’t exactly sure until today.

The Oasis was a small diner surrounded by palm trees and a small, circular parking lot. I had no idea how I would feel when I saw the parking lot or the diner. This was where the heart of my life was. All the best and worst, every emotion I’d ever felt, came from this one place.

This was what I had fought so hard to forget—this was what I knew would bring the pain back. The moment I started to make the turn into the parking lot, a wave of emotion and memories came crashing down.

High school. It was so long ago, and yet it seemed as if it all happened just yesterday. Just like a song can take a person back to a moment, seeing this building took me back to another life—one of dreams, loyalties, challenges and friendships.

Glancing now at the building, I suddenly remembered the jukebox that stood in the corner, just away from our favorite booth. I also remembered the checkered floor where so many people had walked, the walls covered with posters, and of course, how could I ever have forgotten The Wall of Fame?

I let my mind slip farther down memory lane and I saw Mr. Thompson as he sat in his chair, recounting tales of yesteryear. These tales were the seeds that, with time, became our dreams, hopes, goals and aspirations. All the sounds that had been so hidden in my mind and heart began to beat against my brain, and then they finally broke through, taking my breath away.

The diner had definitely aged. Weeds had sprung up out of the asphalt, dead plants bordered the front doors, and the roof looked worn by years of weather. But it didn’t matter—regardless of its dilapidation, The Oasis still retained all the mysticism it had held in its heyday.

But more jarring than all of what I saw with my eyes was another vision that slammed against my heart. I saw that I was late—a Willys coupe, a roadster, and a Buick GS awaited me in the parking lot.

Chapter One

Southern California of today is an entirely different world than it was twenty years ago. Nothing has stayed the same, and in the tumult of time, a way of life I once knew evaporated into thin air. The old Southern California, once so rich in opportunity and freedom, now feels non-existent.

I grew up in what is known as the Inland Valley in southern California during the 1970s. True, the 70s weren’t stylistically savvy, due to the fact we wore knee high socks with short, shorts, but the 70s were special. It was the time at the end of the Vietnam War and a few years after the women’s liberation movement. Our values were both from our parents who grew up in the strict 1950s nuclear family, and the new values from the hippie 1960s. Simply put, I grew up in a time when people knew and liked their neighbors. We knew all of our friends’ parents and they knew us. In fact, sometimes our friends’ parents disciplined us as much as our own parents did. We also had a great respect for them—well, for anyone who was older than us, really. Respect and decency toward one another were the norm.

This was the California of my youth—magical, innocent, and free. Skies were blue, traffic was light, people were nice, and gangs were largely unheard of.

Contrary to the common misconceptions of living in So Cal, every day was not sunny, celebrities were not constantly visible, and Disneyland was not in our back yard. I watched the re-runs of The Mickey Mouse Club from the 1950s with Annette Funicello on TV. And like everyone else in my youth I wanted to be in the Mickey Mouse Club, but I wasn’t a member, and going to Disneyland was a rarity.

These were the days before The Disney Store, when someone could only buy Disney mementos at Disneyland. I was also of the generation of the ticket books, when, quite literally, an E-ticket ride was just that, not a cliché, but an actual E ticket, entitling the bearer to a ride on the Matterhorn, Pirates of the Caribbean, or the Haunted House attractions. My family used to hoard those tickets so that the next time we went to the happiest place on earth, we might actually get to ride two of the three best rides in one day.

***

Another misconception about Southern California is that the state is one solid beach. Not so—we have a sizeable mountain range known as the San Gabriels. Actually, the majority of the area sits in a valley surrounded by them.

Beyond the mountains, however, there are miles of beaches looking out over the Pacific Ocean—which, by the way, is always so cold that it causes swimmers’ lips to turn blue and their teeth to chatter.

We So Cals know our mountains are not the Rockies, the Adirondacks, or even the Ozarks, although they are substantial enough. Lake Arrowhead, Big Bear, Mt. Baldy, and Cucamonga Peak are some of the more prestigious around us.

Between LA and San Bernardino run what is known in this area as the foothills, a smaller mountain range, wider than it is long. At the base of this particular mountain range runs a series of small cities or towns that were, at one point, nothing more than ranches managing orange and lemon groves.

Towns such as Glendora, San Dimas, La Verne, Claremont, Upland and Alta Loma are all situated at the base of these foothills. The main citrus groves and grape crops grew in the land around these towns. There was even a Sunkist packing plant in Ontario before it moved east to Florida. When Sunkist moved out, building contractors moved in. Now, the only way to see what remains of the groves is to peek in the back yards of people’s homes.

This over-developing of homes and the removal of the groves, in most people’s opinion, is what destroyed Southern California and its beauty.

Originally, most of Southern California’s citrus groves were located in what is known as the Inland Valley. These were small farming communities dedicated to the production of lemons and oranges. Other towns that were primarily vineyard-based were located farther east of the citrus groves. Literally thousands of acres were filled with grape vines. There were two wineries in our area, Virginia Dare, which later burned down, and Fillipi, which still produces a small yield each year.

What I remember best about the citrus groves were the months of March and April, when the sweet smell of orange and lemon blossoms was everywhere. One would be hard pressed not to notice the heavenly scent as it came through the breeze.

Glendora was one of the smaller farming communities that had been established since the early 1900s. This was where we called home.

The original Route 66 ran straight through Glendora, as it did with most other towns in our area, such as Upland, Claremont, La Verne, and Alta Loma. But Glendora was known as the Pride of the Foothills. Perhaps this was because of the groves, or maybe it was because the Santa Fe Railroad ran through town, or maybe it was just because it was quaint and beautiful.

We lived on an unknown, out-of-the-way street called Charford. The houses that surrounded us were old, with small, comfortable floor plans and perfect sized yards. It was a quiet, small, neighborhood, great for children, because the streets were a maze, with only one way in and one way out. Random, crazy traffic never affected us, but unfortunately, our lemonade stands never did very well.

In fact, if we did see a car on the street, we knew one of two things; the occupants of the car lived nearby, or they were lost and couldn’t find their way out of our maze-like neighborhood.

People in our town were simple, kind and unobtrusive. Moms made cakes, cookies, and pies for their neighbors. On occasion, we went to neighborhood barbecues.

Plaid shorts, knee-high socks, and surf attire were popular. We drank out of garden hoses, froze orange juice on a stick, and bought rocks as pets. Technology was minimal—video games were in their infancy. In fact, the only video game that existed was called Pong, and after about five minutes, the players could go insane from boredom. So we played outside as a form of entertainment. We rode bikes, played in fields, and swam in neighbors’ pools. My friends and I had a particular favorite pastime—taking out our bikes and racing down the streets with the wind in our hair and adrenaline pulsing through our veins

It was a great way to grow up. As with most kids, I spent almost all of my time with my friends. Every morning, as early as we could, we were out in our neighborhood with our bikes, ready for the day’s adventure. We stayed out until the street lights came on, without any fear of the scary outside world.

To make our youth even better, we were lucky in that we had a favorite hangout. It was a diner called The Oasis, and it was our special place. One of our friend’s dads owned it, and before him, it was his father’s. The diner originally had been built in the early 1950s when Brandon Thompson’s dad was just a kid.

The Oasis was located where the road forks in the town of La Verne. Route 66 continues east, and Baseline veers northeast.

The Oasis had its own history and its own memories. Besides being an authentic drive-in of an era gone by, it was also a main focal point for early street racers. Baseline was originally an old country highway that took drivers through the main part of the citrus groves. It was a simple, less-traveled street than Route 66, and early on, teens from the 50s decided it would make a better quarter-mile race track. The Oasis sat facing the track as its parking lot was next to the track itself. It wasn’t so much an official racing strip as it was a desolate strip of asphalt with a spray-painted line.

The Oasis wasn’t large and it wasn’t well known… it was just ours. It held a sense of wonder for us. On any given day, my four friends and I would find ourselves sitting in the diner, listening to Mr. Thompson tell his stories from the past. He was kind, friendly and always eager to tell a story, which usually had something to do with racing, cars, or engines.

In the middle of a story one day, Runaway blurted out, Did they always race for pink slips?

Well, no, he said. Not always. Sometimes people would race just for fun, and they had no intention of taking their opponent’s pink slip away.

I realized that I hadn’t been listening as closely as I thought. Looking up, I asked, What’s a pink slip again? I was only about eight or nine, and clearly I had gotten lost in the explanation.

Car ownership papers, Mr. Thompson said, smiling at me and probably realizing I was trying to process too much information.

Like when? Runaway persisted, completely ignoring me.

Looking back at her, he said, Oh, sometimes when they were racing friends. Pink slips were taken when the car clubs got involved. Then, and only then, did drivers start losing cars. But, he took a breath and, with his eyebrows raised, said, People just didn’t race on our quarter-mile, you see—sometimes they went other places just to hang out. There are actually two other diners in this area.

We all looked at each other. There are? we asked. Where?

I suppose, being young, we thought our small town was the entire world, and all that was in it was all that there was.

Mr. Thompson laughed, You guys, do you think that this is the only place around? The Oasis here is the smallest.

My curiosity was piqued. How come we don’t know about them? Can we go see them? I asked.

He chuckled again. Sure, you can see them anytime—I still swing by, from time to time, just to get a glimpse. There is one just down the road, here on Foothill. It’s in Pomona, though, and it’s called Henry’s. It’s a big, round building and the parking lot just makes a circle all the way around it. He drew a circle in the air with his finger. The walls are all glass and the roof is covered in white rock. Cars would just drive around and around… that’s what we called cruising. He smiled.

Does it have a quarter-mile, too? Runaway asked.

No, he smiled, quite proud. Actually, we are the only one with a quarter-mile, because, well… it’s not really a quarter-mile—it’s just an old road that we used for racing, Mr. Thompson explained.

What about the other one? I mean, besides Henry’s, Grant asked, reminding us of the other diners in this area.

"Aw, the other one is by far the most popular. It’s called Scrivener’s. It’s farther out—down in south Pomona—and much bigger than either The Oasis or Henry’s."

Brandon, Mr. Thompson’s son, spoke up. Yeah, but Dad, didn’t you tell me they all came here? he asked, looking at his dad like maybe he had been lied to.

Yes, son, I did. The people who came here were the locals who wanted to race for pink slips. But honestly, he paused for clarification, if you wanted to race the big guns—the guys with the money and the know-how—you went to Scrivener’s. They’re right near Holt Boulevard, and the racers would use that for their quarter-mile. Some people even went down to Hollywood and raced at Sunset and Vine. But the cops didn’t like it much.

So did people have to belong to a car club in order to race? Or could they just do it on their own? Runaway asked.

Well, it seems to me that I knew this one guy who used to go down to Scrivener’s on his own and look for someone to race. That’s his picture, right up there.

Mr. Thompson pointed to an old picture of a guy standing next to what looked like a bucket of rust. It wasn’t painted, it didn’t have any bumpers or chrome, and it had no hubcaps—it looked like a piece of junk. Mr. Thompson told us it was a 1947 Ford two-door sedan. That information was lost on us, but the guy did have his picture on The Wall, so we figured his car must have been fast.