part 5
Roger drove home, parked the LTD in the street, moved his Prius, and pulled the LTD into the driveway. But he didn’t put it in the garage. He still felt uncomfortable about the garage, although he couldn’t quite say why. Regardless, he was starting to like the LTD, gas hog that it was. The seats were like a sofa, and driving the car was relaxing. He wasn’t sure how he felt about the waves he’d gotten as he drove through town. As he went back into the house he glanced back at the car. Just to keep an eye on it.
Over the next few days Roger did more things than he’d attempted in years. He tried online searches, called the motor vehicle department, and even asked the desk sergeant at the police station if they’d ever heard of anything like a phony VIN number. The sergeant gave him a look and asked why he thought somebody would go to all that trouble. Roger didn’t have an answer.
He even called the lawyer who’d handled his parents’ estate. He didn’t want to get into explanations, so he just said it was car that had been his father’s, and what should he do about the title and registration. The lawyer explained it was a pretty routine situation, and just go to the motor vehicle department and fill out some forms. And also warned him not to drive the car until it was re-registered. Roger stammered that of course he wouldn’t. He’d been driving it all week. He used his Prius to visit the department though.
Thanks to an obscure law, Roger was able to keep his dad’s custom 82-LTD marker plate. When he applied the new annual sticker, he noticed the plate was still in fine condition, but had a patina of grime and oxidation exactly as if it was really years old. Which it could not be. How had the prankster managed that, he wondered. Except…could it really be the original plate? The accident probably hadn’t destroyed the plates; just the middle part of the car. Where his parents had been.
The more Roger mulled it over, the more he suspected it could be the plates themselves that had prompted the inexplicable prank. If he could trace what had been done with the wreck, maybe he could track down…whatever was trackable.
It took another visit to the police station, where he learned that the town had a contract with the triple-A towing service. The sergeant didn’t know how long the contract had been in place, but it was a place to start. He called the towing company to ask what they did with cars that had been totaled. Sent to a metal salvage company, he was told. Melted down in the end.
