2001 Toyota

At night they laid up and passed the question back and forth like a little rubber ball. What would you do if you had a million dollars? The ball always hurt a bit on impact to palms that only wanted to touch one another. The question stung some days more than others.

While some answers were easy to share — I’d buy us a house, I’d pay off your student loans, I’d get you a camper van — others were more tenderly felt and either said shyly or not at all. When you love someone so much, sometimes the words take away the meaning.

Her private answer was relatively small in monetary value, like most things that truly mean something to someone. When they were young and the student loans came into being and insisted that a job be procured after graduation to pay them off, he had made a sober choice. His first purchase as a young adult was a little old truck, older than they were, which he had named Gertrude and had loved fiercely. She was unabashed about admitting that when she had met him, Gertrude was a healthy part of his appeal. 

He frequently expressed worry that Gertrude wouldn’t make it to wherever that job would be, or that even if it did, that it would crap out soon. Recent repairs had cost more than Gertrude had originally been bought for and the nostalgia felt more and more like a luxury that he couldn’t afford.

So, he posted Gertrude to Facebook Marketplace and sold it to the son of the local police chief. He took out another loan, on a good-as-new used crossover SUV. To his great dismay, he heard through the grapevine that Gertrude made it to Utah and back from Virginia without a hitch. He regretted selling the little old truck but knew it was probably for the best.

She loved him all the same without Gertrude, but every so often when they would ride around in his clean, quiet, perfectly-running financed car that wasn’t even old enough to register for kindergarten, he would get a funny look when fiddling with the radio, plugging in a charger, accelerating with ease to the speed limit uphill on a highway. It saddened her terribly, and she missed Gertrude too. 

If I had a million dollars, I’d track down your truck, she would someday tell him. I’d pay someone to fix her up and to teach you how to do it. We’d get her antique plates and keep your daily driver and she’d live with us forever. 

But for now there is no million dollars, and she painted him a little red truck on a canvas to hang up at home. It saddened him to see, sometimes, but mostly, he loved that she had loved Gertrude too. 

If I had a million dollars, I would track down my truck, he would tell her without hesitation. But I’d make sure my car was paid off first, and make sure yours was safe to drive. At first blush he sometimes sounded selfish, but his responsibility for both himself and her were always there, being slowly and thoughtfully considered, before speaking. 

If they had a million dollars they might have spoken more freely; shyness has no place where desires aren’t unreasonable and responsibility isn’t so slow to take shape when the consequences are fewer. But the million dollars are far away, and for now, they’ll just have to love one another from her old car, which she owns, and his new car, which he’ll own someday.