"First day at work, and I get sent home in the first hour," I laughed as I stripped off my jeans and button-down shirt and leaned into my bedroom closet at my parents' house.
I'd hoped -- actually planned -- that today was going to be an interview only for this summer job, and I'd have a few days before I was asked to start at the used-car lot in town. But Russ Wilks had other plans. He hired me without any kind of real interview, and told me to go home, change and come back for training.
Must be desperate, I thought. And I also thought that Russ seemed pretty cocky... in more ways than one. He'd already paraded out of the shower room in front of me and his mechanic this morning, his freakish dong swinging like an elephant trunk. That was weird enough, although the mechanic, Haskell, acted like it was no big deal.
But what stuck with me more was how Russ reached across his desk and pressed his fingers into my jugular. I guess he meant it as a joke, but it startled me. It was an aggressive move, and he wasn't gentle when he pressed my neck. He was close enough that I could smell the coffee and cigarettes on his breath, feel the heat off his just-showered body.
I pulled on cut-off jeans and the cleanest T-shirt I could find in my pile of dirty clothes, tied up my sneakers and then headed back out to my car. I wasn't in a hurry to get back to the car shop, because Russ seemed like the kind of guy who was going to work my ass off when I got there.
Sure enough, he was standing outside in front of the office windows, legs spread in a an aggressive stance and his hands on his hips. I looked twice out the side window as I swung my car into an open parking space to the left of the building. Was he really pointing at his watch?
"Petey, I hope this isn't an indication of how this whole summer is gonna go," he barked as I hustled around the back of the car toward him. "Fifty cars aren't gonna wash themselves, and I sure ain't getting wet today!"
As I drew close, he clasped a firm hand on the back of my neck, pivoted and steered us both back toward my car, around the corner of the building and then on to the back of the service area. Guess he figured that since I was 18 and he used to be a drill sergeant, he could march me around like I was some new recruit.
On the ground was a hose with a pistol grip end, a bucket, a container of liquid soap and a large sponge. He squeezed my neck, sending a jolt up down my spine that tingled in my balls. "Now that you're dressed for the job, are you ready to actually LEARN the job?"
"Sure," I said, wriggling free from his grasp and stretching my neck side to side.
"Good, because it's something you're going to do once a day. Twice, if it rains or the wind kicks up the dirt. Ever hear of a chamois?"
I looked at him, unsure. Did he just say "shammy?" Russ looked annoyed. He reached into the bucket, which had no water in it yet, and pulled out a yellowish square of material that was about the size of a dish towel.
"Chamois. Chamois. Or if you prefer, sham-WAH, as they might say in Gay Paree." He tossed it at me and I clutched it before it hit my chest.
"What's it for?" I asked. By now, Haskell was out of the service bay, wiping his hands on the blue rag and grinning. He seemed amused that Russ was giving me a hard time, just like he seemed in on it when Russ swaggered naked around the office that morning.
Russ raised his hands, palms up, in mock exasperation. "Haskell, what are they teaching these kids over at that high school? What the actual hell." He took the fabric out of my hands, held it daintily between thumbs and forefingers, and said, "This here is your towel."
"One towel? For 50 cars?"
"Ever watch the Olympics, those fruity looking divers in their little Speedos, diving into the pool? And when they get out they dry off with a tiny little patch of towel? Yeah? Well, that's this, a chamois. Observe!"
With that, he picked up the hose handle and in one sweeping move blasted my lower body with a full spray of jarringly cold water. I spun away reflexively, and he doused my ass and the back of my legs.
"What the fu... What're you doing?!?" I sputtered as he let off the hose. I turned around and he tossed the chamois back at me. Haskell was bent over, laughing and slapping his leg.
"Start drying," Russ said. Shaking with anger and humiliation, I did as he commanded. I swept the soft fabric up and down my legs, and over my sodden denim shorts. I was surprised at how quickly it sopped up the water -- a couple passes and my skin was dry.
I was bent over absorbing the water off my socks when I heard a chortle and then a firm but playful smack on my ass, the sound amplified by the wet jeans.
"Here ya go, sport," Russ said, taking the towel from my hands. With one big twist that flexed his Popeye forearms, he wrung the water out onto the pavement. One twist the other way extracted the rest, and he tossed it back to me.
"Now you know the magic of the chamois cloth," he said. "That's how you dry 50 cars with one towel. Now, let's get you out onto the lot and get some work done."
I collected the chamois, sponge and soap into the bucket and grabbed the hose, but wasn't having so much luck corralling my racing thoughts. First the casual nudity, then the non-interview interview, and now an embarrassing job initiation, right in front of Haskell.
Their laughs were ringing in my ears, but what struck me most was a bizarre feeling of excitement and anticipation. This had to be like no summer job ever... it wasn't going to be boring, that was sure. But what was it going to be, when it was said and done?
Russ had me unspool the hose out to the far car on the lot, a 1985 Pontiac Grand Prix with dapples of rust over the back wheel wells. He squirted some liquid soap into the bucket and took the hose from my hand. I flinched when he reached for the grip and he chuckled as he sprayed water into the bucket.
"You're jumpy, Petey," he said. "I never teach the same lesson twice. So, pay attention going forward." Once the bucket was full and foamy, he told me to dunk the sponge until it was sopping wet. He sprayed the Grand Prix liberally with the hose.
"You gotta wet it before you wash it," he said. "Otherwise, you're just grinding the dirt into the finish."
I nodded.
"Start washing on the roof, big sweeping strokes and be generous with the squeeze," he said. "Spread that soap around and make sure you hit every spot with the sponge." Not wanting to disappoint, I was so liberal with the soapy water that it sloshed well up my arms and a bit onto my chest.
"That's it," he said in a firm voice. "Now the hood, then the trunk. More water in the bucket, now. Keep that bucket full, don't skimp on the soap. Now work the windows down to the doors."
I did what I was told, and it wasn't until halfway through my first car that I realized I was already tuned into the cadence of his commands. Is this what boot camp is like, I wondered.
He prodded me to work fast, so the soap didn't start drying before I could hose it down. Once I had sponged off the tail lights and back bumper he slid the bucket away from the car with his foot and handed me the hose.
"Same drill, kiddo. Start at the top, sweeping motion, don't spare the water and work from top to bottom."
I circled the car as I sprayed. When I'd gone halfway around, cleaning from the top, he instructed me to work back toward him counterclockwise, spraying the quarter-panels, doors and rocker panels.
"Most numb-nuts will keep going all the away around, and end up like a dog wrapped around a doghouse with that hose," he said. "Now, before we start drying, get that next car wet to prep it for soaping."
I turned and sprayed down the next car, a Chevy Impala that was dulled from too many years in the sun. When I was finished and worked my way counterclockwise back around, Russ was waiting with the chamois held from both upper corners, dangling like a flag over his crotch.
"And here comes the most important part," he said. He tossed it at me again. "Show me how to dry a car."
Eager to display my newfound knowledge, I opened it up flat and dropped it onto the roof, and with my palm pressed down in the center, began a pattern of big arcing circles. I was confused as the water pooled and swished about, and the chamois began to ball up around my hand.
"No no no no no no no no," Russ said, and there seemed to be satisfaction in his voice at my ignorance in the use of this strange towel. "Hand me that." I did, and he wrung out what little water I'd been able to collect.
"C,mere," he said, tapping the hood of the Grand Prix. "Come press your dick right up against it." I stood where he'd instructed, and pressed my hips into the car's fender. He came up behind me, so his chest touched my back, and reaching both arms around me, unfurled the chamois so it rested at about the midpoint of the hood. Then he leaned onto his left hand and turned so he was beside me, to my left.
"Now," he said in a softer tone, his mouth just inches from my face, "take the corners closest to you in both hands, and pull the chamois toward you." I reached forward, grabbed each of the corners, and pulled the cloth to my waist. It seemed like an odd way to dry a car, as it bunched and skipped over the top of the water beads.
Russ sighed in an exaggerated way, and slipped back behind me. "Again," he said. I placed the chamois back where he'd had it, and began to pull. "Stop!" he commanded, right in my left ear. I startled and let go of the cloth, but he quickly grabbed my wrists and pushed my hands back to the starting position. Once there, he slid his palms over the top of each of my hands, and interlocked his fingers in mine.
My hands were now his hands. "Feel THIS," he said, and he began pulling the chamois lightly, slowly, until something strange happened. The water caught the fabric, and put up resistance across the width of the cloth. As he continued to drag the chamois that friction came off the car surface, through the fabric, into my fingers and on back to Russ, who controlled all motion.
"Feel that tension?" he whispered authoritatively. I felt the heat of his chest on my shoulders, and contact from both the mass of his crotch against my ass, and the point of his chin into my left shoulder. All I could do was nod. Nod, and continue to pull the cloth back in concert with his wishes.
When the chamois was all the way back, and the tension released, Russ took a step back. The uncoupling left me a little woozy in a way I couldn't define.
"Now, wring it out. Rinse, repeat." I hadn't turned around yet, but I nodded. "Petey, boy, do you think you have it from here on out?"
"Yes, sir," I said. "I think I get it now."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Lunch break brought all new eye-openers. Russ had called me in from the lot, and invited me into his office to eat my bag lunch with him and Haskell. The desk was average size, but with three of us spreading out bag lunches out it felt a little tight. Haskell got up and skirted past me, then returned a minute later with three cans of Coke from the refrigerator in the break room.
"So, newbie, tell us how rewarding it feels to achieve your lifetime goal of cleaning cars that will be dirty again by the next morning," Russ said, popping the top on his soda can.
"Ha, it's more like achieving my goal of earning some money for college so I don't have to do this kind of work for a living," I said.
Haskell nudged me brusquely, and I turned to lock into a stern face. "You got a problem with honest work, boy?" He stared, unblinking, and I felt anxiety rising. Moments later, he and Russ busted up in unison.
