The Sheltered Islander By Sally Flynn

Whoop-whoop

I rented a van from Steve Lobosco at Corrigans/Hertz in Water Mill. I was in a huge hurry to get to Dulles airport by the next morning. He came through for me big time with a brand new minivan at a fantastic price. I had a few other concerns though.

"Steve, I'll need instructions on how to operate this van. My knowledge stops with my 1990 minivan."

"Don't worry. These new cars are a cinch to drive."

Arriving at Corrigans, Steve gave me a fifteen-minute review of all the controls. There seem to be many changes in minivan technology since 1990 and the control console has apparently been modeled after the one in the space shuttle. I was terribly distracted by time pressure while Steve spoke, and I hesitated to let him out of the van because I missed everything between, "Let me show you how this works" and "you're all set." For some reason, the van didn't have an instruction manual.

Pulling into my driveway at 5 p.m., I hurled bodies and luggage into the van and we were on the road by 6. The first problem was the heater. There was no way to turn it off or control it. My son stripped to his pants in the back seat and I had made some kind of adjustment that now blew hot air on my head and freezing air on my feet. In desperation, I turned on the air conditioning for my son and I struggled to put my window down. But apparently the driver's window zooms completely down or up in a flash, but you can't have anything in between. So I spent eight hours using the radio like a timer. After each song, zoom down to cool off during the commercials, and then zoom up for the songs. The van was clearly possessed.

We arrived at my mother's house in Pennsylvania at 1 a.m., and then at 7 a.m. we all left for the airport. On the way, we picked up my daughter. She was full of divine wisdom. Within seconds of being in the hot car, she said, "Mom, the back has separate controls for the heater, up here above the door." She was able to turn off the heat in the back, which enabled my son to put his shirt back on. I asked her if she could help with the heater in the front, but she was laughing at me, an evil laugh that told me the car had possessed her too.

Dropping off the kids at the airport was tricky because, for about two minutes, I couldn't get any of the doors to open. The traffic monitor came by, he made a "turn the key" gesture, so I turned the car on, zoomed the window down and he reached inside my van and tapped one button - a magic button - somewhere on the door console that opened all the doors and hatch at once. But he got away before I could ask him where that button was.

Once the kids were gone, Mother and I headed back to her house - she sat in the back. She wanted me to redirect the music through the front speakers, which I was convinced were just for show because I'd already tried to redirect the radio, and like the heater, it was controlled by satanic forces.

I hit a button somewhere and the sliding door next to Mother opened. That was a nice feature to discover, but not while driving 65 mph on an interstate. The McDonald's garbage was sailing past her face as she screamed. I was pressing all the buttons I could find around me. Finally the sliding door closed. However, all the windows were down, and a woman's voice said, "State your destination, please." I didn't know who she was, or where she came from, but I shouted, "Take me to my mother's house!" I figured she was an angel sent to combat the devil in this car.

The disembodied voice guided us home. I thanked the angel and left a cookie on the dashboard as an offering and in the hope she might reappear the next time I got in the car.

When I returned the van to Steve, unscathed but for my trauma. I told him all about the devil car and the angel that comes to help the unsuspecting driver. He kept a straight face until I told him about the whoop-whoop being broken. The remote that Steve gave me didn't make the whoop-whoop sound, so it was necessary for me to make the sound myself. I did a demo for him to show how well I could imitate the whoop-whoop. As I left, I could hear Steve crying, or was he laughing? And saying something like, "Mother of God, make her stop!"

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