BACK
POPEMOBILE
ravi mangla
For years I’ve listened to Vlad talk about police auctions with the same brio
he once glorified tales of our spring pilgrimages to Tijuana around the dorms. I can’t
for the life of me see how one can compare a police auction with a week of blond
bikini-clad women and binge drinking. Vlad thinks of himself as an adventurer and
the useless dross he picks up for next-to-nothing is his shipwrecked treasure. His
house is infested with the stuff, heaped from floor to ceiling with radar guns, bloody
gloves, confiscated weapons (Tasers, nunchucks, bowie knives, samurai swords),
medals, plaques, dud canisters of tear-gas, and even a polygraph machine (that he
still hasn’t figured out how to work I might add). He bought his black 1981 Trans Am
at a police auction because it looks like KITT from Knight Rider. He revels in his
personal museum of worthless artifacts. I’ve never known anyone who enjoys buying
things as much as Vlad. In fact, I am positive he’s never saved a penny in his life.
Putting money in his pocket is like leaving an infant alone with a set of permanent
markers.
I can only guess how long he’s waited for me to ask for an invitation to an auction.
I’ve never been so interested or curious that I’ve actually wanted to go, but there is an
auction upcoming at the Shaker Hills correctional facility, the second oldest and third
largest prison in the state, and Vlad is insistent that, deep down in my subconscious,
I want to come. So to appease him, I agree to tag along.
Coming up on the prison, I’m reminded of old paintings of the Bastille I’ve seen,
hatched with iron-barred windows and brownstone turrets spearing up from every
corner of the stronghold. There are guards circling with rifled shoulders from the
notched parapets. The prison is hemmed in by a tall, rusted fence crowned with loose
coils of barbed wire. Shaker Hills is out of the way, in the middle of nowhere, in the
town of Shaker Hills - a town built around the prison and colonized mostly by
reformed offenders and their families. A dozen guards haul open the gates to let us
through, frisking us up and down upon ingress. Vlad is smiling like a dope, and not
just because the guard is tickling his armpits. He is a kid in a candy store – scratch
that - a candyland. His teeth are coruscating in the late afternoon sun. He’s wearing a
black gabardine suit and had encouraged me to wear one as well. Naturally, I didn’t.
He’s the only person at the prison dolled up and is sweating like a suckling pig - but
still smiling.
They open with lesser knickknacks: utility belts, outmoded handguns, surplus
office supplies. And then they begin with sequestered possessions. If you look up you
can see the fingers and arms of inmate’s worm out from the barred windows. Some of
the potential bidders shift nervously in their folding chairs. Backstories are delivered
for each item to entice and incite. Believe it or not, there is a whole subculture of
collectors of accessories to murder (yikes). Vlad isn’t one of them. He’s just an idiot
looking for a good deal on something to sop up his attention for a couple of days. I
can’t help but be mesmerized by the gruesome accounts of criminal behavior. The
Camaro that drove through a mall, injuring dozens and killing two; a set of ninja
throwing stars that went slicing through the Midwest; the cell phone used to hold the
Governor’s daughter for ransom. There is a celebrity surrounding these items,
something deliciously taboo and seductive about the thought of possessing one of
them. I have never driven a motorcycle, gotten a tattoo or pierced my ears, but I do
own a washing machine that drowned four people.
Lastly (the piece de resistance?), there is a counterfeit Popemobile built into the
cargo bed of a rusted red Ford, which two brothers used to masquerade as the Pope
and offer full-body baptisms to grown women.
“Is the glass bulletproof?” Vlad calls to the auctioneer, who presses his hand into
the protective medium.
“It’s actually cellophane.” Vlad’s head swivels.
“Let’s buy it, Pete.” Swept up in the excitement of the afternoon and dog-tired from
the pounding heat, which has my head feeling as light as the feather used to choke
the prostitute, I buckle.
We each pay a four hundred stake and I drive the grumbling, clanking truck back to
Vlad’s apartment. The truck smells part like cigarettes and part like a public restroom.
There’s a deep copse of unpaid traffic tickets hidden away in the glove compartment.
Vlad and I consider what to do with our new acquisition.
“I say we go downstate next weekend to one of those small, rustic towns dressed up
as the Pope and we’ll get free drinks at any bar we go to.” Vlad says, spread across the
couch, starry-eyed, envisioning this perfect weekend in his head.
“You do remember how the last guys got arrested.” I remind him. Vlad sits back up.
“We’re not trying to fondle women though. Well not against their will at least.”
“I guess.”
Vlad, with his gift of gab, convinces me it’s the right thing to do. We rock-paper-
scissors to decide who will play the Pope and who will play the Pope’s bodyguard. He
wins and I settle for the role of bodyguard.
On Friday, we buy a Pope costume at the party supplies store (with the red capelet
and mitre and everything), also, shadowing makeup, a golden scepter and a magic
putty that can - according to the packaging - be worked into convincing wrinkles with
enough patience. I deck out in a sleek black suit I last wore for my ex-girlfriend’s
uncle’s funeral. Vlad lends me his aviator sunglasses and an ear bud he tore off a set
of (my) headphones. The shadowing makeup and cosmetic putty does wonders.
Halloween costume technology has come a long way since I was a boy (old bed sheet
+ two holes = ghost). Vlad already has an older looking face once you cover up his
razed black hair. With the makeup he can easily pass for fifty-five, maybe older. I’m
glad that I’m security detail and not the Pope. People say I have a boyish face, and
moreover, I’m far too tall and lean to be the Pope.
We start driving due west. I hang an air freshener from the rearview and roll the
window down partway. Vlad is laying on the corrugated bed of the pickup, in the
cellophane booth, camera ready, smoking a cigarette and drinking a forty. The
country roads are long and empty. Spangles of sunlight sear through the breaks in
the trees. I feel good and glancing at Vlad in the rearview, I know he feels good. I can
already tell it’s going to be a good weekend.
In Calvin Oaks, we’re pulled over by a county cop. He walks with a gimp and is
shaped oddly like a tootsie roll.
“Is there a problem, officer?”
“Is that the Pope you’re driving around there in the back?” he asks, staring
incredulously at Vlad.
“Yes, sir, it is.”
“I thought so.” He inhales powerfully through his furred nostrils. “My wife is a big
fan. I mean a huge fan. I know he must be real busy and all, but if it’s possible,
we’d be honored to have him over for dinner.” The officer smiles at Vlad.
“What do you say, Pope?” I call back to Vlad. He gives the holy thumbs up. Both of
us are famished.
“Wow. You just made our week or year or something. I can’t tell you how excited
my wife will be. I probably won’t have to buy her an anniversary gift now.” He laughs.
“What would the Pope like her to make, I’ll call her right now.”
“Anything you have is fine. The Pope isn’t fussy.”
He calls his wife and I listen as he tries to convince her it’s the real Pope, the “one
of France”.
He introduces himself as Gary, tells us pork chops are on, and we follow him four
miles down the narrow country roads to his farm house in the boonies.
Vlad is expected to say grace. It catches us both off guard. The thought never
occurred to me. His lips curl wickedly as he bows his head and closes his eyes.
“O Lord thank you for thy bountiful eat-eth of food-eth. So bountiful is thy harvest
of pork chops. Thank you for thy beautiful home and thy beautiful family. Jewel two-
sixteen, “God is great”. Blessed be those who love the Lord and, in turn, the Lord
loves and blesses them. Let us fly with the doves and swim with the seals and run
with the jackals” – I jab his arm. “Amen.”
Gary and Ingrid, his wife, ask questions like “What are you doing in this part of the
state?” and “What is it like being the Pope?” and “Which book of the Bible is your
favorite?” Vlad’s Russian-tinged English passes easily for German-tinged English,
which they take for a French inflection. He answers their questions as if he has
thought carefully about each beforehand – which he probably has. I know if I had
covered rock, we’d have been sunk by now. I’m not quick on my feet like Vlad. I’m
much better as the subdued, professional bodyguard.
The children stare at him all through dinner without uttering a single syllable.
When Gary and Ingrid aren’t watching, Vlad flashes funny faces at the children. I
kick him in the shin and he stops. After he blesses the family, their pregnant cat, and
poses for several group shots, I say that we have to be getting to our next engagement
with my fingers pressed into my ear.
“The Pope is thirsty for a little communion wine. Do you know where we can get
some of that on the way?” Gary and his wife look at one another.
“This is a dry county. You’d have to go over to Red Oak or Yarborough.”
“I see. No matter. Thank you for your hospitality.”
“Yes, thank you very much. May the force be with you.”
We follow the signs to Red Oak and manage to find a Howard Johnson with a bar
inside.
I go in first to check if the place is secure. The hotel is designed in seventies kitsch.
The carpet is a grimy burnt orange and walls are papered with an ill-matching red and
black checker design. It reeks of mold and booze. A few plaid-clad regulars are slung
over the bar and others are slumped in booths. The bartender is cleaning a tall glass
with a yellow rag. He gazes up at me. I stick out like a sore thumb in my dry-cleaned
suit, sunglasses, polished wingtips and with two fingers bolted to my ear.
“Area secure.”
“What do you think you’re doing?”
He probably takes me for the health inspector or someone similarly unwanted. I
clip my (Vlad’s) sunglasses to my breast pocket.
“I have the Pope outside and he’s looking for a place to drink.”
“The Pope? You have the Pope outside?” A few heads lift from their hard pillows.
“Yes, the Pope’s in town on official Church business. Is there something wrong
with that?”
“I want to see!” One of the drunks shouts and half of the bar goes staggering
outside to where Vlad is standing with his hands interlaced behind his back. He takes
a regal bow.
“Well I’ll be damned.” The bartender says, rubbing the back of his neck. “You can
drink here and don’t worry about paying nothing either.”
“Bless you, sir.” Vlad says, hitching up his cassock, climbing gingerly over the
tailgate and down from the truck.
We straddle seats at the bar and start with two ice-cold Budweisers. The Pope says
he has never had “Bud-visor” before. He says he drinks mostly imported beer. After a
couple of beers, we move to hard liquor: scotch and water (hold the water) and rum
and coke. The Pope’s eyes are glazing and I’m beginning to feel a little slipshod
myself. The drunk next to me, an older fellow with a scruffy beard like steel wool,
goes on and on about his hemorrhoids. The internet doctor had suggested he plug
his butt with a clove of garlic as a cheap and natural remedy. He makes a lame joke
about Vampire rape. He says that the garlic clove has given him a rash and the bar
stool feels like the top of an active volcano. His eyes well up. He asks if the Pope can
heal him. I tell him the Pope is not a miracle worker, but the Pope overhears this and
orders the man to genuflect before him. He burbles like an auctioneer and flicks the
man’s forehead: once, twice, three times. “Be gone devil! Be gone ass devil!”
The man stands up and exclaims, “I can walk again!” And we realize how drunk we
all are. We laugh and we laugh and we laugh.
A priest walks into the bar. He stares directly at Vlad, who is leaning over the
counter, telling the bartender about the time he painted the Sistine Chapel.
“What in tarnation?” The small, cotton-haired priest says.
“Iz-iz the Pope.” One of the drunks, who hasn’t spoken all night (I didn’t even
know he was conscious) says.
“This man is not the Pope!”
“How dare you.” Vlad slurs and nearly stumbles over. “I-I ex...” He is searching for
the word “excommunicate”. “Banish you! Be gone!”
“This man is an imposter!”
“This man is an imposter!” Vlad points to the priest.
“Hey, hey, that’s our priest you’re talkin’ about.” The drunk with hemorrhoids says.
Some of more sober men stand up (who, incidentally, are also the biggest, scariest
looking men). I hook Vlad’s arm.
“Well we should be going, important papal business. Have to be on the other side
of the country for a service. Thanks again. Bless everyone.” I drag Vlad out and hurl
him into the passenger’s seat. Several of the men follow behind us, reined by the
small priest. We swerve out of the parking lot. They curse and throw their empties.
One of the bottles tears through our cellophane sanctuary. I’m lurching through the
dark, under the star-spattered sky, praying to God they didn’t get in their trucks.
(c) 2008 by Ravi Mangla