Day 244 - Uhaul

 Uhaul

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Back at the height the great recession, whenever that was, Danny had spent six months living in the back of his grandmother’s van. He had a job. He just couldn’t afford the rent. After six months, he met a girl named Martha who was squatting in a rental house. She was under the impression that she couldn’t be evicted because the state government had passed some housing law to protect people. She was wrong, but had been lucky so far. Danny spent four months with her in that house, purely platonic, but it was enough time to build a certain comradery. They went from strangers to besties in a matter of weeks. Shared experience and all that. Danny was pretty sure he had made a friend for life.

Weeks later, the eviction notice came. Then one day the Sheriffs were at the door. And so, it was back to the back of the van, but this time Martha came with him. It wasn’t supposed to turn out like that, but of course it did. Proximity and familiarity breed romance. Three months of bliss followed and another three weeks of arguments followed that. Cramped proximity bred resentment and anger.

They say history doesn’t really repeat, but it rhymes. No one who lived in a van for the better part of a year would expect to be homeless again. But life does have that sort of sense of humor. Danny lost his job when the pandemic shut things down. Ten years older, but much the same, he had little savings. He had bought a used Uhaul van and had been using in as a side gig hauling people’s junk to the county dump. All of the sudden his van became his home and his side gig was his only gig, except people didn’t really have a lot of spare money to pay people to haul junk away.

When he bought the van, he had painted over the logo, but all he had was house paint.  The logo was still legible. Parking restrictions had tightened in the past decade and now he was having more and more trouble finding places to spend the night.

Danny mind often drifted back to Martha and the nights they spent together in the back of van. He wondered where she was now and if things had worked out for her. He had no way to find her and didn’t know what he’d say if he did. He couldn’t even remember her last name. But he had nothing but fond memories.

One night someone threw a rock through his window. The climbed into the front seat and began digging through the glove box. Danny sat up in the back and screamed bloody murder. They were shocked and tripped and fell out the front door.

Maybe they were homeless too. Or maybe they say the van and saw the logo and thought it might be full of something they could sell. Either way it was a miserable time after that. Danny had no money to replace the window and the night air was growing cold.  Danny’s options were few and far between. He hoped Martha was faring better.