Chapter 3: And While Nobody Was Looking

Continued from Chapter 2

Willie Vance loved smashing the headlights himself. Nothing like a good heavy sledgehammer shattering glass and chrome to help you forget about the lawyers.

“Hey! Turn down that fucking boom box,” he shouted between swings, “What, are you people deaf?” Noise swarmed thick as a sandstorm inside the cinderblock garage that housed Finesse Auto Body.

While Willie took care of the headlights, three mechanics—specialists—prepared a 2001 Ford Taurus for the arrival of Allstate’s claims inspector.
Bernard, the Finesse safety specialist, was taking a crowbar to the driver’s side rearview mirror. Scat, the Finesse cooling system specialist, was on his knees, poking holes in the car’s radiator with the greasy shaft of a Philips-head screwdriver. Chic, shop foreman, had already flattened the Ford’s left forward hubcap and began stomping on the right one. Like Willie always said: These little fender-benders can do a lot more damage than people think.

When the car had been towed in an hour earlier, having had a blowout on Utopia Parkway and sustained a flat tire and bent front rim, Willie asked the owner, a perfectly middle-aged woman with an Eastern European accent, “So, you took pictures at the scene right?”

“Oh God, No. I should have?

Of course, she should have. But of course, they never took pictures. If they did, Willie wouldn’t be in this business. Replacing a bent rim is chump change compared to what you can soak insurance for a whole new front end. And luckily, with these small dings, nobody ever thought to call the police. And no-fault covered it.  And who ever really read those 10-page insurance settlements? Especially when English was their second language, barely.

But occasionally, some eagle-eyed big shot noticed the difference between the damage he brought in and what Finesse eventually billed to insurance. That’s when the fraud lawyers popped up. And that’s when Willie’s attorney, Tony Skelza, stepped in. It paid to stay in touch with friends from the old neighborhood.

“I’m so sorry for the red tape, miss.” Willie spoke to the Ford’s owner like an empathetic emergency room doctor, “But we have everything we need now. Why don’t you go home, have a nice diner, call the grandkids, and let us take care of this for you? You’ll be back on the road before you know it. How about some coffee before you go?”

They never wanted coffee. They just wanted to get out of there. Finesse didn’t even have a coffee machine. Five minutes after the client left, the sledgehammers came out.

When the “prep work” was finished, Willie turned up the boom box. As usual they were listening to 1010 WINS: “All News All The Time.” Willie remembered his brother Malcolm calling it NEWZAK, a mind-numbingly repetitive background-news version of the elevator music, MUZAK. Every once in a while Fatboy came out with something funny.

Right now WINS was doing a little Hollywood filler about this Hedd guy from those sci-fi movies. He was hiding out somewhere. “Rumors about a little R & R,” the newscaster said. “Meanwhile, the Iraqi insurgency…”

As if it wasn’t enough he had to look at this homo’s hairless chest twelve times a day, at every newsstand he passed. He had to listen about him too?

“Hey Scat. How many cars you bet that douche bag’s got?” Willie yelled over from his oil-stained paperwork.

“What do think a Maserati windshield goes for?”