I’m not asking for a second chance here, I’m asking for a third chance. Another third chance. How was I supposed to see that guy pulling out of his driveway? And why didn’t he stop? You know it takes two to tango, right? Well, I’m just saying, you’re backing out of your driveway, you give a little honk, a little, “Honk! Honk! I’m backing out here!” Nothing.

Come on, you don’t really need brake lights. Hand signals are still perfectly acceptable. Why do you think they make you memorize them in driver’s ed? Because you don’t need brake lights. You don’t need turning signals. You stick your arm out of the window and it’s either up, down, or something else, I think it’s like if you point left, that’s left, if you point right, that’s a right turn, and then if you point down, or … wait, if you make a fist, but downward, then that’s braking.

It doesn’t matter, you can look them up online. But just let me borrow the car one more time. I’ll run some errands for you on the way back. Oooh, sorry, I’m coming back way too late to make a grocery store run. Yeah, I know that Key Food is open twenty-four hours, but, well, I can’t show my face in Key Food anymore. It’s not even the manager so much as it is the deli guy. We had this incident in the parking lot, but I’m telling you, I promise, it wasn’t with your car. It was somebody else’s car. And if that idiot manager would just hand over the surveillance tapes, I’m almost positive, no not almost positive, I’m positive positive that we’d have video proof that it was the deli guy’s fault. He should have been behind the counter anyway, what kind of hours are they keeping? That was like primetime sandwich hour.

But yeah, no Key Food. And I think Stop-and-Shop closes at midnight. Well yeah, I was planning on coming back at three. Well yeah, Trade Fair is open twenty-four hours, but there’s never anybody there at that time of night, you know, you have to walk in the exit, and the deli section isn’t open. Don’t you want cold cuts? It’ll just be easier to do one complete grocery store trip during regular business hours. Come on, just let me have the car, and then let me have it again tomorrow and I’ll do your errands, although I’m just saying … wait.

Wait, I’ll pay for gas for tonight, fine, but I’m not filling her up tomorrow if it’s just a regular run. And get off my case about the receipts, all right? Like if you say you want a pound of turkey, I’ll get you a pound of turkey, don’t worry about how much you think a pound of turkey at Trade Fair costs. Like I’m just saying, if I find it somewhere else for a little less, well … look, you weren’t planning on spending that much money on turkey anyway. It’s like, if you call up a delivery service and the guy says it’s going to be ten dollars, you’re paying ten dollars, right? You don’t have to ask for a receipt, right?

Well, I don’t know, I guess you could ask for a receipt. Well, like for example, if I find a coupon, right? Like if you want something and are willing to pay x amount of dollars, and I find the coupon, that’s my savings. You give money to me, I find coupon, right? Don’t you get it? Like find your own coupon.

Well I don’t have my own car, that’s why I’m here. Come on, mom always told me to share my stuff with you when we were little kids, don’t you think she’d want you to let me borrow the car? And what about those scratches from last month? Didn’t I tell you I’d take care of it? Yeah, well, it’s a similar shade of red. I don’t know why you insisted on buying red anyway, mister flashy over here. You know cops are more than ten times a likely to pull over a red car, right?

And that basically takes care of that first third chance I was talking about earlier. Fourth chance, third chance, whatever, sorry I’m not writing down every number that I ever come in contact with like you do. Do you need a receipt for this conversation? What are you, an accountant? I’m just saying, the cop pulled me over not because of my driving, but because of your fancy-pants red car. Maybe if it were gray, blue even, maybe he would have let it slide.

And nobody drives just the speed limit. And you should have reminded me where you keep the insurance. No, I don’t think it’s an obvious place, the glove compartment. Excuse me for not wanting to snoop around your personal glove compartments. And what if there was something in there that shouldn’t have been, a gun? I have no idea. I don’t know what your position is on weapons, on guns in the car. You’re a good guy and everything, but I don’t really know you. How well should I know you? What kind of a guy gives out a car and doesn’t think, oh yeah, here’s a little something you should know about registration, about insurance.

Just, I’m tired, yes or no, car or no car. No car? Fine. Can I get a ride? No? Well, if I’m in trouble later, will you pick me up? Well can I call you? I don’t know, maybe you’ll be in a better mood later. Just, mom, stay out of this all right? If you’re not going to help me out, just don’t say anything, because I thought at least you’d at least be on my side, it’s totally not fair, remember the time I was playing Nintendo, and I was on the last level of Super Mario World, and he comes down, he’s like, “Mom! I want to play too!” and you were like, “Let your brother play too!” I don’t care if that was twenty years ago! I never got back to that boss level. You could at least tell him to let me borrow his car. Well you don’t have to force him, but you don’t have to side with him either. You could’ve just said nothing. Didn’t you used to say something like that? About not having anything good to say so you don’t say anything? What the hell?