I walk into a local mechanic shop that was recommended by several people.

“So what seems to be the problem?”  One guy says behind the desk.  I explain how both of my turn signal lights on the dashboard stay on all the time when I turn on my lights, while the speedometer light and any other lights on the dashboard are off.  Let’s just say I’ve been driving, balancing a flashlight on my steering column, for the past week.

The next day, it is the day before Thanksgiving.  I’m going to be leaving for my parents house in about eight hours.

“Hello, is this Jill?”  A gruff voice says over the cellphone static.

“Yes?”  I ask; I always give my shortened name to people when I don’t feel like spelling it out.

“Yeah ummm we’re going to maybe have to keep it over Thanksgiving, right now we are running that test you told us about?”  He says.  I told him that if my car is left out in the cold then the turn dashboard lights would be messed up; if I waited a bit for the car to warm up and ‘knocked’ on the plastic protecting the meters (speedometer, odometer, etc.), then it would switch eventually.

“I see?  Why over Thanksgiving?”

“Well the dashboard is very complicated…”

“Listen, I need that car today,”  I say evenly, “I am coming to pick it up at 3:30 today, please have it put together by then.”

We hang up shortly afterwards.

I go there, and I am out the checkout.  The woman behind the counter slides the single sheet of paper across the counter.

“Four hundred dollars,”  I read aloud.  It wasn’t a question.

“Yes?”

“For a…two dollar part?  I thought he said he just cleaned the contacts and ‘it worked’?”  I asked, sliding the paper back across to her, “I’m sorry I need to speak to someone about this.”

“Of course,”  The woman says as if this happens a thousand times a day.  She calls over a manager, a larger mechanic with a short and neatly-trimmed beard, it looks like his nails have permanent grime under them.

“What’s wrong?”  He says immediately.

“I’m not going to pay four HUNDRED dollars for this,”  I say.

“Well, we did some extensive tests…”  He starts.

“Extensive tests that included leaving my car out in the cold all night?”  I ask, my eyebrows raised.

“Erm…” He says, looking over his shoulder as if calling someone.

“I think I could’ve done that test for a lot less,” I scoff, “There’s no way I’m paying you guys 400 dollars for you to do it.”

“Aaron!”  He shouts suddenly.  He turns away from me and they have a whispered conversation.  Aaron is nodding a lot, and the big sweaty manager is looking more and more like a tomato.

“We’ll have to change that,”  Tomato says, snatching my bill out from my hand and getting on the computer.

Pretty soon he hands it back.

“She’ll deal with you up there,”  He says gruffly; I’m half expecting him to crack his knuckles and call out the hound dogs.

He doesn’t.

“One hundred dollars please,”  the cashier says before adding, “Wow, what’d you say to change their minds?”

“Here you go,”  I say happily, pretending like I didn’t hear her.

I’m sure they saw the new account and said to each other “let’s tell her that we need to add blinker fluid and rotate her bumpers, she’ll believe us!”

I jerk awake on Sunday morning and look over at my clock.

“3:30AM” it glares at me.

I stick my arm out and wrench the covers loose, Sara looks at me and blinks slowly, half-asleep, too.  I lay back, close my eyes, and wonder why I woke up.  It doesn’t take long before I hear it.   Crying.  Faint at first, but it goes louder and louder until it sounds like a baby is wailing right by my bed.

My eyes snap open, and I look over at Sara, whose ears perk up at the noise and she is staring at the wall behind my bed.  I look over at my clock,  4:12AM.  I must’ve dosed off.  I swing my legs over my bed and stand up, staring at my wall.  The crying sounds like it gets closer and then further away, like someone is carrying the baby around.  I hold my ear up to the wall.  I can hear someone talking, but it sounds far away.

So far, that has happened EVERY.  SINGLE.  NIGHT.  since Sunday.

Last night I wake up at around 2:30AM.

“Pleaseeee let it be just for Halloween, the holidays,”  I say to no one.  I told my coworkers yesterday, and one of them said “What if they just had a baby?”

Oh, God.

I look over at Scrappy, who is sleeping in Sara’s bed.

“Oi, wake up!”  I say, wrenching my arm from underneath the tight grasp of my covers and hitting the bed, Scrappy jerks awake and looks at me as if she would like nothing more than for me to spontaneously burst into flame.

I slump back onto my pillow and groan, listening to the cooing baby sounds coming from my neighbors.  I take the pillow out from under my head and hold it over my face.  I wake up a little while later coughing…suffocating from breathing in the pillowcase.  I shove the pillow off my face and look at my clock: 3:45AM it says.

The crying is at normal volume again, and I can’t put the pillow back over my face unless I want a homicide investigation happening at my apartment within the next few days (”Died of Suffocation, Foulplay?” The headlines will read, I’m sure of it)

I’m considering sleeping on the couch tonight just to get some real sleep.

It’s either that or I go out and buy liquor.