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Part One: Dennis—Teenage Car-Songs
There's a prologue before the first part and it seems Stephen King has made useless prologues an artform. This prologue only serves to give a bit of backstory for one of the protagonists, Arnie Cunningham (a nerdy gearhead). It also mentions a "love triangle" and since it's told by the best friend in past tense, much like 'Carrie', we can assume the high school horrors have already passed and this guy survives. How many times must I say these kind of flashback narrations eliminate much of the suspense? The guy who's narrating, who's already lived through it so I have no reason to worry about him, is named Dennis. And he can tell this story with certainty because he was there when his scrawny friend, Arnie, first saw Christine. You can probably guess that Christine is the car and that the car is part of the "love triangle" mentioned in the prologue. Nobody Google "guy loves car". Trust me.
The literal object of Arnie's affections is a 1958 Plymouth Fury. The fury part kicks in when his friend tries to talk him out of buying a clunker but it is in vain. The nerdy kid is apparently in love with the car and he's just lucky TLC specials didn't exist back in the late 1970s. The car's old owner, Mr. LeBay, is a seventy year old, racist war vet with a back brace (A French surname paired with rudeness? Color me shocked). After Arnie puts down his deposit, he goes home and he gets into an argument with his parents about it. Now, Arnie's parents are of the "high expectations" type with the mother being particularly controlling. But when Arnie threatens to flunk out, they back down. Narrator Dennis is surprised at this sudden backbone Arnie has grown. I bet that's not the only bone he's grown for Christine. Yeah. Guy humor. I think y'know what I mean.
On their way to work (they're only in high school but work in some kind of construction gig), Arnie finally sort of explains his love-at-first sight reaction to the tin can on wheels. he sees the beauty underneath the ugly, broken car. Symbolism! It would be very touching if the car wasn't evil. It hasn't done anything evil yet, but when Narrator Dennis sits in the driver's seat, he gets some weird vision of the car back when it was shiny and new in the 1950s. As soon as he starts hearing the car talking to him, he gets out pretty quickly. That counts as weird. And everyone knows weird is the precursor to eeeeviiiil. Naturally when Arnie gets in, the clunker doesn't start up. But after some sweet talking and heavy duty stroking (aww yeah), he gets that Plymouth warmed up (I'll bet he does!) and starts rolling along, a cloud of exhaust helpfully marking his path. The old owner is pretty sad to see his junker go but I'm sure he's cheered up by the three hundred cash he got from a kid who'll have to fork over hundreds more just to fix it up to mediocre level.
The rust bucket gets a flat in front of some cranky woman's house and Narrator Dennis leaves to buy a replacement tire for his friend. He takes the time to muse on his senior year and his fears about life beyond. I can sympathize with that. Most teenagers' biggest fears revolve around adulthood and the land beyond. Upon return, Narrator Dennis has to physically restrain the cranky woman's husband from beating up Arnie because he won't move his metallic eyesore. As soon as they get the smoking junk heap to a shady rent-by-hour garage, the garage jockey gets in Arnie's face since he's one of the few people who dislikes young punks more than me. I don't think a skinny, quiet nerd is much trouble to a garage where illegal gambling, smoking, and other crap goes down. Narrator Dennis and me can only feel sorry for Arnie and curse his stupid blind love for Christine the Clunker Queen.
Narrator Dennis takes his friend home but not before letting the nerdy kid have a good long cry with the occasional profanity-laced rant. Whatever makes you feel better about buying a crud-car, kid. Later that night, Dennis has a nightmare about the car and feels nothing but bad feelings for "Christine the Junk Queen" (He said almost the same thing I said before! Great minds think alike.) His parents worry about him, like normal, caring parents do, and his sister brats at him, like normal, younger siblings do. The only thing that's changing in this promising teenager's life is his friend. Arnie is running errands for the garage jockey and working on that car like Narrator Dennis is working on his cheerleader girlfriend. Teenagers and hormones, people. Things go well enough for a few weeks and then Arnie shows up with a black eye.
Of course the school bully is at that illegal garage. Because why should this scrawny kid have any peace with his piece (of crap)? It's the same school bully who likes to pick on Arnie for fun and he's friends with the garage jockey to boot. When the school bully breaks one of Christine's headlights, Arnie attacks with nerdy, spastic fury but he still ends up the worse of the two after the fight. The garage jockey kicks Arnie out of his garage and that damn nerd is more worried about where he'll park his car (his parents refuse to let him bring it home) than what'll happen when the school bully confronts him with back-up. Narrator Dennis brings up all my points but Arnie just gets all dead-eyed, saying he'll do what he can. Someone needs to beat some sense into that kid. Oh wait...
That old racist veteran is dead. Narrator Dennis finds out when he gets the bright idea to store the car in Veteran LeBay's garage. Arnie is probably the most upset out of all the funeral attendants. Even after Veteran LeBay's brother tells Arnie how he called Arnie a sucker for buying that car. Arnie doesn't seem to care. I bet he could insult his Grandma Cunningham and he'd still shrug and ask about the car garage. The brother doesn't seem to care about Arnie's predicament and doesn't want to rent out LeBay's garage. He gives some good advice on getting rid of the car and Narrator Dennis decides to confront the guy, away from Arnie, to get the whole story on the car and the car's former owner.
And it's quite a story. In a rundown motel, we learn how Not-Yet Veteran LeBay and his siblings grew up poor with an alcoholic father. LeBay had anger issues, hurting his younger brother and refusing to back down from his father's beat downs. The angry LeBay only found steady work in the army, fixing cars and other vehicles. Then Army Man LeBay finally saved enough money to buy himself a shiny, sports car; a Plymouth Fury. LeBay loved that car more than his own family. Yes, Christine's former owner was married and he had a daughter. Both of whom died in the cursed car. The daughter choked on a burger in the backseat and the depressed mother committed suicide via exhaust inhalation in the front. Hmm. That's not really all that evil. If the car accidentally rolled over the girl or somehow electrocuted the mother, maybe we'd have something. In any case, after losing his family, Officially Veteran Status LeBay went into seclusion. He lived off his army pension and stowed his beloved car in the garage. Until the day he decided to take it out and put a 'For Sale' sign. Thus that little story within the story ends.
Narrator Dennis gets home and calls Arnie. Apparently that fat, bully-friendly garage jockey kicked out the school bully and offered Arnie a job at his place, cutting his renting rate in half as payment. To what do we owe such a startling flip-flop in attitude? Arnie will not say nor does he care, as long as he has a place to fix up Christine. Narrator Dennis warns his friend to not get involved with any shady shenanigans and Arnie plays dumb. Right. He's only playing dumb. His dad overhears their phone call and does the whole "You know you can tell me anything" routine. Narrator Dennis doesn't want to burden his dad with mere suspicions but his dad confides that his suspicions are right on. The garage jockey is doing more money laundering than a basement in Little Italy. He knows because he worked for the mob boss wannabe and decided he didn't want to go to jail in the unforeseen future. Narrator Dennis is proud of his father. Proud enough to picture him banging his mother without embarrassment. Awww... yeah? Umm. Wow. That Stephen King is quite the wordsmith.
While Arnie goes on vacation with his parents, our dear Narrator heads over to the garage of illicit ickyness and checks on Christine's progress. First impressions show very little improvement. Narrator Dennis notices that a dent he saw on the car before isn't there anymore. Not like buffed out or painted but just gone, like it was never there. Also, the crack in the windshield is slightly smaller and he can't get to the hood because the cars locks are down. Ooohh so spooky. When the fat garage jockey comes to throw his ass out, Narrator Dennis drops his father's name and suddenly he's invited into the office to talk about Arnie's work and the school bully's dismissal. Christine is mentioned and it turns out Veteran LeBay brought the car in to that garage back in the day. The garage jockey promises not to tell Arnie about his friend's little visit. A jealous, suspicious nerd is one of the worst types of nerds there are; right after gamer nerds. (I think that just about lost me any male demographic I had going with my double entendre jokes.)
The narrator of this story is a football player, thus a jock. Nerds and jocks friends? This goes against all the stereotypes Stephen King has taught me about high school. I only mention this because Narrator Dennis' football team get on a losing streak. He blames it on a dream about Christine. I'm over a quarter into this book and I have yet to see anything truly evil or cursed from that car. Just some nervous feelings from an overly friendly jock narrator. If anything, that car has the magical ability to cure Arnie's acne and make him more focused. He actually attracts the attention of a beautiful transfer student named Leigh. About time the third side of this triangle appears. Didn't expect her to be some flawless model for Vogue, judging by the narrator's description. The same narrator who says his friend looks pretty good now that his face cleared up. Still, I have to think that the most beautiful girl in the whole school would go after someone of equal or greater attractiveness. This is like those sitcoms where the fat idiot has a hot wife, and those two haven't even exchanged phone numbers yet.
Forget the possible romance, we're about to have ourselves another familiar high school staple. A school yard fight! Return of the school bully and he has Arnie cornered with a large switchblade. He's bringing a knife to a fistfight, booo! Cheater! And the students feel the same as they chant that he drop the knife and fight fair. Never have I seen more honorable spectators of bloody sport. Arnie takes his chance to step on the bully's foot and when one of the bully's cronies starts to gang up on Arnie, Narrator Dennis delivers a swift kick to the ass. Like the closest thing to butt sex without penetration and nudity. Another crony goes for the narrator's nuts and gives them a vice grip squeeze! This is like S&M fighting right here. A teacher finally arrives to break it up and after being informed of the switchblade, and knowing the bully's track record, the teacher threatens police involvement. The bully leaves, settling on expulsion instead.
Are you ready for some fooootbaaaall? Well too bad. I'm skipping the out-of-town October game and going straight to the first major fight between the two friends. Arnie invited the Beautiful Leigh to the latest football game at one of their rival schools. Narrator Dennis is jealous and wishes she was with him but that's not what the fight is about since the jock Narrator is still a devoted enough friend to be happy for Arnie. The fight is about Christine, and the fact that Arnie found out he went to the garage when Arnie wasn't there. He thinks his concerned, jock friend is on the Cunninghams' side in wanting to control Arnie and talk him out of keeping Christine. Narrator Dennis tries to argue that he's not spying on him and he worries about what he's getting into with the garage jockey, especially with all the unnamed favors he's doing for the fat man. Arnie insists he has it under control and for the moment, the argument dies down. I haven't seen a dead-eyed outcast this obsessed with a Christine since the masked phantom with the voice of an angel.
So, Narrator Dennis keeps dropping hints that his football season would start off bad and get worse (his team won the day that Arnie was there with his new girlfriend). He also mentioned how he wouldn't be there for the end of the season. And now we find out why. After another conversation where he worries for Arnie and Arnie waves it off, Narrator Dennis goes off to play another crappy match against their rivals. During that football match, he gets tackled by three different guys and I don't know what kind flimsy padding they had back in the late 70s but the tackle breaks his legs, his arm, his spine and he's in a coma until Christmas. When he wakes up, he finds his worried family and lots of well wishers plus the news that he'll never play football again. That's one way to get out of a losing season.
Even with all these teenage bombshells, he still manages to think about that damn car. Look, I like tension-building paranoia as much as the next tin-foil wearing loony but we're going into part 2 with more evidence that the car is actually good luck (the first game they scored was when Arnie and his car were there) than it being some creepy Satanmobile. Also, the Narrator laments that he's falling more in love with his buddy's gorgeous honey-haired girlfriend and this reminds of a similar dilemma where the pretty girl who was with the nerd ended up with the amiable jock and the nerd went all evil (The Stand). I didn't care for the girl in that book and I hope Miss Perfect Mary Sue doesn't end up the same.
Part Two: Arnie—Teenage Love-Songs
These parts are quite dash-heavy. Makes me want to pepper in some extra dashes. - – ― ↔ Look my lines are growing! Just like Arnie's love for Christine and his dislike for his parents. The Cunninghams get into an even bigger argument than the one where Arnie first told them he bought a new car. His mother gets called out on her overbearing stubborness and how she always has things her way even at home. It looks like Arnie's daddy is a bit whipped. Arnie tries to offer a compromise of keeping his grades up and getting more money back into his account since he used up nearly half his savings in fixing up the car that's still rusty but running. Arnie's mom refuses and after she gives the oh so dramatic slap and cry, Arnie leaves.
His father is close behind and tries to offer his own compromise. He'll pay for his son to park at the airport (a 30-day pass is 5 bucks! Holy...!) but he has to be more rational about the car obsession. And if he plans to go to an out-of-state college, he'll have his car then, and he'll be away from the controlling fist of his mother. After some reluctance, and more cursing and angry ranting than a drunken sailor in Thailand, Arnie agrees and they park the car at the airport, taking the bus home. Too bad Arnie didn't recognize the airport parking attendant as a friend of his high school bully. And that bully really grates on me with his nickname for Arnie. I'm sure guys love to bust out Carlin's seven dirty words but one of the few words I can't stand on that list is the 'C' word. You know the one (if you're Australian). And boy does this bully like to say it. It's not Stephen King's first use of the word; the 'N' word and the 'F' word get thrown around at least once in every book I've read. I usually ignore it and don't report it out of politeness/prudishness but this is just overusing and annoying me more and more until I'm itching to kick the bully in his 'C' word. No, the other one. You know the one (if you're English... or a rooster wrangler).
Speaking of 'C' words, looks like Christine is ruining the mood up on Lover's Mountain of Relative Isolation and Darkness for Intercourse Purposes. The beautiful, sweet, funny, and apparently virginal Leigh doesn't want to do it in the car because she feels like the car is watching them. She doesn't get as far as implying she doesn't like the car before Arnie gets annoyed. Dude, you've got the holy grail of girlfriends and you're offended she'd rather have sex in a bed than in the back of a death car? He drives her home and Arnie seems to be more like himself when he's not in that car. It took Alluring Leigh proclaiming she loved him for the car nerd to realize, hey, maybe this enthusiasm for the car that popped out of no where is not totally healthy. What's more, he doesn't remember doing half the repairs on the car that seems to be aging backward. He doesn't even remember driving the car back to the airport lot. Christine may be a jealous mistress but she knows how to get your mind of your troubles and she handles beautifully in the winter sleet. This is like the first stage in a relationship with a crazy ex-girlfriend.
Lovely and Lonesome Leigh gets an unexpected visit from a certain jealous car. Lovely Leigh is scared because her cat fight opponent has about two tons on her. Actually, can you really call it a "cat fight" if one of the participants is a mode of transportation? The car does its engine growl and Foxy Leigh gets her claws out, demands that it leave. It does and this non-cat fight is over. Let's see if the school bully can add some excitement. He finally pays a visit to Christine at the airport. And he's brought his buddies, some alcohol and some cocaine. Just a regular, late-70s airport scene. Time to scare that jealous junker a bit. The book stays on the guilty airport attendant but he hears enough bangs and yelling to know that car is getting banged. Hah. There's the usual smashed windows, dented body, and torn up fender. But the steaming cherry on top is the little surprise left on the dashboard and I have to commend Stephen King on his cheeky way of illustrating that without actually saying it. At least not right away. (spoiler alert: they crapped on it!)
Arnie and his mom get into another argument and he flings accusations while she just cries in shock. Getting some background on her has me feeling a bit sorry for the overbearing woman. Damn it , King. Let me hate someone fully. I guess I still have the bully. (Unintended rhyme, woo.) And it looks like Dazzling Leigh visited Dennis in the hospital and told him what happened. No longer Narrator Dennis, since this part isn't in his point of view, the jock who may have a limp for life has feelings for her. She tells him how Arnie is going to school then going to the garage, and then going home to sleep, nothing else. Well, except for the occasional illegal errand he's running for the garage jockey to pay off any equipment and garage fees. The cops were called but Arnie wants to take justice into his own hands. Please do it soon, you car-maniac, we're nearly halfway into the book and the only deaths we got were via flashback.
It's Thanksgiving when Arnie finally visits his friend. Timely! I'm reading this part a day after Thanksgiving. It's like old times with them joking around and eating turkey on Wonder bread. The candles add an extra touch of class and unintended [b]romance. When he brings up the car, the good mood pretty much vanishes. Arnie tries to put on a polite front but he seems cold and distant. There's a moment of recognition and warmth when Dennis asks his friend if he's alright but then it's gone. Because he's apparently turning into Veteran LeBay. Arnie even has himself a back brace like the vet did because he screwed it up working on the car. Dennis asks Arnie to sign his cast and after Arnie leaves, he compares signatures. One from before Arnie's car was totaled and he went crazy, and the recent one. So I guess the angry, old veteran had slightly neater penmanship? I'll be sure to eye any calligraphers with suspicion.
Finally we have our first sign of the cruelty that is Christine. And when you think about it, it's not so much cruelty as it is rightful vengeance. The first of the group of bully cokeheads is targeted around 1 am, after he panhandled some money at a concert. He spots Christine and is shocked she's running since the job they did on her should have put her out of comission. In addition to the smashes and dents, they put sugar and beer and all kinds of crap that cannot be easily fixed in a few holiday weeks. But after the car chases and runs over the jingling panhandler idiot, we finally get a good description of what Dennis and Arnie have suspected. The car can repair itself. All the damage and blood it got from repeatedly running over one of the bully's cronies (and why kill, when you can overkill?) has disappeared in a whacky rewind manner where the dents pop out and the blood spashes off. I'm sorry, evil or not, that car is pretty kickass. It even parks itself back in its garage spot and left behind a tidy thirty dollars in that mangled, loose change piñata.
Arnie's mother is looking older, blaming herself and worried her son is taking drugs. Arnie's father is all aged and loathing his wife, worried his son is a murderer. Arnie himself is worried he's losing it because he doesn't remember fixing up his car and yet it's good as new. He's scared about the panhandler's murder and it doesn't help when he gets a visit from a detective who suspects Arnie is hiding something. Arnie almost tells him the truth but the ghost of the cranky veteran kicks him in the back and has him giving out smooth lies until the detective leaves. Some semblance of the old Arnie is still freaked out by all this and he calls his girlfriend, the Gorgeous Even When Grieving Leigh. He wants to come clean with her but phantom back pains prevent it, for some reason. If he wasn't a weak little chicken, he'd blurt out the truth and damn the back consequences. Couldn't be something that a pack of ice and some Ben-Gay can't fix. They make plans to go out and Arnie seems to be torn between his two ladies. Ones a well-built, classical model that occasionally leaks and the other is a car. Zing!
The little shopping date starts out very nice. They're cutesy and jokey and coupley and then they pick up a hitchhiker. The hitchhiker seems pretty cool but then Arnie acts a different sort of "cool" before making a pit-stop at McDonalds. Hottie Horror Bait Leigh is a bit nervous about being alone with the male hitchhiker. Not to worry, this isn't that kind of horror book. The hitchhiker notices Arnie's sullen demeanor and then feels "bad vibes" and a bad smell from the car. When Arnie comes back, the smell goes away and she starts eating. Then she has the most overly panicked choking fit I've ever read. She nearly blacks out but luckily, the hitchhiker knew the Heimlich Maneuver and after much crying, Delicate Damsel Leigh gives Arnie an ultimatum. It's her or the car. She's convinced it's cursed because of the rotten smell and how the car seems to watch her, plus she nearly died choking in it. Arnie rightly calls her on those stupid sounding excuses. But the less stupid ones are that Arnie knew the Heimlich and he also smelled the stink of evil. He loses his case when he starts to curse at her and drives off. I guess he's taking the "all girls want assholes" theory to heart. Damn. This book is making me all immature with the cursing. Shit, piss, tits- No. I will not succumb. (Suck cum? Hahaha. Oh, damn it.)
After an interlude where nothing exciting happens (Dennis is getting better in his therapy and Exquisitely Enchanting Leigh is doing poorly in school because a killer car haunts her dreams), we get to another big vengeance chapter. The school bully is drunk driving and in low spirits because his ex-school team lost yet another game. Also he keeps having nightmares about Christine. He's got one of his cohorts and an impressionable new kid in his car. Christine starts following them on the snowy mountain roads and she's got a score to settle. The car chase is badass and all but I was hoping she'd pick each member off, one by one. What can I say? I like to savor my vengeance. But for once, Stephen King doesn't gloss over the details, and the leader of the bunch, the school bully who doesn't care for racist jokes but loves him some misogyny, is saved for last. His car does a barrel roll and explodes into flames, which should keep the delinquents trapped inside warm on such a cold, December night. The schoool bully begs for his life and Christine takes her sweet time toying with him. Even with smashed up legs and punctured lungs, the school bully thinks he has a chance of surviving but it's all gone when he sees the ghost of Veteran LeBay. Bye bye, bully.
It should come to the surprise of no one that the fat garage jockey has health problems and has had them for years. He's in his office when he sees Christine's garage stall empty. He gets some heebie jeebies and does some thinking about his life, like all King characters do, and after going to sleep in his office, he wakes up to see the car drive into its stall, all shiny and new with no one at the driver's wheel. Suffice to say he's kinda freaked out. Meanwhile, Arnie is having a lousy day topped off with a near breakdown. He ends up at a pizza shop after some cruising he doesn't remember doing. He calls his dad who tells him that detective came by again to ask about the deaths of those bullies up in the mountains. While many label it drunk driving accident, Arnie is still rattled about it. He then calls and tries to apologize to his girlfriend because God knows he's never going to do any better than her but he fails when he chooses the car over her. He knows something is wrong but he's a junkie for the junker.
The detective meets Arnie at the shop and his suspicions are higher than ever. New evidence shows that a second car was involved in the supposed drunk driving accident and he found the same shade of red paint as Christine's at both scenes of the crime. Arnie gets nervous but as soon as he's touching the car, he's as cool as a cucumber. And he throws around a curse word or two because he's a gear head. Fuck yeah, manliness (... Did I just type the 'F' word?). Guh. The former chess champion genius thinks it's smart to run some drugs for his garage jockey boss when the detective is still suspicious and watchful. After warrants get served and the garage jockey get taken into custody, Arnie gets caught with illegal tax-free cigarettes in New York City. Illegal tax-free cigarettes? Really?? Shit, I'm disappointed on so many levels.
On Christmas Eve, Dennis finally gets released from the hospital and Arnie and his parents go to his aunt's house for Christmas. If this little family outing read awkward it was only because they had to bail him out of jail. The cops were willing to let Arnie go if he gave them information on his garage jockey boss but Arnie won't squeal on the guy who has Christine in his garage clutches. Arnie says that burden of proof is on the cops and he'd likely get away on probation. Looks like he watches as many crime shows as I do. As for Arnie's former girlfriend, she's enjoying Christmas Eve a little less than Arnie. She's the only one who's alone because her parents are off having drinks with a boss or something. How thoughtful. She's all nervous and not just because the snow storm outside is getting worse. I've always liked a White Christmas but I suppose when it starts knocking down decorations and taking down traffic lights, it's a bit too much.
We now return to The New Adventures of Cold Christine already in progress. One last member of the bully's crash crew remains (technically two, if you count the parking attendant at the airport who had enough sense to skip town after the first death). The last man standing is working the gas pumps on Christmas Eve during a blizzard. Christine would be doing this dude a favor by running him over. But that guy was just an appetizer. Time for a fat, greasy, main course called, Will Darnell. Or Arnie's garage jockey boss. This car may have supernatural self-repair powers but it can't seem to make it over a snowbank in one shot. And the grease monkey, with the inhalor and the heart condition, watches like a dumb cow as the car backs up and runs at his house, over and over, until the house wall breaks. The garage jockey tries to call Arnie, and then the police but doesn't get through. He runs upstairs when the car's already inside and practically spinning donuts in his damn living room. The fat garage jockey suffers a heart attack and Christine finishes him off before driving back to his garage. She's the junker of justice, ladies and gentlemen.
Part Three: Christine—Teenage Death-Songs
I like to think the death songs of the 1970s are the emo songs of today. Now in myyyy remaaaains. Are promises that never came. Except this siiiilent raiiiin. To wash away the wooorst of meeee... I can't believe it took me this long to stick a lyric into my recap. And Linkin Park to boot. Oh well. With all the deaths in the love-songs chapter, I have to wonder what's in store for this chapter. The first change I see is that we're back to first person narration with Dennis back in the Narrator's role. I guess he couldn't have narrated the parts about the brutal killings and Arnie going mental while he was in a coma. Anyway, the heavenly host of hotness herself comes over to visit and I bet Narrator Dennis wishes he didn't have all those casts on him.
They have the house to themselves and talk about the car. Sorrowfully Stunning Leigh bursts into tears yet again and Narrator Dennis offers tissues and the arm without a cast. This looks like the third part in the Dennis System. She tells him about the rancid death smell and he tells her about the former car owner's family dying in the car, as well as the different signatures on his casts. Then they kiss. And I can understand. For the first time, I can understand why two characters would betray a nice boy like that. Mainly because he's not the nice boy anymore and hell, he has Christine, so why not let these two pretty people have each other. They could do a killer double date. Maybe go to a drive-in. Let's crank up some emo death metal about betrayal.
Narrator Dennis and Wonderful In Every Way Leigh do some investigating and find out what any ten year old could've figured out halfway into this book; Arnie is turing into Veteran LeBay right down to the handwriting. Something new we find out is that Narrator Dennis' dad likes to make toys. An accountant with a whimsical side? My word! His dad tells him that he's seen Arnie around, looking all aged and haunted. He suspects his son may be growing close to Arnie's ex and just warns him to be careful and not tell Arnie about it. I guess hos replace bros if the bro goes crazy, curmudgeon-style. He calls the secretary of some old War League that Veteran LeBay was part of. They didn't like Veteran LeBay either but they provided the funeral services because he was a member and all. After a story about the malice of LeBay and the strangeness of Christine, Narrator Dennis gets the address of Veteran LeBay's brother.
It's not until the New Year that Narrator Dennis sees his friend again. While spending the new year at his friend's house, Narrator Dennis notices how different Arnie is. More vulgar and old-looking, and drinking like a fish. An alcoholic fish. Arnie doesn't want to go to college, instead planning to be car mechaninc in Florida, and he wants his girlfriend to come with him. Yeah that freaks out our philandering Narrator. Arnie jumps to conclusions that his friend might be after his girlfriend (dude doesn't even realize they've broken up). These conclusions are very much correct but Narrator Dennis is encouraged to lie through his teeth about it. After watching the ball drop, Arnie drives his nervous friend home and Narrator Dennis has the trippiest trip he's ever tripped. The car smells like death and feels alive but outside the car windows. their neighborhood has reverted to its 1950s state and Arnie keeps changing into the rotting corpse of Veteran LeBay. Blame it on the alcohol but Arnie drank twice as much and he's not hallucinating like a novice taking his first bong hit.
A few days after that crazy New Year's, Dennis finds out that the detective investigating Arnie was murdered. A car wreck, and the first official death of the New Years and this chapter, dedicated to death-songs. Let me bust out the party horn blower. After a brief and understandable, "Screw it, I'm out" moment, Narrator Dennis thinks of his family and Precious Baby Girl Leigh's family and what would happen if any of them got Arnie mad. He calls Veteran LeBay's brother, I guess to get the story off his chest and learn of a few more details regarding that angry veteran. Like how he killed two bullies all on his own and may not have done all he could to save his choking daughter and how his wife knew even less about cars than I did, especially not to attach one end of a hose to the exhaust and stick the other end in the driver's seat with her inside. Even though he won't admit it out loud, Veteran LeBay's brother knows Christine is evil and he's fine with Dennis destroying the car once and for all. Good luck there, limpy.
Over the next two weeks or so, Narrator Dennis and Hottie Hot Hot Leigh get cozy. Conspiring on how to destroy your friend/ex's murder-car tends to bring people close. They make out behind a KFC (the sexiest of all the fast food places specializing in chicken) when they're spotted by Arnie. Oh snap. A possessed nerd vs. a jock with a cast on his foot. What's the opposite of a cat fight? A dog fight? A tiger fight? Oh, nevermind. Arnie just screams obscenities and drives off in Christine. *coughpussycough* Once again, teenage hormones has screwed Dennis over. And not in the good way. Getting caught was the kick to the butt they needed to get a plan together. Dennis makes a few phone calls, and it looks like it's all going down at the illicit garage Christine used to be parked at. He calls the prettiest bait this side of Pennsylvania, and they mourn Arnie, talking about how they both loved him in their own way. Okay, I'm just going to say it. Arnie doesn't seem like such a big deal. Pre-eviling, the guy was a pimply, skinny nerd with a stupid, sarcastic sense of humor, obsessive tendencies and a small-wage job. I could throw a rock in any U.S city and hit three guys that match that description - at least. Maybe not all of them with the job part. (Ooh, fiscal recession burn!)
At school, Narrator Dennis cordially invites Arnie to his old boss' garage. He tries to talk to his friend, telling him to fight the spirit of Veteran LeBar possessing him. For a moment, Arnie does but there's still a couple dozen pages left and let's face it, Arnie couldn't win a splash fight in an ocean. That's phase one of the plan. Phase two involves our injured Narrator renting a giant, pink tanker truck named Petunia. What is it with old guys naming their vehicles female names? The book mentions something about this too but we're nearing the end so it's no use bringing it up now. Narrator Dennis meets up with Don't You Wish Your Girlfriend Was Hot Like Leigh and they take the pink truck (which they plan to use to destroy Christine, somehow). He calls Arnie's father to find out if Arnie left. Arnie has in fact gone college touring with his mother. Apparently, everytime Arnie leaves (and has an alibi), the car of death goes on its vengeance run. Arnie's father finally seems to realize this and he wants to know everything. Narrator Dennis promises to tell him after it's all over.
We're on to phase three, hopefully the final phase. They get to the garage and have trouble opening the garage door because it's iced over. Why couldn't this rampage have gone down in the spring? Narrator Dennis manages to fall down and bust his leg all over again; the same leg he needs to use the clutch on the truck. And I have no idea what a clutch is or does but it seems like it's near the break pedal since he's now using a squeegee mop to maneuver it. They wait for Christine. Narrator Dennis pops some pain pills for his aching leg and gets all fuzzy-headed. Because that's exactly the state you want to be in when you're operating heavy machinery and confronting a killer car once and for all. It looks like he may gotten some sexy sex from the sexiest sexpot since Marilyn Monroe's cookware, though he can't quite remember. Those pills are just ruining everything, aren't they? The one time I'm anticipating some nice, pre-battle sexyness and the Narrator can't remember. And I had to read an apocalyptic preggo bang a Texan gas guy about a dozen times like a month ago. Stephen King is a c-word tease.
Big showdown time and right away, Christine has the upper hand. 'Daaaamn Girl' Leigh has opened the garage door to let in the car but nearly gets run over. Using her invisible wings because she's either an angel or a fantastic gymnast (either way, her future boyfriend is luuucky) she jumps up and holds onto some kind of metal tubes that were all around the the garage. Narrator Dennis finally introduces Christine to the pink tanker. Christine meet Petunia. All four and a half tons of her. There's much excitement and some auto terminology about clutches stalling and engines flooding which have me thinking America's Next Top Leigh is gonna join her fellow angels very soon. This is the chapter dedicated to death, after all. (And we know, the friggin' narrator survives). She's frightened and injured and in a daze. She needs some cold water or something to snap her out of it. What's this? Arnie's father is in Christine's passenger seat, dead from carbon monoxide poisoning? Better than cold water, I'd think. The chapter of death claims a second victim!
With her head bleeding, Christine's latest, fine-ass target makes it to the garage office. No matter how many times Narrator Dennis hits the car, it still regenerates. Narrator Dennis uses his bad leg to handle the clutch after his mop snaps in two (stupid, shoddy '70s cleaning products). He finally aims for Christine's gas tank and the red she-demon leaks out before finally sputtering to a stop, as does Dennis. When he wakes up from unconciousness, they do the same smashy, smashy bumper cars bit again, with OMGFMLeigh helping this time. That car is tough. But it seems to be dead the second time. Yeah sure. Either way, that's as much smashing as they can do because the cops and an ambulance arrive and soon Dennis is in the hospital again. Luckily he didn't rebreak his head and luckily, his partner in crime, Ms. America, didn't get any injuries to her perfect, porcelain face. (Since we're near the end, I must admit that coming up with new, crazier ways to describe her prettiness amused me.)
A police officer arrives to get the whole story from our Narrator. He learns that Arnie and his mom died in a car crash. Apparently the ghost of Veteran LeBay flew to the interstate and after a bit of a struggle, crashed the family car. So the entire Cunningham clan is dead. That brings our death tally up to four, not counting Christine (and I think you all know why I'm not counting that crazy bitch). The police officer seems to believe our Narrator's story, largely because he was good friends with the previous detective who died and got too close to the case. Narrator Dennis narrates his tale to his father and finally here in this book.
The epilogue takes place four years after, still narrated by Dennis. He tells us that after two years of dating, Leigh and Dennis grew apart. Damn it, King! Every time I grow invested in a couple... I guess I can understand why. After all the crap they've been through, the bad memories can never really fade. The cop he told his story to took great pleasure it crushing up Christine's mangled wreck into a cube. But we don't know what happened to the cube. Dennis still has dreams about his friend and the car. Then he reads an article that leaves him uneasy. The airport parking attendant who skipped town was killed in California. A car drove straight into the movie theater he worked at. Daaaamn. And there you have it. Christine, the Lean, Mean, Vengeance Machine.
***
Well this was an interesting read. I started out reading this with the impression of an evil car. All those parodies of evil cars came from this menacing Fury-mobile. And yes, the car is a killer but it's also pretty damn cool. It killed off those drinking bullies and it made a man out of Arnie. The real villain was that army veteran, LeBay. I feel like a good exorcism would've solved their problem and then Arnie would've had the wheels and the girl. But then this would be no more than a typical high school melodrama about a guy in love with his best friend's girl. Though, actually that sounds kind of interesting too. With cursing, cars, and old fashioned rock and roll, this book will probably appeal to the guys, the girls, and the secretly possessed machinery. And on that bombshell, I end my post. Thanks for reading!
