.

“Dang it, I forgot to call Bridgette!”

“…Who?” I asked, taking my eyes off the road for a second to glance at my mom in the passenger seat. 

“The woman at the dealership. She told me to let them know when we’re on our way.”

My eyes were back to flipping from the windshield to the GPS that was guiding me through the crazy twist of overpasses that made up this part of Milwaukee. They reminded me of scenes in earthquake disaster movies or Godzilla where similar structures came crumbling down to the earth as the ground shook. Just another typical fleeting discomforting thought that my anxiety often gifted me.

We pulled into Armato Ram Dealership of Milwaukee minutes after my mom hung up the phone. It wasn’t much of a warning.

“This is why I told you to give me a heads up when you were on your way,” Bridgette teased with a goodnature wink as she left us at her desk to go grab the vehicle we were looking at. It felt like ages, staring at the glass door, before she pulled into the parking spot with the freshly gassed up Ram Promaster. It was smaller than I was expecting, but my excitement to test drive it didn’t allow me to dwell on it too long.

“Are you sure this is big enough?” my mom asked, as we peered into the sliding side door. That should have been my second clue.

“Tim’s plans looked okay,” I replied, with a shrug. My uncle had sketched out some ideas for the buildout given dimensions we had found online. I walked around to the otherside. Was there always two sliding doors on the ones that I had seen? It didn’t matter, we could build across it, or even have some storage accessible from the outside there. 

It drove like a dream. I was immediately comfortable in it. I didn’t drive it for more than a few blocks before I knew that I wanted it. This was going to be my new home.

I pulled back into the dealership and we gave the van one more look over on the outside before I would go in, fully ready to purchase it — and my eyes glazed over the emblem on the side passenger door.

I almost bought the wrong van.

Promaster City, the smaller, more compact cargo van. I felt like an idiot. No wonder it felt small.

“How’d it go, ladies?” Bridgette asked, as we walked back inside.

“It’s the wrong one.”

 

To be continued…