Midnight

"I'm going to say it one more time to make sure it sticks – we are not letting shit pile up like that again. No matter the reason."

"I know, Mid. That's about the fifth time declaring that today for us all to hear," I remind her.

"Well, I think I need to in order to ensure you understand that can never happen again," Midnight laments once again from behind me in the back seat area.

"Oh, well that's a bit different, then!" I exclaim as if I've only now gotten her message. "So, what you're saying is—"

"I'm not going to let you go any further with that comment," Midnight cuts me off with a stern tone. "I can already tell by your sudden interest that you have some combination of stupidity and sarcasm lined up."

"Aww, what if it was a good one?" Starla protests from the passenger seat, turning to view her friend.

No, her little sister. I can't get over Midnight being so open and agreeable to the idea – and sharing it, when it inevitably got brought up. It's undeniably sweet – though I have refrained from bringing it up or using the term out loud myself. I have plenty of other ways to tease Middie.

"I can guarantee whatever would have come from his mouth wouldn't have been worth the time and effort. It rarely is," Midnight remarks.

"So you at least admit once in a while, something brilliant does come out?"

I look in the rearview to find Midnight leering at me for a moment, before closing her eyes and shaking her head. "Where are we headed?" she asks, trying to get things back on track.

"Out in the junkyard to pull parts for our business."

Midnight can't help but sigh in mild dismay at my answer, while Starla reacts the opposite, snorting with amusement even before she turns her head to view Mid's face.

"Hey, you wouldn't let me have my fun, so I had to resort to that low comment," I reason.

"Naturally."

"That sounded kinda sarcastic, Middie."

"Nothing gets by you, does it?"

"Well – don't ask my elementary school soccer team about that. Let's just keep up the facade." After my witty little comment, I put forth the effort to turn my head and see Midnight's reaction for myself rather than the mirror.

Evidently, Midnight expected that out of me, for she waits until my gaze is upon her before rolling her eyes and letting out another long, rather exaggerated sigh of frustration. "This ride has certainly been long enough even without your mouth spitting out awful comments. We after a foreign car all the way in the back of the yard?"

"Nope." I purposely leave my answer barren of information. After all, now that I think of it – it's been a little while since I pushed her buttons. I need my dose of fangs and claws, though perhaps not in the actual physical manner.

"That's it? Just 'nope'?"

Just to make it worse, I nod my head to affirm my position.

"So you don't do just American cars – you have stuff from other countries, too?" Starla asks.

"We have a small collection of them in the very back," Midnight speaks up, changing direction. "I suppose there's still quite a few, but it's a hodgepodge of many different makes comprising multiple countries."

"There's some organization out there," I protest, feeling a bit vulnerable as Midnight's tone begins to shift into something decidedly more derisive as she eyes me once again through the mirror.

"Sure, It's organized well – assuming one squints and tilts his or her head a certain way."

"Yeah, but that's still organization, even if there are a few more steps needed to understand it. But no, we're headed out here for deceased and orphaned American manufacturers."

"Oh, I remember Teddy telling me while working on the Cutlass that Oldsmobile is no longer around – cars like that?" Starla suggests, hopeful in her contribution of a little fact.

"You are right, but I usually try to keep manufacturers that were part of a bigger entity altogether. So Oldsmobile and Pontiac are still kept with the rest of the GM cars, Mercury still lives with the Ford products, Plymouth with Mopar, et cetera. This area is basically little companies that were separate from the Big Three, doing their own thing for a while before disappearing or being bought out – and sometimes, they get bought out, but still happen to exist in part."

"That's oddly specific. I'm guessing it pertains to what you're after," Midnight remarks.

"Yeah, we need some interior trim out of a '64 Rambler American and some gauges out of a '71 AMC Matador."

"Huh. That's two brands I've never heard of – I can't wait to see what their cars look like compared to the... I guess the normal brands I've seen so far," Starla comments.

"I'm a bit hazy on the details, but I think they're both part of the same brand," Midnight hesitantly corrects her.

She shouldn't feel hesitant about that – because she's right. I point a thumb back at Midnight. "That's my girl."

"Wait, that doesn't make sense to me. You said one was a Rambler, and the other was an AMC," Starla politely protests.

"Yeah, it's... complicated," I admit, scratching the back of my head. "Even when they were being sold as Rambler, those cars were under the corporate name of AMC - the American Motors Corporation. It was a merger between Nash and Hudson in the '50s, only part of a plan that was to see them join with a merger between Studebaker and Packard to make a "megacorp" like the Big Three in Detroit. It didn't happen, for a number of reasons."

"'The Big Three in Detroit'? I take it they weren't headquartered there like the others?"

"Nice observation, Starla," I compliment her, glad to hear someone take note of that little detail. I pause a moment while hustling the steering wheel to the right near the end of the main artery.

"They were set up in Kenosha, Wisconsin if I remember right," Midnight chimes in during my lapse of information.

"Yep. Whether they were sold as Ramblers of the later AMCs, all the parts are stamped the same – American Motors."

"That just seems very confusing to me. I still don't quite understand how they are both the same thing," Starla says, shaking her head.

"I think John just likes to hear himself talk, because he really didn't do anything to explain that situation," Midnight agrees with a distinct lack of energy.

"Well, I never said that I could make sense of it. I don't know the complete ins and outs of them, so facts like that are sort of lost to me," I concede. "AMC did their own unique thing for most of their existence – sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn't. Chrysler bought them in the late 1980s solely for the Jeep division, which AMC had acquired in 1969 from what had been a merger between Willys and Kaiser-Frazer in the '50s. There's a lot of misfits no one remembers in the American automotive landscape."

While there is a mix of makes out here in the domestic orphans, they're sorted out into their separate groups; it's not difficult to find the Kenosha cars once we start rolling through and find the largest group out here. By happy coincidence, one of the first vehicles we encounter is on our list – a '71 Matador two-door hardtop in a weary cherry red hue.

"Hey, stop one is already here," I cheer as I tap the brakes and throw the truck into park. Starla leans toward me to get a better view out my window at our target when I point to it. While I don't have a visual on Midnight in the back, I can guarantee she's taking a gander as well.

"I'll be honest with you John – that doesn't look all that unique or out of the ordinary to me," Starla states in an unusually flat tone, retreating back to her own seat.

"Yeah, it's not much of an oddity, but what about behind you?" Midnight suggests.

Both Starla and I turn our heads to look behind us – at Midnight. While I'm confused as to why I should be looking behind at her, Midnight looks disturbed by the sudden attention.

"I was talking about behind as in the opposite way you were gawking previously, you dumbasses," Midnight spouts, pointing her hoof to the passenger side window.

"I only had my head turned to look out the window, not my whole body," I rail back at her. "And Starla was only following my lead, dumbass!"

"Regardless, you're missing my point here," Midnight mutters in disappointment, tapping the passenger side glass in the back with her hoof in hopes of shifting the conversation away from her cock-up.

For now, I cut her a break and look out the window. A tubby compact car greets me, swathed in a fitting shade of disco-era brown paint. Perhaps just as striking as its ungainly shape, the car has enough window glass to make it look more akin to a fishbowl on wheels than human transportation.

"Uh... alright, that's a bizarre-looking vehicle," Starla admits sheepishly, cringing as she speaks.

"When I say AMC made some oddballs, that's what comes to mind. The AMC Pacer was a... polarizing design, to say the least. If the looks weren't weird enough, the initial plans for the power train were pretty out there too – they were going to source rotary engines from GM. That fell through when GM gave up on the rotary engine project, so they got straight sixes and V8s."

I motion for everyone to pile out of the Trailduster as I pop open my door and climb out. I hear the passenger door open and shut as I walk to the back of the truck, but neither mare is anywhere to be seen by the time I pop open the tailgate to hunt for tools. A lean to one side gives me their location – Starla and Midnight have closed in on the abomination we just discussed for a better look.

However, Starla's attention has been grabbed by the compact car sitting next to the Pacer – and she happens to turn her head and spy me as I glance over. "Hey, this green one is pretty weird-looking too – looks like the back end got chopped off. What is it?" she hollers at me, pointing her hoof to the car I can just barely see past the Pacer.

But I know what it is – and Midnight does too, as she casts a look in that direction. I can only imagine the look of disgust on her face.

"It's a Gremlin," Midnight answers her, making her disdain clear just by how she utters the name. "For some godawful reason, John actually likes the look of them."

It's hard to tell whether the look Starla offers me is one of uncertainty of Midnight's statement or concern over my tastes in design. I have to shrug my shoulders and I finish picking out my tools and walk around the side of the truck. "What? I think they're cute. At least both doors are the same size."

That comment gets both mares to glance at each other, then back to me with a hearty helping of skepticism and confusion.

"The passenger door on the Pacer is a couple of inches longer than the driver's side door. Go look if you don't believe me – the gauges are a one-man job anyway."

I can still hear Midnight and Starla murmuring to each other as I make my way to the Matador. I don't even have to open the driver's door to see today is starting out easy – the dashboard has already been disassembled to a fair extent. Not only is the dashpad already removed, but the face has also been stripped down – meaning there isn't much left that holds the gauges in place.

While I hope they work, and it is a bit troubling the backside has seen much more sun than normal, it will be less disappointing since I don't have to do nearly as much work to retrieve them; in fact, only a few minutes and a handful of screws later, my mission is accomplished.

As I climb out of the Matador with my tools and my prize in hand, I'm surprised to find Mid and Star are no longer hanging around the compacts. I glance over to my left to find they have moved further down the line, ogling more of the cars AMC had to offer over the years. They catch sight of me as I start heading toward the truck, and their hoofsteps soon close in on me.

"Damn, did you just rip the gauges right out of the dash? No way it was that simple," Midnight jests at my side.

"Must have needed parts from it before – most of the dash was disassembled," I explain, tipping the gauge cluster in her direction so she can have a look. "What got you two to wander down the line?"

"Curiosity – Starla started looking around and saw one of those Javelins with the massive front fender arches, wanted to get a better look."

"Ah, yeah – the humpster Javelins. I take you remembered enough from the last time you and I encountered one at a car show to relay the info?"

Midnight nods her head, while Starla lets out a giggle. "It really is just a variety show out here, isn't it? Not a lot of duplicates like the other big makes."

"No, there's not much for inventory, and there's a myriad of reasons for that," I remark, setting my haul down in the back of the truck. "American Motors didn't sell near the volume of the Big Three, and even with the sporty cars like the Javelin – they weren't as well-cared for as Camaros and Mustangs tended to be. Back then, they were all just used cars after a few years – if there wasn't an attachment from the owner, the car usually got used and abused, and passed on or sent to the scrap heap. So survival rate isn't good on many of the AMCs."

"I could see why people wouldn't care about the Pacer or Gremlin—"

"Watch it, missy," I interrupt, pointing my finger at Starla even as she smirks at my interruption.

"—but a lot of the others don't really look too outlandish. Were they not very good cars, or was there some other reason they didn't sell much?"

I have to pause a moment and consider Starla's question. There is not a particularly clear-cut explanation on that one, though I realize I'm not being grilled for hard information; still, I'd like to offer a reasonable answer.

"I guess it comes down to brand loyalty and the size of your outfit. GM and Ford, and to a lesser degree, Chrysler – they were all well-known and respected companies by the time American Motors rolled around – even if the entity was merely a merger of existing makes, there's uncertainty on how something like that is going to mesh. And they never had the deep coffers like the Big Three – that's less money for development, dealerships, and advertising. So that combined with misunderstandings on the products they put out, the sharing of parts between models, and even parts from other makes built under license... it starts to seem like a hodge podge, I guess. Does that make sense?"

Starla's nose wrinkles a little even as she tepidly nods her head in agreement. Meanwhile, Midnight emits her own slight chuckle as she turns her head back toward the Pacer and Gremlin.

"Did they get a knack for appearing cheap? It looks like a lot of them share exterior door handles," she comments.

"They did share door handles – same as the Javelins down there and this Matador. Why spend money you don't possess to reinvent something that already works?"

"Point. But I doubt folks see it that way."

"You're right, most of em don't. At the end of the day, AMC hit its stride making smaller cars, and it worked well enough for them in the late fifties to early sixties, and again in the early to late seventies. But they couldn't react to market shifts as quickly with less money, and that bit them in the eighties. By the end, Jeep was the only thing they had any automaker interested in. There were some interesting curiosities like the AMC Eagle, the four-wheel-drive wagon, but that wasn't enough to save them when the Hail Mary move was an alliance with Renault to build... the Alliance."

"I've not done much reading on French cars, but it seems like at least here in the US, they didn't put their best foot forward with products."

"Nope – it was not a good car by any metric. But AMC didn't have much else to work with. Before that, you had the Spirit, which was just a reworked Gremlin, and the Concord, which was a reworked Hornet compact. Nothing really new or groundbreaking. I guess even the seventies compact surge wasn't enough to help them economically, but then again, all the American automakers were struggling against the superior build quality and fuel efficiency from the fresh batch of imports, particularly from Japan. They were the last of the American independents and stayed above water for thirty-some years as an entity, but they died a slow, painful death."

"That's... not an uplifting story. Wow," Starla muses, shaking her head.

"Business is cutthroat, that's the automotive industry for you – innovate, adapt, or get left behind," I say, shrugging my shoulders. "I'm sure it wasn't rosy for the people that still liked AMC, or the workers in the plants suddenly out of a job in 1987."

"Alright, I think that's enough depressing shit out of you for the day," Midnight butts in, saving me lightly with a hip check. "Let's get on to the next car and on with the day."

"Hm. Sounds to me like you got a hot date planned I don't know about."

"Shut up – I want to do at least a little bit of work on the Chrysler tonight," Midnight snaps back. "Starla wants to pitch in a hoof, too."

On cue, Starla nods her head fervently, forcing her braid to flail with the movement as she plasters on a big, pleading smile.

I dart my eyes between them momentarily before settling on Midnight, whose stoic face leaves nothing to offer me. "I don't know – you called both me and Starla a dumbass earlier. I don't think that kind of behavior deserves a reward," I ponder, before glancing at Starla. "I think your little sister owes us both an apology, don't you?"

Starla laughs as Midnight groans in frustration. "I knew you were going to take off and run with that," she whines at me.

"I said it once, Midnight."

"And you like it, don't lie," Starla adds. "The more it gets used, the more natural it will become."

"Okay, Star – he will run with that excuse. Don't give him any fuel."

"You ought to listen to your big sister, she makes a good point."

"Ugh."

Midnight may protest, but that dour face doesn't completely hide the grin she's fighting to keep under wraps...