I know a lot of you out there aspire to evil. You work at it and you grow in callousness and cruelty. In reality though, nothing is a test of your evil nature like your ability to torture the ones you love. It takes a special kind of professional evil to truly master this.
For the past three months I have been torturing my beautiful and kind wife, and tomorrow my evil plan comes to final fruition.
Come. Let me explain the plan in its fullness so you may join in me in my gleeful cackling:
My wife drives a 1997 or 1998 Dodge Durango. We need something like this for trailers and work around the farmette we inhabit, doubly so since we sold the truck.
A few years ago, I bought myself a new hotness. A snazzy BMW sedan. Since then my wife had a second child (with my help.) The Durango is merely adequate for her needs now, but it’s a terrible car to take on long trips. On the last one we took the BMW, and while it is snazzy and hot, it is also small and cramped and inadequate. So, what we don’t have is a good all around family car.
Since I only drive two miles to work and the Beemer has muchos resale value, I offered to trade it in on a great family vehicle and drive the Durango for my limited usage (I fequently go a month between tanks of gas.)
Now you may be thinking to yourself that this doesn’t sound particularly evil. You may even think it sounds generous. Wait and see. Wait and see.
Anyhow, my wife test drives and researches every single vehicle on the road and has been doing so since August. She looks at Magnum’s Pacificas, Oddyssey, Toyota Siennas, Chevys, Fords, the works.
After lots of research she decides that not only is the brand new Honda Oddysey perfect for her, it is in fact the only car she wants. It is by far superior in terms of features, safety, space, handling, and somehow, it is also kind of cool.
So, in November we test drive the perfectly featured vehicle that she wants. This is the leather with the DVD and Nav System, the fold down seats, the Sun roof, the variable cylinder management that lets it get 30mpg on the highway, the whole nine yards. They offer me an excellent price and an excellent trade-in on my vehicle.
This is where I become evil. I say “Let me think about it for a day or two.” The salesman says “Fine. Take your time, but beware that these cars are very hot what with the new model redesign and all.”
I say “Yeah, yeah, yeah” and we leave.
A few days later I call and say we’ll take the car. Unfortunately it’s been sold. No problem though, they’ll get me another one and it should only take a week.
It turns out that it’s going to take several months. The salesman was right. The cars are ridiculously difficult to get, particularly with the DVD and NAV systems. So, I go back and tell my wife that we can’t get it. Being a fine lady, she doesn’t balme me for not buying the car when I had the chance but she is clearly crestfallen. She keeps talking about it though, and convinces me to order one and wait for it.
The guy tells me that he can guarrantee me one by the end of January, and he’ll try like hell to work a trade and get one by Christmas but he can’t make any promises.
I tell my wife that it will be here by Christmas. This turns out to be a mistake. Try as he might the salesman can’t make a trade. I tell my wife that I made a mistake. The salesman told me he thought he would get one by Christmas, but couldn’t garranty he would so we’ll have to wait for the end of January.
Now my wife knows that I like to play cruel tricks. Many is the time in the past when I’ve told her that I had to disapoint to her, only to come through at the last second with the goods. I do this to be cruel and to enjoy the emotional roller coaster. It is also an evilly guilt free way to torture her. She can’t really get mad since I did come through, right?
So my wife knows I do this all the time. She figures I’m doing this again. I can tell she thinks I’m just trying to torture her, and that there really will be a Honda Oddysey with DVD and NAV waiting under the Christmas tree.
There isn’t.
My confesses that she thought I was just torturing her, and really thought that I would come through. She is crestfallen, and disapointed. I feed off this emotion like a pig at a trough. Best yet, she can’t get mad at me because I told her the truth when I said it wasn’t going to be there
So, the weeks go by. Every week the Honda Salesman calls me and diligently tells me the status of the car. It’s being built. It’s on a boat. It arrived in Canada. It’s on a trailer on it’s way.
My wife also asks me about it once a week. I tell her the salesman is a jerk, and I can’t get in touch with them. I say that when I do get in touch with them they give me the runaround. I tell her that I don’t know when it’s coming, and maybe I should get my deposit back. She’s frustrated that things aren’t progressing.
Meanwhile the dealer is thanking me for my patience. Today he calls and tell me that the van has arrived and I can pick it up tomorrow, and because I was so patient they are going to include some cool accessories for free: all season mats, splashguards, leather wrapped steering wheel, cargo tray. About $300 bucks worth. These people that I’m painting as incompetant villains to my wife are being real sweethearts.
Now, here’s where it gets evil. Literally right after I hang up the phone with the salesguy my wife calls and asks if I hear anything abou the minivan.
“I can’t believe you called and asked,” I say. “That’s an amazing coincidence. I just got off the phone with the salesguy.”
“What did he say?” she asks. Her voice brightening with hope. “Is it here?”
“Well, you’re not going to beleive this” I reply as the full power of the dark side fills my being, “but you know that snowstorm last night? Well, apparently the truck carrying the minivan to deliver it wrecked. It flipped onto it’s side, and your car was smashed.”
“You’re kidding me,” she says.
“That’s what I said.” I reply. “I told the guy that was unbelievable. He offered to show me the insurance report and they even emailed him photos.”
“Is the car ok?”
“It fell like ten feet on it’s side. It is most assuredly not, ok. They can’t sell it now. That’s what the guy told me.” Here, I work for credibility. “I’m not sure I beleive him. I told you I thought these guys were trying to screw us. I bet they really are getting the car, and they just don’t want to follow through on the good deal they gave us so they made up an excuse.”
“Do you really think so?” she asks.
“I don’t know what to think?”
“That’s really disapointing. How long do you think until they can get another one?”
“Well, he said they were backed up for six months but that maybe he could try to get a demo released earlier or something.”
“Six months…” she says like it’s a prison sentence.
“Maybe we should look at something else.”
“Maybe” she says. “Maybe it just wasn’t meant to be.”
Tonight we looked on the internet for reviews of other vehicles. We plan to go car shopping tomorrow night. She just went to bed bitterly disapointed. Nothing lives up to the Oddysey.
Here’s the rest of the plan:
Tomorrow at noon, I go and pick up the minivan. At that time I am going to coerce the salesman into calling my wife and apologizing for the mythical accident. I am going to get him to tell her that he thinks he can get us a replacement by July. This will sink her despair that final crucial degree.
Tomorrow night I drive the car home and hide it in the garage. Hopefully my wife will be lying on the couch in totally inconsolable depression. I will tell her to look on the brightside, that she’s free to shop for a new car, and c’mon let’s go and take a look at the new Kias! She will resist, but I will eventually force her to go with me.
I will say “Why don’t we take my car, since that’s the one we’re going to trade?” and we will grab the kids’ seats from the old Durango and head to the garage.
The moment we open the garage, she will see her brand new minivan, exactly the one she wanted, and I will hand her the key.
I will feed off that moment as she moves from the deepest pit of despair to pure exaltation, and, she can’t get mad at me since I came through!
Mwahahahahahahahahahaha!
P.S. I actually thought about taking her car-shopping all night in her car and then revealing the van to her when we got home, but that seems really tiring to me after surfing the web for three hours with her tonight looking at all these other models. I guess it also wouldn’t be fair to the car salesman, to waste their time like that.
In a perfect world I would find say, a Toyota dealer, who would show my wife a new van. I would tell the Oddysey story to the salesguy and provided he had been properly coached beforehand that he actually makes a lot of sales that way. People can’t get the Oddysey so they end up buying the Toyota. Then he shrugs and says the Toyota is nowhere near as good as the Oddysey but at least you can get it.
Unfortunately, I don’t know any Toyota guys that I think would be willing to do this and have the panache to pull it off without making my wife suspicious.
So that’s that. Admit it. I am the evillest of them all. Am I not?
Gloat, gloat, cackle.
