The March Hare

I think that, if you own and operate a salvage yard, you should take some time to look around and ask yourself, "Does this look like the kind of place where young women are regularly tortured and killed by myself and my staff? If so, what can I do to alleviate that?"

When I finally had my old, trusty '93 Geo Storm towed away last week, I visited a salvage yard that did indeed look like an ideal place for the imprisonment and torture of young women. And an owner who seemed more than up to the job.

For one, the place was in the middle of nowhere. Actually, it was in the middle of somewhere, but it was the most desolate and horrible somewhere I'd ever seen. Dirt road, rusty trailers; the few neighbors scattered around seemed, from the appearance of their dark and crumbly homes, more than up for a little torture if it came to it. If I lived there, I would want to torture someone.

Then there was the man inside the 'office'. Speaking lightly accented English, he first asked me about my business there. Then, as I waited for the tow truck that seemed as though it would never come, he began asking more personal questions. Much more personal questions, such as where he might be able to find me on a weekday. He punctuated all of this by telling me that I was 'a very beautiful woman' or a 'very nice person'. Knowing myself to be neither, I became very afraid.

If I met the guy out on the street, in a well-lit, extremely public place, then I might think he was pushy, or really lonely I might have laughed and said 'no thank you' and gone on my way. But out here, within screaming distance only of those who didn't care if I screamed, I felt trapped. I couldn't leave until the tow truck came, for one. It had forced this man and I into a more intimate situation than I cared for.

Finally the tow truck arrived, and I quickly did a sweep of my car to make sure that absolutely nothing containing my address or phone number remained inside. The salvage yard owner expressed a hope that I would come out to the salvage yard to visit sometime. I said I didn't think that would be happening. And then I escaped.

I mean, really. What about a salvage yard is not scary to begin with? At the best of times? Add a creepy owner, a desolate location, and a tow truck driver who never shows, and you've got a great horror movie. Except that it's been done over and over again. So, come one, you weird little man at the salvage yard, come up with something original!