The Price of Gas
"Gas is at two-thirteen at the Speedway," she commented as they drove past.
"Huh. Not bad. We'll have to fill up on the way back." He grinned a bit. "I remember when two bucks was a bad price for gas."
"I remember when one dollar a gallon was too much. At least for my mom. There was this one place in town where it was like 89 cents, and she'd only fill up there." She nodded mock-gravely. "It was an Arco."
"Good to know."
"Yep, very important fact there." Idly she rolled her window down a bit. "Of course, then at some point the price started going up -- I don't remember when, sometime in the middleish 90s -- and I think the one cheap Arco went out of business or something, and then mom just basically gassed up wherever looked cheap at the moment. Dad freaked out about the raised prices, though."
He glanced at her. "Your dad was kind of prone to freakouts, wasn't he."
"You could say that. I remember about when it was at $2.75ish -- the first time, if you will, since it isn't like that's such an extraordinary price anymore -- he started going around saying that it would hit five bucks a gallon soon." Her mood dimmed slightly. "He got really angry at mom when she disagreed. They wound up having another one of their fights." Then she shook her head. "I don't even know why I still remember that. It isn't like it matters anymore."
"Well, yeah. You won't have to worry about dealing with him anymore; you're halfway across the country from him now."
"True." She grinned crookedly. "And it wasn't even a bad fight, really. He didn't throw his gun through the window that time, or anything!"
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