The Turnoff

I remember lights whooshing by outside the windows. The moon was on the other side of the world at two in the morning and headlights closing in made me flip my rearview mirror up. The driver slammed on his horn even though there were two empty lanes on either side of me, but I still eased my foot down on the pedal. After passing four exits, the car behind me finally turned off and probably went home.

I said I’d call when I got home safely, but I usually forgot so he was probably sleeping anyway. Mom, on the other hand, would be sitting in bed, busy on her laptop, straining her eyes for me even though she had to be up around five to get to work on time.

She called as soon as I got onto the freeway, wondering whether she should leave the backdoor unlocked or wait up for me. I told her to go to sleep and that I’d be home fairly shortly. There were only a couple cars for me to pass every five minutes or so. 

Mom drives ten miles above the limit on main streets but yelled if my speedometer touched 40. She would tell me to shut up and then she’d raise the corner of her mouth when I reminded her of our defensive driving course. "Children grow up to drive like their parents," I'd say, and she'd hit the break for the red light just a block ahead.

Aaron always drove for me. Even when his license was temporarily suspended, I put my keys in his hand and slid in the passenger seat. He had three more years of driving than I did. Because of that, and because he gave me performance anxiety when I did get behind the wheel, I would just recline my seat and put my feet up on the dashboard.

Driving myself home at the end of the day gave me privacy to scream along to songs Mom thought sounded like the Devil. Ironically enough, when I got the time to myself, I switched to the CDs that kept my eyes gaping through the windshield, and with no heart to sing along. My arms stiff, and my knuckles white, I sped around the turn, letting the music take the wheel and steer.

Orange signs and blinking arrows warned me that a construction zone was up ahead, but the road was empty. I didn’t look to see if any of the workers stared when I went by. They probably just wanted to finish up so that they could get home already. No matter how strictly signs claimed to enforce the lowered speed, I never seemed to get noticed.

Driving at night reminded me of cruising with the upperclassmen in college, especially when there was nothing to be seen on either side of the road. My friends didn’t mind when I sat quietly on the hump in the backseat. They left me to my thoughts and gave encouragement when I found the will to speak. I once piped up and joked that I would drop out just so that I could have my own car. When I did, I told everyone that college simply wasn’t what I needed at the time.

Only a couple of people at school supported my decision to leave, though I’m not sure how my therapist felt about it. In his last semester of grad school, he was the only psychologist I knew that got me to tell the wholehearted truth, that every day was a steep hill to drive over. BeforeI left, he gave me his personal email address, his cellphone number, and a hug. Just for whatever. He crossed my mind that night.

It was the last day I promised to drive safely. After months of priding myself on honesty, it panged when false words skidded out of my mouth. I wish I could’ve gone in reverse, or at least slowed down. That’s how I was, though. My words were burnt rubber. They became the tread marks that Aaron joked about when he said, “Oh look, someone decided to turn off just right there.” They crashed through the guardrail, but didn’t deploy the airbags to keep from smashing against the steering wheel. They spun in the air and landed upside-down on unsuspecting ears. They leaked and smelled like anti-freeze.

They honked the horn until the paramedics arrived to provide a pronouncement.

Reviews

[Laura Lynn]

I like how you write. It is practical and includes a life experience I wish I myself could pace myself to write so patiently like this. People have these hardships, I mean the narrator makes approaches decisions with a quiet manner and has the calm spirit to be able to reconcile past events with current events. Looking back and seeing why one made such decisions and a balanced type of regret so on and so forth

[Tinker Kid]

Nice style of writing, the ending made the story too. The humor is somewhat dark but the story is light and smooth. Good job.

[roarke]

original analogy, life and driving. Loose and schizophrenic ....the dark humor at the end made a plausible ending for this write. Cerebral mind stuff, always meat for the grinder. I'm putting my arm out to make a turn off.