how I learned to drive
In the very early morning hours of January 3rd, 2006 – two nights after a New Year’s Eve fueled by [B]’s famous “cokestasy,” a night that started at a party thrown by Juanita More(SF’s “premier drag persona”) and ended in the hazy surreality of a medical marijuana distribution (and use) center, a night during which I decided I wanted to hook up with him as I watched him whisk one cute gay boy after another off into the bathroom for a little quickie action; one night after we dropped a reluctant [M] at the airport and then, under the façade of drug acquisition and “O.C.” viewing, I ended up in [B]’s house, in his room, and finally (inevitably) in his bed – I had to get on an airplane to Edmonton, Alberta, way the fuck up north in Canada, for a two-night excursion to my cousin's wedding. [B], or more accurately [B]'s car, was assigned the task of getting me to the airport.
We planned, of course, not to sleep; who sleeps before a 6am flight? No one I know. But not sleeping, of course, requires stimulants - and we were all out, and his usual sources were not responding. I might have given up, napped a little or just lain around and made out, but [B]'s determination knows no bounds, and at 2am or thereabouts he proclaimed, "Ok. We're going to Palo Alto."
"What?"
"To [G]'s. To get coke from him."
"That's crazy. We have to go the airport!"
"We'll be fine. It's not very far. I drive fast." He does, infamously, drive fast. Too fast, it turned out: barely five minutes into the trip, we were accosted by sirens and flashing lights and - "Oh my God, is this really fucking happening?" I said - we were being pulled over. I sat in the car and waited, for what seemed like an hour, the scene unfolding behind me obscured by the searing lights of the police car, while [B] was interrogated by four large gruff cops. Later, he told me about the multiple sobriety tests, about them asking whether he had been using drugs - "No." "Really? You're shaking." "I'm just really hungry, sir." - about in the middle of all of this the cops asking one another about kitchen-remodeling plans ("Yep, seems we're going for the marble countertops after all"). I didn't know what to do and I was sure that disaster, real disaster, had struck; I called [N], who was supposed to be sleeping, and started crying, and she was freaking out too but she tried to calm me and promised to come help us if we got hauled off to jail. I hung up the phone and I waited and wanted to die and finally one of them came over and knocked on my window and I got out of the car.
"Can I see your license, ma'am?" I showed it to him. "Have you been drinking?"
"No." This wasn't entirely accurate - I had been drinking a few hours before - but I was quite sober, and he didn't investigate further. "Ok. Now, he's just over the limit. And we're going to cut him a break, he's very lucky tonight, we're going to let him off without the DUI, just a citation for speeding, because we don't want you to miss your flight."
"Thank you, I have to get to a family wedding, it's very important, I'm meeting my grandmother..." I did my best small/pretty/emotionally vulnerable/responsible/sweet/pitiable performative femininity routine.
"Right. We don't want to mess that up for you. So here's what's going to happen. You're going to drive the car to the airport. And then when you get there he's going to go in with you, get something to eat, wait for your flight, and by then he should have sobered up enough to drive home."
"Ok, thank you." He nodded and he walked over to the other cops, they were looking at papers or filling something out, and [B] and I looked at each other and he put his arms around me and I whispered in his ear, "I don't know how to drive stick!"
"What?"
"I don't know how! I've never driven stick!"
"Well, you're going to have to pretend."
"But..oh my god, what the fuck...we're only like five minutes from your house right? So we just need to get there and then I can call a shuttle to the airport or something." He nodded. The cops came back over to us. "You should feel very lucky," one of them said to him.
"I do, thank you, sir," he said.
"You need to get yourself a new liscense."
"Yes, I know, I'm sorry, my wallet got stolen recently in a bar."
"Hm. Well. Maybe you should stop going to bars." The cop seemed grimly pleased with his clever admonishment. [B] managed to laugh and also to nod, admonished, and to say, "Sir, I should tell you, she isn't very experienced with stick shift."
"That's fine. She just needs to drive the car." I still cannot imagine why this piece of information seemed totally irrelevant to these guys, but it did. I was so freaked out that walking in a straight line was difficult, probably much more so for me than for [B] but I did my best, and I got in the driver's seat and took a breath and I couldn't even figure out how to turn on the car. The cops were behind us, watching us, our car surrounded by the lights from theirs, and I tried to be calm: "I really, really don't know how to do this. You're going to have to explain it to me."
"Ok, put it into neutral..."
"I don't know what that means."
"Push in the clutch..."
"I don't know what that means."
"You really don't know how to do this, do you?"
"I told you! No!"
"Ok. The pedal to the far left? That's the clutch. Push it in, all the way. Now, put the stick..."
"You do that. You move that thing and just tell me what to do with the pedals." So somehow we managed, team-driving, the car clunking and wheezing, to make it out back onto the road, to turn around, to drive towards his house. Or so I thought until I somehow, despite my totally vague sense of directions and surroundings, realized that this was not the way we had come. "Wait, where are we going?"
"To Palo Alto."
"Wha..what the fuck! We're supposed to be going back to your house!"
"Yeah, well, we missed the turn...so we're just going. We really need that cocaine now."
"But..."
"Just drive."
"Jesus. This is fucking insane. I can't drive this thing!"
"You're doing fine. I'll help you. Go left here..."
And there was nothing I could do except follow the directions; it was 3:30am, and I was on the fucking freeway.
I drove. There were, fortunately, almost no other cars on the road, and I went (relatively) slowly and I managed more or less to stay in my lane. I am, you should understand, even when not dealing with a car I have no idea how to operate, a pathetic driver; in high school, when I was taking driver's ed, people I had never spoken to in my life would come up to me in the hallways and say, "Omigod, I heard that you totally can't stay on the road!" I was shaking, my heart was beating extraordinarily fast; it was hard to say whether from terror or exhiliration. Because even though I knew this was one of the stupider things I'd ever done - or because I knew that - it was pretty fucking exciting, too. [B] lit me one cigarette after another and we listened to Jeff Buckley; I sang along, loudly and off-key but not caring, to "Hallelujah." I made him call up [N], who was now half pissed off at our death-driving idiocy and half jealous she wasn't there, and he made her call up Air Canada and inquire about whether I could switch my ticket to a later flight; at this point, even if it was still possible to make it to the airport by 5am, I felt much too invested in the events of the night to leave them behind so soon, not to see things through to some kind of end. (I could, it turned out, very painlessly switch - O Canadians! and their blessedly accomodating tendencies - and I would make it to Edmonton, eventually, at 9pm the next night, twelve hours later than scheduled.)
I drove. [B] tried to get me to drive faster and I did my best. And then there were signs to Palo Alto and I turned off the freeway - he was still telling me, at every step, when to press and release the clutch, when to accelerate; and he was switching gears for me. Somehow, we didn't die. Somehow, we pulled up in front of [G]'s place and we parked the car and got out. I let out a breath - I don't know if I had been breathing at all - and I realized I was shaking so much I could hardly stand up, and I grabbed on to him and he caught me and kissed me and I said, "Wow, we fucking made it." And kissed him some more. And he said, "Let's have DUI sex!"
Which, eventually, is what we did. And did; and did; and I think will always, a little bit, as long as we - if we - continue to have sex at all, do.
(February 2006)
We planned, of course, not to sleep; who sleeps before a 6am flight? No one I know. But not sleeping, of course, requires stimulants - and we were all out, and his usual sources were not responding. I might have given up, napped a little or just lain around and made out, but [B]'s determination knows no bounds, and at 2am or thereabouts he proclaimed, "Ok. We're going to Palo Alto."
"What?"
"To [G]'s. To get coke from him."
"That's crazy. We have to go the airport!"
"We'll be fine. It's not very far. I drive fast." He does, infamously, drive fast. Too fast, it turned out: barely five minutes into the trip, we were accosted by sirens and flashing lights and - "Oh my God, is this really fucking happening?" I said - we were being pulled over. I sat in the car and waited, for what seemed like an hour, the scene unfolding behind me obscured by the searing lights of the police car, while [B] was interrogated by four large gruff cops. Later, he told me about the multiple sobriety tests, about them asking whether he had been using drugs - "No." "Really? You're shaking." "I'm just really hungry, sir." - about in the middle of all of this the cops asking one another about kitchen-remodeling plans ("Yep, seems we're going for the marble countertops after all"). I didn't know what to do and I was sure that disaster, real disaster, had struck; I called [N], who was supposed to be sleeping, and started crying, and she was freaking out too but she tried to calm me and promised to come help us if we got hauled off to jail. I hung up the phone and I waited and wanted to die and finally one of them came over and knocked on my window and I got out of the car.
"Can I see your license, ma'am?" I showed it to him. "Have you been drinking?"
"No." This wasn't entirely accurate - I had been drinking a few hours before - but I was quite sober, and he didn't investigate further. "Ok. Now, he's just over the limit. And we're going to cut him a break, he's very lucky tonight, we're going to let him off without the DUI, just a citation for speeding, because we don't want you to miss your flight."
"Thank you, I have to get to a family wedding, it's very important, I'm meeting my grandmother..." I did my best small/pretty/emotionally vulnerable/responsible/sweet/pitiable performative femininity routine.
"Right. We don't want to mess that up for you. So here's what's going to happen. You're going to drive the car to the airport. And then when you get there he's going to go in with you, get something to eat, wait for your flight, and by then he should have sobered up enough to drive home."
"Ok, thank you." He nodded and he walked over to the other cops, they were looking at papers or filling something out, and [B] and I looked at each other and he put his arms around me and I whispered in his ear, "I don't know how to drive stick!"
"What?"
"I don't know how! I've never driven stick!"
"Well, you're going to have to pretend."
"But..oh my god, what the fuck...we're only like five minutes from your house right? So we just need to get there and then I can call a shuttle to the airport or something." He nodded. The cops came back over to us. "You should feel very lucky," one of them said to him.
"I do, thank you, sir," he said.
"You need to get yourself a new liscense."
"Yes, I know, I'm sorry, my wallet got stolen recently in a bar."
"Hm. Well. Maybe you should stop going to bars." The cop seemed grimly pleased with his clever admonishment. [B] managed to laugh and also to nod, admonished, and to say, "Sir, I should tell you, she isn't very experienced with stick shift."
"That's fine. She just needs to drive the car." I still cannot imagine why this piece of information seemed totally irrelevant to these guys, but it did. I was so freaked out that walking in a straight line was difficult, probably much more so for me than for [B] but I did my best, and I got in the driver's seat and took a breath and I couldn't even figure out how to turn on the car. The cops were behind us, watching us, our car surrounded by the lights from theirs, and I tried to be calm: "I really, really don't know how to do this. You're going to have to explain it to me."
"Ok, put it into neutral..."
"I don't know what that means."
"Push in the clutch..."
"I don't know what that means."
"You really don't know how to do this, do you?"
"I told you! No!"
"Ok. The pedal to the far left? That's the clutch. Push it in, all the way. Now, put the stick..."
"You do that. You move that thing and just tell me what to do with the pedals." So somehow we managed, team-driving, the car clunking and wheezing, to make it out back onto the road, to turn around, to drive towards his house. Or so I thought until I somehow, despite my totally vague sense of directions and surroundings, realized that this was not the way we had come. "Wait, where are we going?"
"To Palo Alto."
"Wha..what the fuck! We're supposed to be going back to your house!"
"Yeah, well, we missed the turn...so we're just going. We really need that cocaine now."
"But..."
"Just drive."
"Jesus. This is fucking insane. I can't drive this thing!"
"You're doing fine. I'll help you. Go left here..."
And there was nothing I could do except follow the directions; it was 3:30am, and I was on the fucking freeway.
I drove. There were, fortunately, almost no other cars on the road, and I went (relatively) slowly and I managed more or less to stay in my lane. I am, you should understand, even when not dealing with a car I have no idea how to operate, a pathetic driver; in high school, when I was taking driver's ed, people I had never spoken to in my life would come up to me in the hallways and say, "Omigod, I heard that you totally can't stay on the road!" I was shaking, my heart was beating extraordinarily fast; it was hard to say whether from terror or exhiliration. Because even though I knew this was one of the stupider things I'd ever done - or because I knew that - it was pretty fucking exciting, too. [B] lit me one cigarette after another and we listened to Jeff Buckley; I sang along, loudly and off-key but not caring, to "Hallelujah." I made him call up [N], who was now half pissed off at our death-driving idiocy and half jealous she wasn't there, and he made her call up Air Canada and inquire about whether I could switch my ticket to a later flight; at this point, even if it was still possible to make it to the airport by 5am, I felt much too invested in the events of the night to leave them behind so soon, not to see things through to some kind of end. (I could, it turned out, very painlessly switch - O Canadians! and their blessedly accomodating tendencies - and I would make it to Edmonton, eventually, at 9pm the next night, twelve hours later than scheduled.)
I drove. [B] tried to get me to drive faster and I did my best. And then there were signs to Palo Alto and I turned off the freeway - he was still telling me, at every step, when to press and release the clutch, when to accelerate; and he was switching gears for me. Somehow, we didn't die. Somehow, we pulled up in front of [G]'s place and we parked the car and got out. I let out a breath - I don't know if I had been breathing at all - and I realized I was shaking so much I could hardly stand up, and I grabbed on to him and he caught me and kissed me and I said, "Wow, we fucking made it." And kissed him some more. And he said, "Let's have DUI sex!"
Which, eventually, is what we did. And did; and did; and I think will always, a little bit, as long as we - if we - continue to have sex at all, do.
(February 2006)
posted by Abigail at 3:21 PM
1 Comments:
Refreshing...this entry was refreshing.
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