“Hey kid, come downstairs. I've got something to show you.” The voice wafted upstairs as I lay half-dozing on the couch. It was March, and damned if my stepfather was gonna sucker me into shoveling the walks again. “Is it important? I’m kinda tired.”
There was a mix of mystery and maybe a bit of annoyance in the reply. “Well, I got something for you, but if you’re not interested…” Something about the tone got my curiosity aroused and I slowly rolled from the couch and stood up. “All right, hang on, I’ll be right there.” I made my way downstairs and saw my stepfather waiting by the door, with his coat on. Fuck. I thought to myself. I’ve been had. He had that look on his face though. That half smirk like he knew something I didn’t, and I began to panic slightly, hoping all my dirty magazines were still stashed away safely in their spot between the bed and the wall up in my room. He chucked a thumb towards the front door. “Take a peek and tell me what you think.”
OK, now I was really confused. I peered out the half-iced pane of glass and out towards the street. “All I can see is that Pinto out there.”
My stepfather rolled his eyes back with that jeeze this kid is obtuse expression he seemed to get on his face quite often since I had hit puberty. Nobody said I was the sharpest knife in the drawer. “I know it’s late, but Happy Birthday.”
I took another glance outside to get a better view. “Really?” The emotions were mixed. Part of me was thinking Fuck yeah, car! While the other half was wondering Hey, don’t these things explode? and Jeeze, you couldn’t find a Mustang or a Nova, like any other kid from Jersey drives? Another look towards my stepfather and when I saw the keys dangling from his index finger and the original thought won out. “I’ll grab my coat.”
The sidewalks were icy and the wind blasted my face and hands, making them lose sensation almost immediately upon hitting the front steps. But if I had frozen in place at that moment, a passerby stopping to look at the curious new ice sculpture in my front yard would never be able to mistake what my attention was on at that very moment. It was blue, ugly as hell, might send me to the Pearly Gates at the slightest tap of the rear bumper, but dammit…it was mine. I slid behind the wheel and felt the cold cross breeze as the passenger door opened and my old man dropped into the passenger seat. “Fire it up,” he said. A quick turn of the key and the engine began to purr (well, more of a groan).
After waiting a few minutes of waiting for the car to warm up and the windows to defrost, I eased the clutch in, just like he had taught me on his old pickup. Shifting it into first I let out the clutch and started to give her some gas so I could smoothly bring it into traffic and…with a lurch, it stalled. But hey, nobody said that freedom started out smoothly. One more try and the car rolled into the street, and I knew that the world had gotten a little smaller for me.