Alice Bliss - Laura Harrington [57]
“You need me to call somebody? A teacher? Your mom?”
“No!”
He thinks about his own kids, lost to him following his divorce, the look they get in their eyes, the faraway look, the fear, the anger, the tough protective layers they build up around their hopes and their losses.
“Alice—”
She looks at him.
“I’m not the enemy, okay?”
She hesitates, then nods and turns away.
B.D. grinds the Chevy into gear.
“Come and see me tomorrow, okay? Alice?”
“Okay.”
“I mean it.”
B.D. lurches away, tailpipe rattling, looking at Alice in his rearview mirror.
She breaks into a run, and even though she has no idea where to go, she’s suddenly like some sort of homing pigeon, and in short order she finds herself at Uncle Eddie’s garage. He slides out from underneath the 1979 BMW he’s working on.
“Hey, Alice, what are you doing here?”
She looks at her feet. She didn’t think she’d have to explain to Uncle Eddie.
He looks at his watch.
“Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”
“I . . . It’s just . . .”
He grabs a set of keys.
“You want to drive? Take your mind off things?”
“Okay.”
“We could head out to the lake. Back roads. Nice and slow.”
She nods, uncertain of her voice.
“I’ll drive us out to the golf course, then you can take over.”
Eddie leads her around back to the little parking lot behind the garage and opens the passenger door of a restored 1966 Mustang. In the back corner of the lot, Matt’s truck sits up on blocks, covered with a tarp. Alice hesitates. The tarp looks like a shroud. Don’t think like that, runs through her mind. It’s just a truck; it’s just a tarp.
“C’mon, Alice, let’s go.”
She turns back to Uncle Eddie and the Mustang.
“Uncle Eddie, I can’t drive this car.”
“Why not?”
“It’s . . . it’s . . .”
“Spectacular, isn’t it? Hop in.”
The seats are deep, buttery leather.
“Don’t you feel cool just sitting in this car?”
Alice smiles, she almost laughs.
“If I could afford it . . . man, I’d love to have a car like this.”
“Who owns it?”
“Some Kodak CEO. Nice guy. For a CEO. He’s got good taste in cars, at least.”
“How much longer do you get to play with it?”
“We’re done. He’s picking it up tomorrow. Lucky us he’s busy in Washington right now. This is my good-bye drive. And I’m sharing it with you, you lucky girl.”
Uncle Eddie rolls down his window and cranks up the radio.
“Put your window down,” he shouts.
She rolls her window down, sticks her arm out, flaps her hand in the wind. Uncle Eddie fiddles with the dial until he finds the classic oldies station and the Rolling Stones: “Satisfaction.” Perfect. He turns the volume up so loud the floorboards are vibrating under their feet. Uncle Eddie shouts along with the music.
But I try, and I try and I try and I try-y-y . . .
He drums on the steering wheel.
I can’t get no!
More drumming.
No satisfaction!
He looks at her and grins. What can she do? She grins right back.
They change places and moderate the volume just a bit in the parking lot of Silver Lake Golf Course. Alice adjusts the seat and the mirrors under Uncle Eddie’s watchful eye.
“You ready?” he asks.
She nods.
“I figure we’ve had enough practice in parking lots.”
“Only three—!”
“That’s plenty. You’re a natural.”
“I am?”
“Time for the open road, girl.”
As she eases the Mustang out onto Blossom Road, she thinks, thank God there’s no traffic because it sure feels like she is driving down the center of the street.
“A little to the right,” Eddie suggests.
She oversteers onto the verge, and then overcorrects, and finally gets the car centered in the lane. It’s harder than it looks.
“There you go. You’re getting it.”
Alice makes it through six miles of open road, she manages the four-way stop at Lakeshore Boulevard, and Uncle Eddie talks her through the tricky intersection right before they get to the lake.
“Hang a left on Seabreeze. Let’s get some ice cream.”
This is easy, she thinks, until she almost clips the guardrail making her turn into the frozen custard place.
“That was a little close.”
And then she hits the brakes too hard as she pulls into a parking