can do it.
Aloha agonized.
—What if I wreck?
—Nobody’ll notice the dents in this car. Look, dear, you drove an aircraft today. Just goddamn do it.
—I want to go there badly, Aloha admitted. “Fuck it,” she said. She climbed in careful to protect her dress.
She pulled the gear into neutral even before she started the car, knowing this was safer. Once she had the car started, she went to the far right, past the H layout of first through fourth gears.
The damn thing wouldn’t go into reverse. She stamped on the clutch and jammed the shifter to the right in every combination. No reverse. She put it in first and let up on the clutch and the car lurched forward, banging into the garbage cans in front of her which in turn saved the front of the garage wall. And the VW Bug chugged and stalled.
She got it going again and still no reverse.
“Goddamn it!” Aloha got out of the car and pushed it backwards. Once it got rolling good she jumped in a tried to steer it but the car rammed into the mailbox and the edge of the driveway.
“Shit.”
She managed to shift into first gear and jumped forward, stood on the brake while still in first and the car stalled immediately.
—This ain’t going very well, she observed drily.
—Why me, Lord? said Bonnie.
Aloha got out again and straightened the mailbox, climbed back into the front seat. “Oops.” She got back out and went and pulled down the garage door.
Finally back in the driver’s seat, she started the car smoothly this time, clutch in, shifted into first, chugged a little going into second, and wound the engine too high with too many RPM’s, a term she’d just learned today, missed the shift to third and hit fourth anyway. She looked up in time to swerve away from a yellow and white ’57 Chevy.
—Lights! screamed Bonnie.
“Oops. There.”
She approached her first stop sign timidly. She killed the car, restarted it and lurched into the intersection, narrowly missing a kid on a bike.
She knew Tallahassee’s street layout well, so she headed for North Monroe on all the back streets. “Just as a public service, you understand,” she alibied aloud.
—Thank God, said Bonnie, her seeming voice strangled.
The worst was the heavy Saturday night traffic on North Monroe. She drove a couple of stumbling blocks in the slow lane.
Thankfully, it was cool enough to keep her from perspiring.
Aloha Blaze swerved into the Silver Slipper parking lot with relief. She even had enough sense to circle, and then park in a space pointing out so she wouldn’t have to push the damn car out again.
And that’s when she realized. She remembered her parents depressing the shifter on the far right of the H to get into reverse. She tried that thing.
“I’ll be dipped in sh—”
—Aloha! Bonnie interrupted. Time to start being a lady.
“Here we are and I feel ragged as hell,” Aloha said.
—You’re running out of time.
“But,” Aloha went on. “Not one crash, and we are here.”
She checked her fancy watch. It was pushing eight. Well, whatever happened would. She was frazzled from the driving experience, but elation started within her that she’d actually driven and done so successfully—successfully by her definition.
Plan A: Fight for your man. Down and dirty. It fit her personality and mood right now. Beat them to the restaurant and occupy the reservation and when they showed up, act surprised and confounded and hurt. A nagging thought told her that wasn’t the first class approach. And what would she do if they were already seated? Well, Plan B, of course. Plan B was: To be developed if necessary.
—Just be cool, dear.
—Yeah, sure.
If nothing else, he would know that she cared enough to go through all this trouble for him. Wouldn’t he?
—Maybe, said Bonnie. Men are coarse and disappointing.
She hurried under the awning and into the front door. Before she headed for the reservations clerk, she turned to check her appearance in the door glass. Partially because of her vanity, but mostly worry that her driving travail had disheveled her.
Oh, shit.
Rudd and a woman were walking out of the parking lot coming this way.
Too late!
Quickly, she went to the ladies room and killed a few minutes. She reapplied her lipstick and breathed deeply to calm herself. There was no waiting line so they must be seating reservations pretty well on time.
—What to do? Plan A is no longer operational. Aloha.
—Okay, do Plan B. Bonnie.
—Which is?
—Beats me. Bonnie was dodging.
—Don’t chicken out now, look at all the trouble you’ve gone through to this point.
—Bluster it out. You’re pretty well composed now.
—Got it. Execute Plan B. Confrontation possible, but not part of Plan B. Aloha.
Besides, she realized, the elation at conquering her fear of driving was flowing through her like a tornado. This was a different kind of high.
Aloha Bonnie Blaze marched up to the reservations desk. “Sorry I’m a few minutes late. Reservations for Biggs, please.”
She raced her memory for his name...Mark.
Plastered black hair and horn-rimmed glasses. He checked his list. “I don’t have reservations for Biggs.”
“Eight o’clock.” She looked into the open-dining room she could see. Suppose she conned her way in and they put her in a different room? Or Rudd was in one of the many individual curtained rooms?
“Nothing, ma’am.” He looked at her expectantly.
She fixed him with her glamorous smile. “You are Mark?” At his nod, she went on. “I confirmed these reservations with you a couple of hours ago.”
He squenched his face. “I seem to remember—” He checked his reservations list. “Ah. That was a Mr. R. Six.”
She shook her head emphatically. “No, Raymond Biggs. You confirmed it.”
“I misunderstood, please forgive me.” He was glancing around in the dining room behind him.
