Stick Shift

(Instructions for driving a manual car)

1. Get in the car and put your seatbelt on.

She parks on the quiet lane down by the church, empty on a Sunday afternoon.  They almost collide, then rear back from each other, as they cross in front of the bonnet. 

“You first.”

“No, you.”

He bends himself in behind the steering wheel and she slides into the passenger seat where he was just a second before. 

“Neat of you to be doing this,” he says.

She busies herself with the belt, clipping it into place.

“No bother,” she says.  “Sure, you’re halfway there already.” 

She runs her thumb along the soft leather of the seat, feels the heat under her where his body was, spreading up her back and and down her thighs.  He fumbles for the lever, cranks the seat back, adjusts the mirrors.  The smell of the sea mixes with the leather in the disturbed air.  She knows it’s just his aftershave, but it’s like he’s brought California beaches with him, and, not for the first time, she imagines him on a surfboard, bare-chested, beautiful.

“Guess so,” he says, and gives the gear stick a shove. “But between this staff of Satan and the whole wrong-side-of-the-road thing, it’s just a whole heap of junk to me right now.”

She’s been awake since seven.  Her little sister insisted on helping her choose what to wear,  lolling on the single bed next to hers, pulling faces at every outfit.  Her sister wanted her to wear a t-shirt with a glittery unicorn across the front, but she settled in the end on jeans and her favourite top, little sprigs of flowers and flower-shaped buttons.  They compromised on sparkly nail polish.  It’s not a date, she repeated to herself in the mirror, carefully applying another layer of mascara. Now she is here in his car with him, she wonders what she was about, ever thinking she could do this.  

“Nice of your parents, though,” she says. “I have to borrow my mum’s car if I want to go anywhere.”

“They kinda had to, you know.”  He checks his reflection in the rearview mirror, dabs at his hair.  “They brought me to this shithole. How else am I going to get around?” His voice is loud in the small space.

They are almost touching in the gap between the seats, and the hairs rise on her arm as though reaching for him.  She pulls away, adjusts her legs, brings her feet in close so that her thighs lift off the seat.  She hates her thighs.  He wiggles the steering wheel, looking for a second like her cousin’s toddler on one of those pointless rides at the shopping centre.  She looks out at the dripping hedges. At least it’s stopped raining. 

“Is it though?” she asks.

“Is it what?”

“A shithole?”

He has the decency to redden, at least.

2. Put the key in the ignition and turn until the engine starts.

He fiddles with the air vents and turns the radio on.  An announcer is going through the death notices.  How hick can you get, she thinks, and snaps the radio off.

“Easier to concentrate,” she says. 

She thumbs the dial of the vents on her side and cool air fans her face. 

“We were all born driving ‘round here,” she says.  “Feels like that, anyhow.”

“Oh, same back home.”

“It’s not a competition,” she says.  But she knows that it is.  The girls in her class have talked about nothing else for weeks, speculating about the new boy.  And now she is here, with New Boy, in a car. 

“Right, give Satan’s staff a wiggle there,” she says.  “Make sure it’s in neutral.”

He looks back at her, slow to react.

“Loose. Not committed to any one gear yet.”

“I know neutral,” he says, and reaches for the gear stick just as she does, their fingers tangling.  She pulls her hand away, feels the bloom of heat on her cheeks. 

“That’s it.  Neutral.  Now, start her up.”

He turns the key.  This, he can do. “Houston, we have lift off!”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” she says.  “We’ve a bit to go yet before we’re flying it.”

“Okay, babe.”

 “Not your babe.” She glances across at him, checking he hasn’t noticed the deepening colour.  He’s not even looking.

3. Put the clutch pedal down with your left foot.

“So, those two pedals to the right you already know about, I’m guessing.”

“Sure.”

“See the third one there on the left? Press that to the floor and put the car in first.”

“OW!”

He pulls his right hand away from the door, sucks at the skinned knuckles.

“You alright?”

He holds out his hand.  Nothing really to see.    

“Yeah, you’ll need to use your left hand there for the gears,” she says. She rests her arm on the passenger door and brings her knuckles to her lips.

He cups his hand over the gear stick. She has to stop herself from reaching out, her fingers aching to trace the dark veins lacing down his tanned arm.  He shoves at the gear stick and the gears protest, metal teeth scraping against metal, an acrid metallic burning smell.

“Motherf—!  Sorry.”

“Go easy, will you.  You have to coax it over.”

Her hand hovers over his, not touching, guiding. She prays that the longing in her chest won’t burst out of her, splash over the leather seats.

“That’s it.  Now do that a few times till you get the feel of it.”

Finally, the gear pops neatly into first.

“Yeah, baby!”

He raises his palm for a high five but she mistimes it and the slap is lame, embarrassing.  She wipes her palms on her jeans when she’s sure he’s not looking.

4. Use your right foot to press down on the accelerator gently to increase the engine’s revs.

“Now, give it a lash,” she says.

“Say what now?”

“Some juice. Some welly.”

He looks back at her blankly. 

“Press down on the accelerator.”

“Why didn’t you say so?”

The needle jumps on the dashboard and the engine complains.

“Come on!”  He bangs the door with his fist.

“Go easy!  She won’t go if you’re mean to her.”

His body slackens over the steering wheel, deflated.

“You have to ease up on the clutch at the same time,” she says.  “Here, like this.”

She raises her right palm out in front of her, her left.  Pushes one forward, the other back.  He holds his hands out and does the same. He is fine-fingered, nails crescent-shaped, clean and even.  She pictures those hands playing a guitar, a fire on the sand as the sun goes down. Maybe a girl with blonde hair and long legs dancing before the flames.  Yeah, definitely a girl.  With perfect thighs.  She sits on her hands, hiding the glittery varnish already beginning to chip.

5. Slowly lift the clutch pedal until it starts to vibrate gently (the bite point).

“Right.  Go again.”

She watches his legs move up and down, brown skin rising and dipping below the rip in his jeans.

“Now, feel that,” she says. The hum of the engine reaches deep inside her.  “That’s what you’re looking for every time.”

6. Release the handbrake and the car should start to move slowly.

They both lean towards the dash, willing the car forward. Nothing happens.

“Stupid heap of shit!  I’m doing the whole up-down with my feet but nothing gives.”

“My fault,” she says.  “I’m an eejit.  Forgot to tell you to release the handbrake.”

He pops the button and eases the brake down.

“That’s it, now go again with the feet.”

7. Increase the revs, raising your foot off the clutch, until you’re using only the accelerator.

He gets the car into first gear, grips the steering wheel, works his legs. The movements are clumsy, somehow too much and too little at the same time. She is thrown forward, then back, then forward. He flings an arm across her reflexively, protecting her.  The car judders, stops.  He yanks his arm away.

“Sorry.  I didn’t mean—-.  I just wanted—”

“You’re grand,” she says.  “It always hops like that until you get the hang of it.  Try again.”             Her fingers slip between the flower buttons, tracing the line where his arm touched her.  She might actually die of yearning here in the car beside him.

He mutters the steps to himself: neutral, handbrake, clutch.  The sea smell is cut through now with something earthier.  He reaches up to the mirror, uselessly nudging it away and then back into place, and there’s a blot of damp under his arm.  He jiggles the gearstick and turns the key, works his legs. The car stutters, then he finds the bite.

They glide forward.

“Steady, now,” she says.  “Steady.” 

She wonders if it’s possible to snap a chunk out of the steering wheel. 

“You could loosen your grip there any time you feel like it.” 

He says nothing but his fingers soften.

8. If you’re too quick lifting your foot off the clutch the car will stall.

“Better,” she says.  “Now move her into second gear.”

He takes his eyes off the road, studying the gear stick, looking for second. The car drifts towards the hedge, a squeal of briars digging into the paintwork. She lunges at the steering wheel, overcorrects, and the car skids across the faded white line in the middle of the road.  Hands everywhere, his covering hers on the wheel, hers making a grab for the handbrake.  They lurch to a stop.

“What the f—!”

“Sorry, seemed like you weren’t in control there for a second.”

9. If you stall, apply the brakes, turn the engine off, return to neutral, and begin again.

He sighs and sits back, unclips his belt.  “I can’t,” he says, reaching for the door.  “It’s too much to remember.”

“Ease off on the drama, would you?  You can’t give up so easy.”

He works his thumb into the hole in his jeans, worrying at the lines of thread.

“It was so much easier back home.”

The engine ticks in the quiet between them.

“Do you miss it?” she asks, and thinks she might actually burn through the car floor with the stupidity of the question. 

“Yeah, I miss it,” he says, simply.

 Their breath is beginning to cloud the windscreen.  She cracks her window open and the smell of peat swirls between them. In the distance, a tractor starts up, makes lumpy progress across a ploughed field.

“Will we give it another go?” she asks.

The rip in his jeans is bigger now, the tanned skin exposed.  She imagines what it would be like to trace the softness through the hole in the fabric. She knows with sudden certainty that it will happen.  Not today, but soon. That they will be together, this boy and her. That he wants her as much as she wants him.  

“Come on,” she says.  “You’ll be grand.  Start again.”

He slides the belt back across, finds the slot for the buckle.  Straightens, faces forward, resets. 

“Okay,” he says. “Here we go. Keys, handbrake, feet, coax.”

He goes through the steps and the manoeuvre is straight out of an instruction manual. Smooth, flawless.  He glances over at her, grins. She grins back.         

The car slides forward.

“There you are,” she says.  “Now, we have lift off.”