Along for the Ride(103)

‘She doesn’t like the stroller?’ asked my mom, who was standing behind me.

‘Usually she loves it. I don’t know what the problem is.’ I bent down, adjusting the straps, but Isby just yelled louder, now kicking her feet for emphasis. I glanced up at my mom. ‘I better just stay here. She’s really unhappy.’

‘Nonsense.’ She gestured for me to move aside, then leaned over, undoing the straps and lifting Isby up. ‘I’ll watch her. You go have fun.’

I did not mean for my expression to be so doubtful. Or shocked. But apparently it was, because she said, ‘Auden. I raised two children. I can be trusted with a newborn for an hour.’

‘Of course you can,’ I said quickly. ‘I just… I hate to leave you with her when she’s like this.’

‘She’s not like anything,’ my mom said, pulling the baby closer to her and patting her back. Weirdly enough, before, when Isby had been googly and cheerful, it was clear she was uncomfortable, but now, amid the screaming, she looked completely at ease. ‘She’s just giving me a piece of her mind.’

‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ I said, raising my voice to be heard above the din.

‘Absolutely. Go.’ She put the baby over her shoulder, still patting. ‘That’s right, that’s right,’ she said, over the shrieking. ‘Tell me everything you have to say.’

I just stood there, watching as she started to pace the kitchen floor, rocking Isby in her arms. As she walked, she fell into a rhythm: step, pat, step, pat. The baby, over her shoulder, looked at me, her face still red, mouth open. But as the space increased between us, she began to quiet down. And down. And down, until all I could hear was my mother’s footsteps. And then something else.

‘Shh, shh,’ she was saying. ‘Everything’s all right.’

Her voice was low. Soft. And with these last words, suddenly familiar in a way it had not been ever before. That voice I thought I’d imagined or conjured: it was her, all along. Not a dream, or a mantra, but a memory. A real one.

Everything’s all right, I thought now, as I bumped over the curb and onto the street. There was no traffic in the neighborhood, and I thought of all those mornings with Maggie, feeling her hand on the back of my seat, her footsteps slapping the pavement as she raced to keep up before giving me one last push – Go! – and I was on my own.

I just kept riding, shooting under streetlights and past mailboxes, the tires whizzing against the pavement. As I turned out of the neighborhood, I had the road to myself, all the way to the single stoplight where it ended at the beach.

It was the light I focused on, solid green, up ahead of me, as I pedaled faster, the fastest yet, my hair blowing back, the spokes of the tires humming. I’d never gone so fast before, and it occurred to me that I should probably be scared, but I wasn’t. On the other side of the light I could see the ocean, big and dark and vast, and I pictured myself hitting the sand and just keeping going, over the dunes and into the waves, the current the only thing strong enough to stop me. I was so immersed in this image, which was amazingly clear in my head, that I didn’t see two things until I was right up on them: the banged-up Toyota truck sitting at the stoplight, and the curb right across from it.

I saw the truck first. Suddenly, it was just there, although I was positive there had been no traffic when I’d looked only seconds earlier. And maybe it was a good thing that I hardly had time to process that it was, in fact, Eli’s truck. Because the next second, the curb presented itself, and it needed my full attention.

I was already zooming past Eli when I realized I had to make a decision: try to brake and turn and hope my crash was a small one, or keep going and try to jump the curb. If anyone else had been in that truck, I probably would have taken the first option. But it wasn’t anyone else, and I knew – even in those dwindling seconds, when I could feel every bit of my blood rushing through my ears – that this was probably the best way to explain to him what I’d tried to that morning at the shop. So I jumped.

It wasn’t like what I’d seen Maggie do that night at the park. Or the tons of bike videos I’d watched over the last few weeks. But it didn’t matter. For me, the feeling of rising up suddenly, suddenly being airborne – the tires spinning into nothing – was amazing. It was like a dream. Or maybe, like waking up from one.

It only lasted a few seconds, and then I was coming down hard, the bike hitting the pavement with a bang beneath me, even as it kept moving forward. I felt the shock all the way from my fingertips to my elbows as I tried to control the handlebars, hanging on for dear life as the tires skidded, trying to fall over sideways. This was the point where I’d always given into the crash, squeezing my eyes shut as the garbage can or bushes came closer, closer, closer. But now, I kept them wide open and just held on, and after a spray of sand, I was somehow back upright, and moving on.

My hands were shaking as I carefully eased on my brake, feeling my pulse thudding in my temple. It was all so clear to me – the fast approach, spotting the curb, and launching up, up, up – and yet at the same time, I could not believe I’d actually done it. In fact, it didn’t even seem real until I circled around, still shaking, and saw Eli, who at some point had pulled over to the curb and gotten out of his truck and was now just standing there, staring at me.

‘Holy crap,’ he said finally. ‘That was awesome.’