February 2024 Flash Lit 7 (second gear) - Shift

University Avenue in Berkeley slopes gently upward from the bay to the campus.  There are roughly ten million stoplights from where it leaves Interstate 80 until it ends at Oxford Street.  A long time ago, I was learning to drive a manual transmission car.  The freeway had been no problem because there was no stopping, starting, or changing gears.  Then Rick, my boyfriend at the time, and I arrived in Berkeley.

“Clutch!” Rick said.

 

There was yet another grinding sound and the baby blue 1968 VW Beetle stalled.  Again.

 

I pressed the brake to stop the backward drift of the car.  If this were a dance, I had no left feet.  The clutch made no sense at all.

 

“OK.  Start again,” Rick said, pushing his blond hair back out of his eyes.

 

For him, I would do it.  I was eighteen and in love.

 

The car rumbled back to life and I made it through the intersection when the light turned green.  I managed the shift into second gear and the light ahead went yellow and red.  I panicked and slammed both brake and clutch, but the engine did not stall.

 

Until the light turned green.

 

The cars behind me, headed for class or the Indian grocery or the bookstore or wherever, sometimes honked, sometimes drove around me with stares of disgust.  I crossed San Pablo, which felt like a miracle, only to stall at the next two stoplights.

 

Every grind of gears, every stall made the tears gather in my eyes.  I wasn’t getting any better.

 

When I almost rolled backward into some unsuspecting Volvo (probably automatic), stalled for the zillionth time, I gave up.  I pulled the parking brake, threw open the door, walked around to the passenger side, and told Rick, “You drive this fucking car.”