Flirting In Cars

by Alisa Kwitney

  The bed went away. So did all thought of the sheets, and laundry, and what might come after. Gone also was any lingering self-consciousness about her body or the wet, fleshy sounds they were making. All consciousness was now bound up in the feeling of Mack’s sinewy body as he moved powerfully inside her, churning her up, conjuring her up out of her flesh. Zoë wrenched her hands free, clutched his back, dug her heels into his muscular buttocks, and cried out.

  Afterward she couldn’t look at him. She buried her head in his chest as he patted her comfortingly, stroking her hair. He didn’t ask her what was wrong. Maybe he was used to making women fall apart.

  Now the sex was all she could think about. The more she touched him, the more she wanted to touch him, the more he seemed to take up residence in her imagination. All through their driving lessons, as she checked her mirrors and signaled before moving out, or reduced speed to navigate a turn, or practiced her three-point turns, she was distracted by what they had done last time, and by what they would do afterward. In bed, her legs over his shoulders. In a chair in the living room, straddling him. Standing in the kitchen, fully dressed, her cheek resting on the counter as he took her from behind. They did it tinged with roughness, shaded with tenderness, broken up with laughter. She had never experienced so many moods of sex with one person before.

  “I have to get some work done,” she said now, unbuttoning her jeans. “It’s almost Thanksgiving, and then Maya will be out of school and I won’t get anything done.”

  “Me, too,” Mack said, pulling off his shirt.

  “Just once, just a quickie today, and then I have to work.”

  “Okay.”

  They fell to the floor together, wrestling like puppies.

  “Ouch.”

  Mack raised himself up on his arms. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m just—don’t stop. Just a little sore.”

  “Let me see what I can do about that.” He moved down between her thighs.

  “You don’t have to…I…”

  There was a knock on the door. “Hello?”

  “Mack, someone’s there.” He popped up, glazed and guilty.

  “One moment please,” she said, straightening her clothes. “Yes,” she said, coming to the door.

  “You have a UPS package,” said the man, peering into the kitchen. He was wearing a brown uniform that matched the truck Zoë could see out the window, parked next to Mack’s Crown Royal. “Oh, hello, Mack.”

  “Hello, Ed.” Mack was standing against the kitchen counter, partially turned away. She wondered how much Ed was taking in.

  Zoë signed for the package, which was from Bronwyn. She wondered if the kitchen smelled of sex. Surely not.

  “Ed used to go to school with me,” said Mack.

  “Pleased to meet you,” said Ed, openly curious. He had a weak chin, a thin brown mustache, and a faint smell of nicotine about his person. “So,” he said to Mack, “what’s new?”

  “Well,” Mack said. He looked at Zoë, as if for permission. She looked away. “You know I’m starting my own driving school.”

  “Yeah, Moroney’s sure burned up about that.”

  Zoë ripped open the box and found that Bronwyn had sent her a bunch of articles. There was a New York Times Magazine essay about a couple who had left Manhattan to open their own goat farm in Dutchess County, and a magazine piece entitled “Beyond Suburbia: The Commutable Wilderness.” There was also a West Side Spirit cover story about the many New Yorkers buying up second homes in the area. “It used to be that middle-class Manhattanites moved out of the city after they had children,” the reporter wrote, “but now many choose to have their city and leave it, too.”

  “Thought you would find this useful for research,” Bronwyn had written. “Seems as if you’re part of a big trend, moving out there. Property values are going way up. The magazine is Brian’s, so don’t throw it out. Miss you terribly. Wish we could spend Thanksgiving together, but am being forced to see the dreaded mother-in-law.” Zoë felt a rush of guilt: she had hardly called Bronwyn in the past three weeks, embarrassed to talk about her affair with Mack while her friend was so miserable.

  “So,” Mack was saying, and his voice sounded tighter than she was used to, “what’s he saying?”

  Ed looked profoundly uncomfortable. He glanced at Zoë, and she thought his little brown button eyes looked shifty. “You know, stupid stuff.”

  “Like what?”

  “Mack, I’m not sure this is the place…” This time, the glance at Zoë was telling.

  “He means that your old boss is talking about me,” said Zoë. “What’s he saying?”

  “Oh, now, I didn’t mean that anyone was talking about you, ma’am.”

  Zoë snorted and watched Ed’s face. “Let me see…he’s bad-mouthing Mack by impugning his professionalism, saying that Mack is taking advantage of me…no, wait, that I’m taking advantage of Mack?”

  “Now, look, I don’t know where all this is coming from,” said Ed, who had clearly never been interviewed by a hostile reporter.

  Mack moved a step closer. “What’s he saying, Ed?”

  “What he’s saying,” said Zoë, “is that I’m paying you for more than just your expertise behind the wheel.” The whole thing seemed so amusing to her that the words were out before she remembered that this had been the subject of their first fight. Funny how that happens, how the place where you’re most sensitive always gets reinjured.

  “I never said that,” said Ed, almost spluttering. “Besides, everyone knows Moroney is full of shit.” He shrugged at Zoë. “Pardon my language, ma’am.”

  “I’m going to kill him,” said Mack.

  “Calm down.”

  “I’m going to kill him!”

  “Look,” said Zoë, “if I’m not that upset, you don’t need to be, either.”

  “It’s me he’s insulting.”

  “Don’t be silly. His point is that the only reason you’d be interested in someone ten years older and not conventionally beautiful was because she was paying you.”

  Mack stared at her as if she’d gone mad. “No way. I think the point is, the only reason an attractive, sophisticated woman with a high-powered career would hang around with a poor, dumb, blue-collar slob was because she was hiring him for services rendered.”

  Zoë laughed. “As in, you’re only good for one thing?”

  “Exactly. And I don’t think it’s funny.”

  “Think about what we both just said.”

  Now Mack laughed. “You’re right,” he said. “It is funny.” He put his arm around her shoulders. “What makes you think you’re not conventionally beautiful?”

  “What makes you think you’re dumb?”

  “Aha, so you do think I’m a poor blue-collar slob.”

  “Yes, but not dumb.”

  Ed, who was clearly sorry he hadn’t just left the package on the porch, cleared his throat. “I’ll just be leaving now,” he said.

  “Yeah, well. You tell that son of a bitch Moroney that if I hear one more word about this rumor, I’m going to forget I ever signed a confidentiality oath.”

  “I don’t even talk to him, Mack.”

  “You just tell him that I don’t care what he says about me, but I don’t appreciate his bad-mouthing my girlfriend.”

  Ed left and Zoë stood there, feeling bemused. “So, I’m your girlfriend, huh?”

  “Well, yeah.” Mack took a deep breath and rolled his shoulders. “Of course. What else would you be?”

  “I don’t know.” She smiled. “It just sounds kind of young.” She tried to remember the last time she’d been called someone’s girlfriend. Ten years ago? More? It sounded like something that belonged to another phase of life, along with ID bracelets and prom dates.

  “So what do I call you, my womanfriend?” Mack wrapped his arms around her. “Hey.”

  “What?”

  “Want to come over to my sister’s for Thanksgiving dinner?”

  She loo
ked at him. “Shouldn’t you ask her first?”

  “Nah, it’s fine. She’d just get bored with old Bill and me.” Although, if he were being completely honest, “boring” wasn’t the right term for the carefully maintained monotony of his sister’s marriage.

  “All right then. Thanks.”

  “What do you want to do now?” Mack looked at the clock. “We only have another half hour before Maya gets home.”

  “I don’t know. I guess we kind of ran out of time.”

  “I guess so.” Mack kissed her, cupping her face in his hands. “Never mind.”

  “We won’t be able to do this when Maya’s home over vacation, you know. Even though she’s sleeping in her own bed more, I just wouldn’t feel comfortable.”

  “That’s all right. We can still hang out, can’t we? I mean, you’ll want some time alone, but we can also do some stuff together, right?”

  “Of course we can.” And Zoë, who had never felt such a fierce sexual pull toward any man, was amazed by how much sex didn’t matter to Mack. It was as if, with all the other men she’d known, there was life, and then there was sex, a thing apart, something you did and then finished, like a meal. With Mack, sex seemed interwoven with everything else, seemed to matter both less and more.

  “I love you, Zoë,” he said, sounding somber.

  She touched the side of his face, amused. “Try not to look so upset about it.”

  It was a good thing they had decided not to wait to have sex until she passed her road test, thought Zoë, because she was beginning to think it wasn’t just a matter of being phobic about driving. Perhaps some people weren’t really meant to operate motor vehicles. It could be a kind of learning disability, directional dyslexia and vehicular gross motor dysfunction. Mack said that was ridiculous, anyone could learn.

  But driving, Zoë decided, was the most unnatural activity she had ever attempted. How the hell did anyone ever remember everything? All of a sudden, after a lifetime of moving your legs to get from one place to another, you had to learn how much pressure to apply to a pedal with the pad of your right foot. Meanwhile, you had to get used to your left foot sitting off to one side, useless as a vestigial nipple. And then there was the steering. None of the chapters in the driver’s manual seemed to cover how far you were supposed to turn the wheel, and Mack kept saying, until the car is pointing where you want it to go. But there was a time factor involved, a coordination of hand and foot that was completely unlike the coordination of dance. And while you were struggling to get the combination of foot push and hand turn synchronized, you still had to pay attention to all the road signs and other cars and miscellaneous unexpected hazards, such as deer and road crews and cyclists who appeared not to realize that a little plastic helmet really didn’t provide all that much protection.

  “Zoë, watch out!” Mack gave a sharp tug on the passenger-side steering wheel, swerving around the cyclist.

  “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.” Zoë turned back. The cyclist was pedaling obliviously along the road leading out of town, his face half-hidden by the hood of his black sweatshirt. “I could have killed him.”

  “You were only going twenty. That’s a trip to the hospital, not the morgue. But you do have to remember to look out for people as well as cars. Now, come on, remember you’re still driving.”

  “Oh, my God. Why isn’t he wearing something bright and reflective?”

  “Because he’s not from Manhattan. Come on, remember to signal before you turn.” Mack guided her into the parking lot behind the liquor store.

  “I nearly hit him!”

  “Nothing happened, that’s why we use dual steering wheels,” said Mack. “Now take a deep breath. Are you okay?”

  “No.” Zoë was shaking, sweat running between her breasts, staining the armpits of her shirt. He reached out his arms and she pushed him away. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “You did fine until we saw the cyclist.”

  “You mean, the one I nearly ran over.”

  “Okay, let’s talk about that. Remember what I said about the car going where your eyes go? So when you saw the cyclist…”

  “I was looking at him because I didn’t want to hit him!”

  “And it’s good to look. Once. But after looking at him, Zoë, you need to think about giving him enough room…”

  “You said never to cross the double yellow line unless I was pulling off the road!”

  “Well, yes, but this was an exception to that rule. That’s why we take lessons, because you can’t learn everything from the rule book.”

  Zoë got out, slamming the car door. “I’ll say.” The driver’s manual didn’t tell you that if you were going the wrong way, you couldn’t just stop when you wanted to stop, or turn when you wanted to turn. It didn’t spell out that you had to look, check, indicate, turn off the windshield wipers, which you kept turning on by mistake when you meant to signal a turn, and then check again because you’d let more than two seconds elapse. By the time you were through with all that, you’d probably missed your turnoff. And could you just turn around? No more than you could reverse the earth’s orbit.

  She walked into the liquor store, wondering if she should just down a quick vodka so Mack wouldn’t expect her to drive back.

  “So,” said Frances, who was dusting a large taxidermy turkey. “How are the driving lessons going?”

  “I don’t think I was meant to drive.”

  “That’s what I always used to say.”

  “No, but I really don’t think I was meant to drive. Before I sit down at the wheel, I feel as though somebody’s tied my intestines into a knot.”

  “At least you don’t throw up,” said Mack, closing the door carefully behind him. “I had one boy who was always puking when he got tense.”

  “At least he didn’t almost kill someone. Nice turkey, Frances. Did you just do that one?”

  “Yeah, he got hit by a horse trailer near my house. I thought he was very appropriate for the season. Speaking of which, do you have somewhere to go for Thanksgiving? Because Gretchen and I would love to have you over.”

  “Oh, thanks, Fran,” said Zoë, feeling a little uncomfortable. “I would have loved to, but I’m already eating with Mack and his sister.”

  “Oh, of course,” said Frances, looking bemused.

  Zoë felt as if she should just post an ad in the local paper: “I’m screwing my driver.” She could feel Gretchen’s speculative look from behind the counter, and knew that she was going to be discussed at length as soon as she left the store.

  Mack, however, seemed not to notice any undercurrents. “You and Gretchen are welcome to join us,” he suggested, bending down to pet the little French bulldog.

  “Oh, we wouldn’t want to intrude,” said Frances, beaming down at her dog.

  “You sure? Might be the perfect opportunity to convince my sister about the evils of development.”

  “Oh, we couldn’t do that, could we, Gretchen?”

  But Gretchen looked as if someone had electrified her. “Of course, if the subject naturally came up after dinner…why don’t you just pick out the wine you want and let it be on us? We’d love to come.”

  “Don’t forget,” said Mack as they left, “the best propaganda sounds almost completely objective.” He winked, and both women waved, looking happy.

  “That was a nice thing to do,” said Zoë as they walked back to the car. “What made you invite them?”

  “I want you to have your friends around you.” Besides, he figured Bill and Moira could use a little more liveliness at the dinner table.

  Were Gretchen and Frances her friends, Zoë wondered. And if not, what would it take for them to become friends? “What about your friends,” she asked. “That guy you work with at the garage.”

  Mack looked surprised. “You’re right. I never thought of him, but I should invite Skeeter.”

  Mack had his hand at the small of her back as they reached the car, and a pretty, blond woman stiffene
d as she saw them. She was standing outside of the Stewart’s shop, wearing the maroon uniform and smoking a cigarette.

  “Hello, Jess,” Mack said, raising his hand.

  She raised her own hand. “Happy Turkey Day,” she said, sounding miserable.

  “You, too. And hey, cut that out.” He indicated the cigarette. “I thought you’d quit.”

  “I did, but you know how it is.”

  Mack waved again, then got into the car.

  “So that was Jess,” Zoë said. “She’s pretty.”

  “So are you.”

  “I’m not angling for a compliment, Mack.”

  “Never said you were.” He drove in silence for a moment. “I’m in deeper with you than I was with her. Just so you know.”

  “Mack, I’m not asking for reassurances or promises. I’m not jealous of your ex-girlfriend. I’m only going to be here until the spring, when the school year ends.”

  “I know that.”

  “You know, if you were to drive back instead of me, we would have a little spare time.”

  “Are you trying to seduce me into cutting your lesson short?”

  “Of course I am. Is it working?”

  “Of course it’s working.”

  He took her in the house and made love to her in the kitchen, from behind. But at the last moment, Mack turned her around and took her into the living room, where they sank down on the rug. He paused, then rearranged her so that she was on top of him. Even though Zoë could feel he was still hard inside her, she knew something was wrong.

  “Zoë.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you love him? Maya’s father.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Who was he?”

  “A photojournalist.”

  “Did he ever see her?”

  “No. He didn’t want to. He was angry. He said he felt forced into something he hadn’t agreed to.”