a good ten minutes to figure out the GPS. Once we enter the information correctly and don’t have to delete it ten times, we buckle ourselves into the beast and take off. Not so much like a racehorse, but more like a turtle.
I’ve been in Escalades more times than I can count, but always in the back, with media escorts at the wheel. Everything looks a whole lot wider and longer from the driver’s seat. I feel like I’m driving a short bus with touchy gas and brake pedals. I turn corners too wide and at the best of times I am horrible at gauging distance. Three miles always feels like five to me, and ten feet might as well be fifteen. I have a hard time with measurements, too. I don’t know how many centimeters are in an inch, nor do I care. Tony used to tell me he was six inches, but even I knew that wasn’t true.
Yuck. I’d blocked out Tony from my head for quite a while. Now he’s back, thanks to Mom.
“You’re kinking up my neck!” Mom complains.
“It’s called whiplash,” Lindsey piles on.
I do not appreciate her help and momentarily take my eyes off the road to glare at her in the passenger seat. She doesn’t seem to notice.
“Would either of you ladies like to drive?”
“I will,” Mother volunteers.
“I don’t have a driver’s license.”
I look at Lindsey, who shrugs at having left this vital information off her résumé. I’d just assumed that she always took the bus in Seattle because she didn’t own a car. “Since when?”
“Since never. My parents don’t think women should drive.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“No. My dad and brothers have licenses, but Mom and I and my sisters don’t.”
“You could have gotten your license when you moved out.”
She shrugs again. “I only just moved out, and I knew the Spokane bus system like the back of my hand.”
This is all news to me and reminds me of how little I know about Lindsey.
“Turn left in three hundred feet,” the guidance system directs. I turn too soon and end up in an Arby’s parking lot. The soothing female voice tells me to make a U-turn, and I whip the big SUV around.
“You’re kinking my neck,” Mom says again, but I ignore her.
“You have to learn to drive, Lindsey.” I have to work and can’t always chauffeur Mom around or pick up prescriptions.
“I said I don’t have a license. I didn’t say that I don’t know how to drive.”
“Rebel.”
She smiles. “The girls in my family live at home until we get married.”
This explains why she’d accepted a job four hours from her hometown, but it doesn’t tell me why she’d jumped at the offer to move across the country.
“Turn left.” I turn left.
“Earl’s a better driver than you.”
“I know, Mom.”
Mother’s complaint gets a chuckle from the twenty-six-year-old with no license. “I’m the first girl in my family to move out.”
“How many in your family?”
“Counting my parents, nine. I have three older sisters and one younger, and two younger brothers.”
To me, as an only child, that’s a lot of people. Her parents must be insane to want them all to stay at home long after they should be on their own. Then I remind myself that they couldn’t be too bad if they let Lindsey go to college. “You do have a bachelor’s degree from WSU.” Just for good measure, I add, “Right?” because, at this point, I’m not sure of anything.
She nods. “I was supposed to find a husband there like two of my sisters did.”
“Women have a hard enough time finding a good date in college. For God’s sake, how can you be expected to find a good husband?”
“I don’t know. I never did.”
“Turn left in six hundred feet.” I guesstimate the distance and am shocked when I actually get it right. “You know that saying about kissing a lot of toads before you find true love.” I pull to a stop at a red light and step on the brakes only a little too hard. “It’s true, but keep in mind that finding true love isn’t about the pool of toads, but rather about the toads in your pool,” I quote myself. “So, date broadly but be selective, and you’ll find your prince.”
“Why haven’t you found yours?”
God, I hate that question. The answer is that I’ve dated broadly and selectively. That’s one of the big differences between Mom and me. She dated broadly but wasn’t very selective.