Back Roads

I was sitting in the front seat of my mom's large, bulky car from the late eighties/early nineties. I was tiny for my age and the seats were extremely roomy. My mother was flying down the back roads and, she was lost. I didn't know how to get there of course because I had never been there. Also, I was still a kid. She handled this predicament like everything else, with anger. She gritted her teeth and spat out curse words and her wide eyes darted back and forth. "Where are those directions?" she snarled. She saw me holding the paper my dad had written on and she tore it from my grasp with a "hmf". She kept muttering and swearing. As I so often did, I tuned out her words believing such unnecessary harshness couldn't be directed towards me. She maintained her reckless driving all while analyzing the directions clutched in her right hand. Even at such a young age I knew she was endangering me with her rage. I rubbed my hands together, staring at the passing trees all while wishing to be able to teleport to another family in another town far from the one she was in.

I withdrew my gaze and stared down at my lap. My shirt was wrinkled and my shorts were dirty. I never remembered to shower or brush my teeth and my mother never reminded me. Nothing in that household made sense to me. While I was still rubbing my hands slowly and forcefully together, I raised my gaze from my bony knees to the dash. I stared at it. It was not the dark blue interior I was so used to seeing but instead it was now a tan color. I turned my head and looked up and saw my mom with her clenched jaw and darting eyes. She was older now. I pulled down the visor and looked at myself, I was older too. I was in my early twenties but socially I might as well have still been a little kid. "Why aren't you helping?" she snapped in my direction. I didn't answer her or offer to do anything; I just ignored her as usual as I stared out the window.

I heard her phone ding and she grabbed her oversized handbag. While still driving she dug her free arm deep into the bag and nonsensically rummaged through it. "Who is texting me?" she growled. I wondered why anyone would want to. "Gah!" she shrieked in frustration. I looked at her, then the gaping bag. Her phone was on the very top, buzzing now from an incoming call. I grabbed the phone and handed it to her. "Tsk," she said as she yanked it from my hand.

"Hello?" she said suddenly in a cheery tone. "Yes, I can't find your place." She put her phone on speaker and continued to hold it in her hand while attempting to drive. I patted the car seat for her to put down her phone. She glared at me and tightened her grip on her phone. The person on the other end kept trying to give her their physical address, but she wouldn't take it. "Well I'm driving, I can't write it down." They said it anyway in an exasperated tone and I hurriedly typed it into my phone and found directions. I silently held my phone up to her to show her I had them. She responded with a scowl that would put anyone else into a panic. I shrugged and returned to the view outside my window. I placed my phone next to her, avoiding her gaze. My annoyance was starting to grow with her.

She suddenly slammed on the brakes in the middle of the road. She grabbed my phone, hers still in her other hand. Instead of using the map already pulled up on my phone she opened up a map on hers. She looked from my phone to hers, back and forth, typing in their address. The tip-tap noise coming from her keyboard seemed to cut the air with each unnecessary button she pushed. Her loud, exasperated sighs were making my body tense and uncomfortable. I looked at the clock on the dash and tried to figure out how long we had been sitting in the middle of the road. I wanted to open the car door and walk away from her.

She tossed my phone back on the seat while trying to figure out her own phone. She kept slapping her arms and hands against her legs muttering, "Who would live in such a place?" I rolled my eyes knowing full well she lived on a back road.

There was honking behind us as I saw a truck coming up from behind us on the road. She started screaming at her rearview mirror, telling them to shut up. The truck slowly passed and stared at her in confusion. She turned her body to face the driver directly to continue yelling at them. I saw them look at me in disbelief then quickly turn their attention back to the road and their own destination. I wished I was in their car.

I heard the voices on the other end of the phone, shouting to get my mother's attention. But it was no use; She was in her own angry, little world.

Finally, a robotic, female voice came over the phone,

giving us the appropriate directions. My mother gave an exaggerated sigh."Finally," she said under her breath. Unlike her, I realized she was still on the call and they could hear everything that was said. I pointed to the phone. "What?" she asked me flatly. I made the phone gesture with my hand and she looked at me in blankly.

"You're still on the call." I said.

Her eyes widened and she licked her lips. My heart tightened for her but I also was secretly glad. Maybe she wouldn't be so… "her" towards me from now on. She slowly reached her hand out to the phone. With one touch she ended the call. She continued staring at the phone then up at me. I looked back at her, staring intently at her face to see her reaction. She jerked her head straight forward, took her foot off the brake, and floored it.

She drove with a newfound craziness, taking each dangerous curve faster than suggested by the signs. Her movements were jerky and I closed my eyes feeling hot tears forming between my lashes.