"Ok." Jennie said to the lady on Lisa's GPS. "I can do this. Just like riding a bike."
"Recalculating." the GPS lady replied.
Dammit. She must have missed a turn. Ok. Breathe. She had this under control. She was in the car. Of course, it was a shiny red vintage Ferrari convertible. She didn't even want to think about how much it must be worth. But that was beside the point, right? Because she was going to drive it to the airport without getting a scratch on it. No problem.
So far, so good anyway. She'd managed to remember which pedal was for gas and which one was for braking. See, she told herself. Just like riding a bike.
"In one quarter of a mile, turn left."
Ok. Turn left. Jennie swerved the car into the left lane, and her ears were instantly greeted by the sound of a horn blaring just behind her. Oops. Probably should look next time before switching lanes. Ok. Lesson learned. No problem. No harm done.
She turned left and found herself on the entrance ramp for the 405 freeway. Here's where things got a little dicey. Even when she had a car, she'd never really done much in the way of highway driving. She always took the train whenever she left the city to go home to her parent's house in the suburbs. Now, she felt her hands clench against the steering wheel as she approached the merge and saw the cars zipping by in front of her.
Just stick to the right lane, Jennie told herself. It wasn't like she was a stunt driver in some high-speed movie car chase. Who cared if everyone else was going 80 mph? She would go 40, and everyone could just pass her if they didn't like it. She could do this.
She moved the steering wheel to join the flow of traffic, barely missing the back bumper of the car in front of her. She stepped on the gas to increase her speed as much as she dared.
"I'm going to die..." she chanted to herself. The speedometer crept upward from 25 to 35 mph. "Oh God, I'm going to die."
"Proceed on the current route for ten miles." the GPS lady said.
Ok. Ten miles. That didn't sound like a lot. She could do it. Just don't change lanes. The car behind her was honking. There, it was passing her. Good. No problem. Oh look, the driver was giving her the finger. She pressed her foot a little further on the gas pedal, forcing herself to breathe as her speed climbed past 40 mph.
Just a little farther. So far, she'd managed not to crash. Everything was going smoothly now. She was going fast enough that the cars weren't honking anymore at least. She could handle this. It wasn't that bad.
She longed to look down at the GPS and see how much farther she had to go, but she didn't dare take her eyes off the road. The lady would tell her when it was time to exit, right? Just breathe, she told herself. Breathe and stay in your lane. Everything was fine.
Her shoulders finally started to relax and her fingers unclench, and she mustered up the courage to press the gas pedal a little further. The speedometer was climbing past 45 and approaching 50 mph when she felt the car give lurch. What was it doing? Why was she slowing down? 40, 35, 30... Was she braking? She could swear she was still pressing the gas.
"Go!" she said out loud, pressing the gas pedal all the way to the floor.
It was no use. It was at 25, 20, 15 mph... With no other choice, Jennie pulled the car onto the shoulder and glided to a full stop.
What just happened? Did the engine die? Did she break it somehow? She looked around at the dashboard for any hint of what could be wrong. Oh there - that little yellow light was on. The one shaped like a little gas tank. The one right next to that gauge she'd been ignoring, marked with the letter F and the letter E.
The letter F for "full."
The letter E for "empty."
She bent forward and gently banged her head against the steering wheel as comprehension dawned.
The arrow pointed to E. She was out of gas.
