The Driving Instructor
"She's forty-two, divorced, finally learning to drive. He's the Somali instructor who doesn't treat her like an idiot. When she passes her test, she wants to celebrate. He takes her somewhere private and teaches her something else."
I'm forty-two years old and I've never learned to drive.
My ex-husband did the driving. My ex-husband did everything—earning, decisions, thinking for me. Twenty years of marriage reduced to "let me handle it" until there was nothing left of me to handle.
Now I'm divorced. Living alone. Taking the bus like a teenager.
Time to change that.
The driving school sends Abdi.
Thirty-five years old. Patient eyes. A calm voice that doesn't make me feel stupid for asking about the gear stick for the third time.
"Everyone starts somewhere," he says on our first lesson. "I've taught grandmothers who'd never touched a steering wheel. You're doing fine."
"I'm terrible."
"You're learning." He smiles. "There's a difference."
I stall the car again.
He doesn't sigh. Doesn't make that face my husband used to make when I got something wrong.
"Try again," he says. "You've got this."
We meet twice a week for three months.
Slowly, I improve. The gears become intuitive. The mirrors become automatic. I stop gripping the steering wheel like it might escape.
"You're ready," Abdi says in week ten. "I'm booking your test."
"What if I fail?"
"You won't." He looks at me with something that might be pride. "You've worked harder than any student I've had. You want this."
"I want to be independent."
"Then you'll pass."
I pass.
First try, minimal faults, the examiner actually smiling as she hands me my temporary license.
"I passed!" I call Abdi immediately. "I actually passed!"
"I knew you would." His voice is warm through the phone. "Congratulations, Halima. You should celebrate."
"How?"
"I know a place." A pause. "If you want company."
The "place" is a viewpoint.
Alexandra Palace hill, overlooking all of London. He's parked when I arrive—my first solo drive, nerve-wracking and exhilarating.
"You made it," he says as I get out.
"I drove here. By myself." I laugh, giddy. "I drove here."
"How does it feel?"
"Like everything is possible." I lean against my rental car—mine, mine, mine—and look at the city lights. "Like I wasted twenty years waiting for someone else to take me places."
"You didn't waste them." He stands next to me. Close. "You learned things. What you want. What you don't want."
"What do you mean?"
He turns to face me. In the darkness, with London glittering below, his eyes are serious.
"I've watched you change over three months. From a woman who apologized every time she touched the gear stick to a woman who drives like she owns the road." He reaches out, touches my face. "What else do you want, Halima? Now that you know you can have it?"
I should think about this.
He's younger than me. He was my instructor. There are professional lines, personal complications, all the reasons this is a bad idea.
But I've spent twenty years following rules that didn't serve me.
"I want this," I say.
And I kiss him.
We end up in his car.
Bigger than mine, more space in the backseat. Not that we care about space—we're too tangled together to care about anything.
"Halima—are you sure—"
"I haven't been sure of anything in twenty years." I pull at his shirt. "I'm sure of this."
He lays me down on the backseat. The leather is cold against my back; his hands are warm as they undress me.
"You're beautiful—"
"I'm forty-two—"
"And beautiful." He kisses down my body. "I've thought about this since the second lesson. When you laughed at something I said and I forgot what I was teaching."
"Why didn't you say anything?"
"Professional ethics." He reaches between my thighs. "You weren't my student then. You are now."
He's as patient with my body as he was with my driving.
Takes his time. Finds the spots that make me gasp. Adjusts when I guide him, doesn't get defensive when I say slower or faster or there.
"Abdi—"
"Let go." His mouth replaces his fingers. "I've got you."
I come looking at the lights of London.
The city I can finally drive through. The life I'm finally claiming.
"Please—"
He rises over me.
He fills me slowly.
Lets me feel every inch, watches my face, stops when I need him to, moves when I'm ready. It's nothing like sex with my husband—frantic, mechanical, done for him.
This is done for me.
"You feel—"
"Tell me—"
"Like I've been waiting for this my whole life." I pull him deeper. "Like everything before was just practice."
He moves.
Slow at first, then faster. The car rocks. The windows fog. Outside, London doesn't know or care that a forty-two-year-old woman is finding herself in a backseat.
"I'm close—"
"Me too—" He reaches between us. "Together—"
We come together.
Fall into each other.
Breathe.
After, we sit side by side, looking at the view.
"What happens now?" I ask.
"Whatever you want." He takes my hand. "I don't have expectations, Halima. I just know I want to see you again."
"As what? Your student?"
"As a woman I'm interested in." He squeezes my hand. "A woman who amazes me."
"I'm seven years older than you."
"And?"
"People will talk."
"Let them." He turns to face me. "I've learned something from teaching you. You don't let anyone else drive your life. Why would you let them drive this?"
We don't let them.
We date quietly at first—dinners, drives, weekends away. Slowly, we stop hiding. His family accepts me faster than I expected. Mine is shocked, then grudgingly pleased that I'm happy.
"You've changed," my sister tells me.
"I learned to drive."
"It's more than that."
She's right. It's more than that.
It's learning that forty-two isn't too late for anything—new skills, new love, new life.
It's learning to take the wheel.
And never letting anyone else steer again.