Night Drive

Texas summer nights are hot. 

This kind of wet heat sticks to you like a second skin, yet somehow drys your breath like an oven.

It's the type of heat that begs you to stay inside.

Going nowhere, my partner and I hopped into the car late around midnight. Maybe he knew I needed a drive, a break from reality. 

Despite the pleas of oppressive heat, we set off with the top dropped and A/C cranked. Not too high, though. Part of the delight of night driving is the silence. 

It is best not disturbed. 

With the soft puttering of the factory exhaust bouncing off the asphalt, we turned left down the once-familiar country road. At night, though, it's a different planet. Without the sunlight, or any civilized light to speak of, you're driving by instinct alone.

As the hot summer crawls into my lungs, the darkness settles in the recesses of my eyes, filling spaces it shouldn't be. It raises hairs on the back of my neck, this primal fear. Sweat pools at the small of my back.

Maybe the road will keep turning here, or, maybe this is the abrupt turn with the roadside memorial.

His hand on mine, I grip the wheel tighter. Is any of this worth the risk? 

I feel the texture of the road. The tug of the wheel. The reverb of the exhaust against nothingness. 

Breathing in, the inky black consumes you. 

Exhale.

At the event horizon of a black hole, you delicately dance between chicanes and sweepers. 

Forgotten in the emptiness, it feels as if these alien roads were purpose built for you. Crosswinds like solar winds surge through your hair and into your lungs. Inhale again.

Exhale.

Push the stick down and to the left. The shifter bites into second and the wheels bark. The engine speed climbs and crescendos as you rocket down a straight like Voyager 1 blazing into interstellar space. 

Overwhelmed, you forget the heat, the night, the wind. 

For a moment, it's just you and the vehicle. No fear. 

You breathe into it. 

It breathes into you.

You slow as you come to a bend, and see, in the dim distance, a light. Then two. Then many. A station for weary interlopers hovers at the upcoming corner. 

Its lights ring off the lenses of my partner's glasses as we pass.

I remember I have a home. 

More lights.

The headlamps graze the corners of a skulking SUV. Steady now. It is best to avoid its orbit and wait until it grumbles past. 

Gone now, I feel my way through the dark, back home. Breathing settles.

The landing bay, loud enough to wake the sun, opens. I pull in, park, power down.