Parallel Park Me

I did not expect
competence
to feel this sexual,
but then she backed into the parking spot
in one clean motion
and ruined my whole afternoon.

No apology to the curb.
No corrective shimmy.
No whispered appeal to God.
Just mirror, wrist, turn, done…

I sat there beside her
trying to act like
my body had not just learned
something humiliating about itself.

Nothing is hotter
than a woman
who can actually drive.

One hand on the wheel.
The other reaching across me
like that is not
its own kind of event.

Like I am not over here
reassessing my standards
because she checked her blind spot
without looking panicked.

That’s the part no one warns you about.
Not the jawline.
Not the sunglasses.
Not even the loose palm at the red light.

It’s the ease.

The way she glances once,
signals once,
moves once,
and suddenly I’m in love
with the concept of being taken somewhere.

Sometimes it’s not deep.
Sometimes it’s just watching a woman
parallel park…
like she has never once
been bullied by a city block.

Sometimes it’s her saying
hand me that coffee
without taking her eyes off the road
and you do,
embarrassingly willing.

Maybe that’s all romance is.

Not flowers.
Not fate.
Just letting your body go loose
in the passenger seat
and realizing, all at once,
that safety is hot.

That ease is hot.
That a woman who can get you there
without drama
might be the filthiest thing
you’ve ever believed in.

Author’s Note

I did not fail my road test five times to become anything but a passenger princess with strong opinions and limited gifts behind the wheel. This poem is fiction, but I remain fully committed to the possibility of one day being quietly and competently driven somewhere by a hot woman.

Dedicated to my amazing friend Katie, who recently validated an extremely important conversational thesis about competent drivers being hotter. Thank you for helping turn an unhinged TED Talk into this 3am poem, because my page desperately needed something less emotionally ruinous.