Page 173 of Unspoken Truths

“Careful there,” he teases me.

Mom is waiting next to Emil, chatting as they wait for me.

“There you are,” she says. “You look gorgeous, we should definitely run away before Nacio decides to buy a scalped ticket to come with us.”

Emil snickers as his son perks up.

“Shit, was that an option?” he asks.

“No,” Mom says, making me smile as she opens the front door. “See you later, Nacio.”

“Be safe,” he sighs.

“Yes, but most of all, have fun,” Emil says.

I have to say, practicing my driving in my new SUV is wild. Mom unlocks the doors as we walk toward it, tossing me the key fob. There’s a briskness to the air, reminding me fall will be here soon, but it’s not too bad yet. I haven’t experienced winter in Portland.

If the guys have their way, I won’t at all.

Pushing away the dark thought, I force myself to smile as I open the driver side door. They won’t ruin tonight. I’ve been looking forward to it for months, and I plan to enjoy it. Getting in, I take a calming breath and shut the door.

“Here we go!” I squeal, pushing down on the brake with my foot and pressing the ignition button.

“Seatbelt, hot stuff,” Mom teases me, and I nod as I make sure to pull it on.

The drive to the venue isn’t awful, even though I have to grit my teeth as I drive into the parking garage.

“Mom, I have to park?” I hiss. “I don’t know if I can do this!”

“You’re fine, we’re going to go up to one of the upper floors with this tank,” Mom says calmly. “It’s easier when you have an extra space or two so it doesn’t feel as if you’re going to hit someone. Deep breaths, you’re doing so good. If you really can’t do it, I’ll park, okay?”

Swallowing hard, I concentrate on the tight turns as I drive into the higher levels.

“Why is that car so close to me?” I mumble. “This feels like a design flaw.”

“It really does,” Mom agrees, though I can hear the amusement in her voice. “I’m taking you out to lunch this week so we can practice parking together. For now, this is probably one of the most stressful places to learn. Way to jump into the deep end, honey.”

“Awesome,” I mutter. “God, why is the ceiling getting closer to me!”

“It’s the garage. It’s not going to crush us,” she says. Every space has been full, but the spots look so small, I doubt I would be able to park the SUV in any of them.

Toward the sixth floor, I begin to see more open spaces, and I look out for a cluster of spots together so I can attempt this.

“There we go,” Mom says. “Six spots all together. Slow down, and I’ll tell you when to cut the wheel.”

I’ve been driving at a crawl anyway, so it’s not difficult to continue at this pace.

“Start to turn the wheel,” she says. “This is your spot.”

Concentrating on turning and not hitting the concrete wall ahead of me once I’m in the spot leaves little room for any other worry.

“There! You did it,” Mom says. “I can straighten you out if you need it. Put the car in park first.”

It’s an easy and silly thing to forget, because my brain is already happy to be done with this. Pushing the park button down, I sigh in relief when I feel it shift. Checking my surroundings, I open the door and look down at the lines. I’m a little over.

“Well, I couldn’t be perfect the first time,” I sigh, taking off my seatbelt and getting out. Mom comes around to take my spot, quickly righting the car.

“You’ll get the hang of it,” she says, hopping out after and locking the car.

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