Page 7 of One Knight Stand

Frankie kept her foot hard on the gas pedal. I had no idea why Professor Grange didn’t tell her to ease up. He talked to her calmly, like we were on a Sunday drive or something. I couldn’t always make out what he was saying because of the loud roaring in my ears, the grinding of Jax’s teeth, and Wally’s gasping breaths. But the professor’s tone remained unruffled, which might have been good for Frankie but only made me more nervous because he wasn’t stopping the car or taking control from her.

Eventually, we drove onto a dirt road and approached a small rise. I yelped as we flew up the rise and over a small ditch, causing us to land with a teeth-snapping thud on the other side. Without hesitating, Frankie pulled hard on the wheel, accelerating into a ninety-degree sliding spin to negotiate the next corner.

“Aaaaagh!” I screamed as the rear tires tossed up dirt and dust. My seat belt locked out with a sharp pain along my ribs and shoulder.

At this point, Jax released my hand and pulled me tight against his side, holding me there the best he could. I heard him suck in air until Frankie managed to control the spin and shot the car forward again. Professor Grange instructed her to take the next left, where we drove onto a paved surface at the slalom area.

Seeing the finish line in sight, Frankie gave a loud whoop and angled toward the rightmost course. Without even waiting for instruction, she began to accelerate. Over the noise of the shrieking coming from us in the back seat, I could barely hear the professor tell her she didn’t need to take the slalom at top speed the first time.

But Frankie seemed determined to do it.

She barreled into the first turn. The tires squealed as she jerked the steering wheel back to the left. Her timing was off and the car was going too fast, so she skidded through the turn, clipped a series of orange cones and sent them flying. The skidding had slowed the car significantly and had put it out of position. She made it through the next turn, clipping even more cones, but completely lost it in the fourth turn as we jerked sideways and two of our tires went straight up in the air, threatening to roll us over.

We shouted a warning from the back seat as the car slid sideways and leaned hard on the training wheels. I wasn’t sure there was enough car touching the ground to keep us from toppling over. I pressed my face into Jax’s chest, closing my eyes and thinking if I had to die, at least I was in his arms. At the last moment, Professor Grange announced he had the vehicle and casually held us in the turn until our velocity decreased and we thumped back to the ground.

As the car came to a stop, Jax, Wally, and I ripped off our seat belts and bailed out of the car, running across the tarmac with our helmets still on.

When we reached the gatehouse, we saw Professor Grange and Frankie had exited the car. We stood near the gatehouse panting and watching as he walked her back to the start of the slalom course. He appeared to be critiquing her technique, pointing to the downed cones and skid marks. She listened intently.

After a few minutes, they headed our direction. Frankie practically bounced alongside the professor with the biggest grin on her face I had ever seen.

“Wow! What an awesome experience!” She pulled off her helmet as she approached us and shook out her hair. “How come you guys ran over here?”

I paused, at a complete loss for what to say, my nausea barely starting to subside.

Jax came to the rescue. “Uh, we were just following Professor Grange’s instructions. He instructed us to always keep moving. So, when the car stopped, we took off. We figured this was far enough. Right, Professor?”

“Excellent assessment of the situation, Mr. Drummond. The more real you can make these training sessions, the better prepared you will be for the real world.”

I looked gratefully at Jax, and he raised an eyebrow at me when Frankie wasn’t looking.

As Professor Grange collected our helmets, he nodded at Frankie. “Not bad, Ms. Chang. Although some collateral damage occurred, and your technique could use some smoothing, that was not bad for a first attempt.”

Not bad? Some smoothing?Was he serious?

“You lost it by being overconfident on the slalom, which only means you need more practice and experience to be successful there,” he continued. “Beware, overconfidence has killed more agents than stupidity, and that’s saying a lot.”

While we were standing there, another car pulled up with a different instructor. “Would you like me to take them back to the school and save you a trip, Ardus?”

“Thanks, that would be great. Ms. Sinclair, you’ll be in the driver’s seat next week. I strongly suggest you spend more time in the simulator, going over today’s experience and preparing yourself.”

I felt numb as the three of us wedged into the back seat, with Jax sitting in the front. There was no way I was going to be able to drive that course. A year’s worth of practice wouldn’t be enough, but with only one week, it was hopeless.

Seeing my look, Wally bumped shoulders with me. “Don’t worry, Angel, you’ll be great. Just like in the simulator.”

“Seriously, Angel, it wasn’t that hard,” Frankie said. “I’ll be happy to give you all the tips I learned, so you can drive as well as I did. Hey, maybe Wally will lend us his car to practice a little.”

“No!” Wally and I said at the same time.

I recovered first and tried to explain. “Ah, what I mean is, Wally’s car is too old for that kind of driving. Right, Wally?”

“Absolutely too old,” he agreed. “Simulated practice would be alotbetter than using my car.”

Jax didn’t offer his car, either, so we fell silent.

As we got back to UTOP and started walking back to the dorm, Frankie was still riding high. “Escape and Evasion may just be my favorite class of all time, which is saying a lot because I like so many classes at UTOP. I can’t wait until it’s my turn to drive again.”

She turned to us. “You guys will drive with me again, right?”

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