Just Drive [old version]

[ chapter six ]

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Chapter Six - Vanilla Dip Donuts

                Within the first five minutes on the road, Austin must’ve changed the station at least fifteen times; he was currently deciding between a rowdy party song and an old P!nk hit from 2006.

                “Goddamn it, Austin. Make up your mind,” I muttered under my breath. Of course, he didn’t hear me. It was either that or he chose to ignore me.

                Eventually, he settled on the dumb rowdy party song, but he didn’t seem to be satisfied with his choice. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see his fingers tapping along the side of the window—it was more comfortable for his lanky frame to crouch over the window as opposed to the armrest. As soon as the song ended, he reached for the power knob and turned it off.

                “Can we get something from Tim Hortons?” he asked casually.

                Of course, we just happened to be on a long stretch of busy road where all the Tim Hortons stores were on the other side, but I knew in my head if I didn’t get him something now, he’d be begging for an overpriced Starbucks pastry-coffee combo later when we hit a rest stop. Sighing, I pulled into the crook in the middle of the road and turned around.

                “Hello and welcome to Tim Hortons. What can I get you today?” a cheerful female voice chirped from the other side of the drive-thru speaker.

                I looked at him expectedly, but he was still staring at the menu. I had to hold back my laugher; he looked funny, as in a deformed human-paintbrush funny. His back was smashed against the sea-patterned seat cover and the top of his hair was brushing the ceiling like a bronzed paintbrush on a gray canvas.

                After staring at the menu for what seemed like forever, he turned to my side of the car and yelled as loudly as he could, “A vanilla dip donut and a small black coffee!”

                For a moment, the other side was silent, but the girl quickly came back with the price and chirpy directions on how to drive up another twenty feet to get to the window.

                “It took you that long to decide on your normal order?” I asked as I yanked the lever.

                Austin shrugged, but instead of answering my question, he came back with his own. “You remember my order?”

                I rolled my eyes. “It’s the same one you’ve been getting since you figured out that a vanilla dip donut is not a donut filled with vanilla flavored chewing tobacco.”

                He winced, but I expected it. He didn’t like it when people bring up the stupid, gullible things he believed as a freshman in high school. It wasn’t that he was dumb, but it was safe to say Austin has always been a bit slower in getting his act together.

                We pulled up to the window. Just as I was about to wiggle my wallet out from my jean pocket, Austin laid his hand on my forearm and smiled. In his other hand was a wad of bills. “I’ll pay,” he insisted. “You’re already driving me to California. The least I can do is pay for my breakfast.”

                My first reaction was to slap him, but three years of experience and a lifetime of dodging soccer balls prepared him for it. Despite the fact that he was struggling to fit into the car to begin with, he easily evaded the hit. “You didn’t eat yet?” I burst.

                He drew his lips into a thin line. No reply.

                “You had time to go to the soccer field but you didn’t have time to eat?” Starting with my hands, my body was starting to shake. Before high school, Austin used to be a chubby ass kid, which was strange, considering the fact that he was a soccer player. When he first tried out for the soccer team in his freshman year, the coach told him he was talented, but that he was “too fat to be on the team.” For the past few years, or at least to my knowledge of the first three years, Austin has constantly been fluctuating between trying to lose weight while still building muscle. Despite all that, he still cites vanilla dip donuts as one of his favorite foods along with Twinkies and other vanilla flavored fried food.

                He shrugged. “I had a handful of Cheerios if that counts,” he said as nonchalantly as possible.

                I glared at him. “I thought you were over this by now,” I reprimanded, but I ended up sounding more exasperated than angry.

                “Sorry,” he whispered as he reached across my seat to hand the money to the cashier.

                As soon as the window closed, I stared at him in awe. “How much of that did she see?” I asked.

                “Not much.” Before we could carry on any further, he window opened again and the girl handed me a small, brown bag, a cup of coffee, and the change. “Have a good day!” she chirped.

                I handed the bag and the change to Austin before putting the coffee down in the cup-holder. By the time I was done rearranging everything, Austin already started working on his donut. The edge of the vanilla icing that normally drips over the edge in a food porn-like manner was licked clean into a sharp, sweet ring. I watched for a moment as he went in to take a bite of his donut, but he stopped when he noticed me watching.

                Before he could ask anything, I proposed my own question. “Why do you lick the edge of the icing off?”

                His face contorted into his thinking expression. After a moment, he replied with a vague shrug. “I guess I like to taste the icing before I taste everything else?”

                “You’re such a strange kid,” I commented.

                “A strange kid that’s a whole year older than you,” he replied good-naturedly.

                I smiled. The first time we formally talked to each other was freshman year in high school. I sat in front of him in homeroom, and when our names came on the announcements for birthdays, I turned around and gave him my happy birthday wishes. He did the same for me.

                After that, everything seemed to fall into place. I never noticed he was in my other classes before that; suddenly, the kid I was letting copy my Spanish notes every day had a name. Somehow, we ended up bonding over strange, little things like the way it was impossible to read either copy of our notes. His writing tended to bunch up into scrawled clusters separated by large spaces whereas my words fell off the edge of the paper as a result of me falling asleep in class. Of course, he was always the one to wake me up before our teacher noticed anything.

                Just then, as if I was in Spanish class again, a jolting beep came from my steering wheel. My eyes snapped open, and I saw Austin’s arm retreating back to his seat. “They’re waiting.”

                I looked back. The lady behind us was angrily shaking her fist at me. To my left, the girl in the drive-thru window was also glaring at me. Shyly, I grabbed the lever and pulled the car out of the drive-thru as quickly as possible. “Thanks,” I muttered as we passed the exit sign.

                He smiled. “No problem.”