Learning to Be Driven novel · Chapter 1 of 12
Chapter 1: The Potholes
I've been terrified of driving ever since the day my cousin crashed into a pole two hundred meters from my house.
Nothing happened to me.
But I sat trembling in the back seat, with the smell of gasoline and blood, and from then on I never got behind the wheel.
At twenty-two, with an internship at a construction company waiting for me and no license, I didn't have a choice.
"My dad can teach you," Andrea said, her mouth full of bread. "He's the most patient man in the world."
"Your dad scares me."
"Everything scares you."
"Your dad is serious."
"He's an engineer. That's normal." She wiped away the crumbs. "Plus, he has an old truck he won't care if you crash."
Andrea Cevallos had been my best friend since the first semester of architecture school.
I met her when I was eighteen, on a Monday during registration, waiting in line for a student ID.
We hadn't stopped laughing since.
I'd seen her dad four times in four years.
Once at her birthday, once at a cousin's graduation, and twice in the hallway of their house.
Tall, with black hair and gray at the temples, a calm voice.
He'd never spoken more than ten words to me in a row.
Still, every time I saw him, something coiled up under my belly button.
I'd never told anyone.
On Saturday at five in the afternoon, Rafael Cevallos picked me up on the corner of my street.
He was driving an old blue Chevrolet LUV, with a manual transmission and a broken dashboard.
"Good afternoon, Lucero."
"Good afternoon, Don Rafael."
"Rafael. No 'don.'"
"I prefer 'don.'"
"As you wish." A brief smile moved his beard. "Get in."
I got in.
It smelled like old leather, coffee, and something else—a woody soap I couldn't name.
He drove in silence along the highway to Yaruquí, left the pavement, and turned onto a dirt road between cornfields and eucalyptus trees.
He stopped in the middle of a clearing.
"No one's here," he said. "Switch to the driver's seat."
I got out.
I walked around the truck with weak legs, and we crossed paths in front of the hood.
His shoulder brushed mine.
I felt tiny.
I sat in the driver's seat, my hands gripping the worn plastic.
"Push the clutch."
I pushed it.
"All the way. Put it in first."
I put it in first.
"Let it out slowly."
I let it out.
The truck jerked and stalled.
"Again."
It stalled.
"Again."
It stalled six more times.
By the seventh time, my knees were shaking.
"I can't feel the car," I said, almost crying.
"You're too tense."
"I know."
"Relax."
"I can't."
"Breathe."
"I'm breathing."
Rafael stared at me for a moment.
Then he unbuckled his seatbelt, shifted up a little in his seat, and said, with the same calm as always: "There's a technique."
"What?"
"Some people learn better with their body."
"How?"
"Sitting here."
He patted his thigh.
"On top of me."
"So you can feel the pedal and gear movements through my legs."
"It's common with students who get stuck."
I looked at him.
His eyes were dark, calm, unreadable.
He wasn't smiling.
But I saw a vein pulsing in his neck.
And I understood.
I understood it wasn't a technique.
I understood he knew that I understood.
And that he was giving me both the way out and the door at the same time.
"You do this with all your students," I said.
"I've never done it."
"Then why with me?"
"Because you're asking me with that face."
My cheeks burned.
My hands hurt from gripping the steering wheel.
I could say no.
I could get out, call a taxi, never see Rafael Cevallos again in my life.
"Show me," I said.
He slid over to the center of the seat.
I clumsily switched places, swinging one leg over the gearshift.
I sat on his thighs, my back to his chest, my hands on the wheel.
I felt his warmth through my jeans.
His big hands gripped my waist.
"Like this."
"Like this."
"Push the clutch."
I stretched my foot.
I felt his legs moving under mine, following every press.
"Feel that."
"I feel it."
"First gear."
I put it in first.
His hand covered mine on the gear knob, warm, rough.
"Let it out."
I let out the clutch, and the truck started, rattling, the dirt road bouncing under the wheels.
The first pothole made me bounce.
The second threw me back.
And I felt something hard, thick, firm, pressed against my ass.
I couldn't breathe.
Rafael didn't say anything.
He didn't move.
But his fingers dug into my waist.
"Keep going," he said, his voice rougher than before. "Don't stop."
The road was full of potholes.
Each one made me rise and fall on top of him.
Every time I came down, I felt him harder, hotter, about to explode through the fabric.
My stomach went weak.
My sex burned.
I felt the wetness soaking my underwear.
"Don Rafael," I whispered.
"Tell me."
"I don't think this is a technique."
"No."
"Then what is it?"
His hand moved up from my waist, along my side, and cupped my breast over my blouse.
He squeezed.
A moan escaped me.
"It's that I can't stop thinking about you," he said against my ear.
He kept driving with my hands on the wheel and one of his on my chest.
The other hand went lower.
It slid down my thigh, under my skirt, and stopped on the fabric of my thong.
He touched it.
I was soaked.
I moaned shamelessly.
"Sir..." I said, breathless.
He pushed the fabric aside with two fingers and touched me directly.
I arched my back.
He slid one finger in, slow, into my tight, burning body.
Then another.
The truck rattled.
I was driving with my hands clenched on the wheel, at ten kilometers an hour.
I had two fingers buried inside me and a hard bulge throbbing against my back.
"Keep the wheel steady," he ordered.
"I can't."
"You can."
"I'm going to..."
"Not yet."
He pulled his fingers out, slowly, soaked.
He showed them to me, glistening in the evening light.
Then I knew.
Everything was about to spiral out of control.
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend