Country Drive

Country Drive
by pataphysics
A thin wire fence was barely perceptible in the dark when
we pulled the car to the side of the road. I switched off the
headlights and listened to the rest of the music. The music
ceased abruptly because the tape ran out on one side. She
turned to me and asked, “Now what?” Behind her, the fence
and the stars were double exposed with my face lit up by the
dials from the dashboard. My face was partially obscured by
her ponytailed head in the reflection. “Now? Don’t you want
to talk about the music?” She laughed and then got out of the
car. I stayed where I was and watched her climb on to the hood.
Her hair matted up on the windshield in front of me. She hummed.
The humming was audible, but slightly muffled. It was the music
that we had been listening to that she hummed softly. She was
humming it wrong. The melody changed into something else
that I couldn’t quite place. I grabbed the beer from the back
seat and joined her on the hood. “You know, the music is wrong.”
She took one of the beers and opened it with her lighter. You
could tell that she was excited and would soon be full of beer.
Full of beer on the hood. Humming while drinking while looking
at the stars and humming the music all wrong.