Well, we did.
A green one.
Unsurprisingly, we blew right through it, merged on the highway, and Michael gunned it. Sixty-five miles per hour—if that was really what this was—had never felt so outright dangerous, so…
Fun.
“Oh, shiiiit!” I yelled, a huge smile forming on my face.
The vibration of the engine pulsed through my legs and... yeah, it was hitting me there a little bit. I had never felt so exhilarated but also so close to the edge of danger. What we were doing was just fucking crazy!
We were going over seventy miles per hour near other vehicles doing the same speed, with only a helmet and Michael’s instincts to protect us. If we peeled out, if someone cut us off, if we hit something that made the bike sputter out of control...
But just as it had in town, the longer we spent on the road, the more of a thrill it began to feel. I worried less and less about what could go wrong and focused more and more on what was going well. I didn’t worry about crashing. I focused on the pulsing vibrations going through my body. I focused on how it felt to travel at speeds faster than anything I’d ever done.
I focused on how this was all Michael’s doing and how he was literally giving me the ride of my life.
Truly, nothing like it had ever happened. Truly, no one like him had ever come. Truly, no man had ever given me a date like this.
And it was only the early stages of the date. That was by far the best part. This was… this was changing how I felt about motorcycles, that it most certainly was.
Actually, toward the end, the motorcycle ride was almost becoming a little too much to handle, in part because the vibration of the motorcycle, and the effect it had on my body, even though I was wearing jeans...
Well, let’s just say that vibration had that pleasurable effect on me. And while it certainly felt good, I was more than a little worried how it would look to Michael ifthathappened before he and I had even kissed, let alone gone all the way—something that wasn’t going to happen tonight, no matter how magical or thrilling this bike ride was.
I managed to keep it under control, but just because I didn’t physically finish didn’t mean there was some serious work done on the mind.
Eventually, Michael pulled off the highway, only for him to loop back around toward Springsville and back on the highway. The bastard had very much done this deliberately. He knew all too well what a bike ride like this had done.
Well, I could see why he did it. It was the most arousing mode of transportation there was. As much as I tried to tell myself it didn’t mean anything, the reaction of my body very much suggested otherwise. I had gone from loathing bikes and associating them with death and murder to wondering if I could manage avoid finishing on his. I would have cursed myself out an hour ago if this was the dilemma I had to face, but now, it was unavoidable.
I had to laugh at myself in a way. I’d become the very thing that I had hated for so long—someone who loved bikes. I swore that if the bike ride had lasted just five minutes longer, I would have lost control.
“Wanted to go back to Springsville, huh?” I shouted, hoping my voice didn’t sound like a shaky, hot mess.
But then Michael did something strange. He didn’t take the exit for Springsville. He slowed down as if to make me think that he was going to take that exit, but that wasn’t actually what he did. Instead, as soon as we passed the exit for Springsville, he gunned the engine even faster, and this time, I knew that he wasn’t staying by the speed limit.
And yet, I did not care. In fact, I felt like I wasn’t myself—in a good way. I was on an adrenaline high that wanted to keep pushing things to the limit.
And just like that, we got off at the next exit. It did take me a couple of seconds to figure out where we were going, though, because we had parked on a street with a few different bars and restaurants. I think we may have still been in Springsville district lines, but this was not the Springsville we all knew by any stretch of the imagination.
“Hidden Cellar?” I said, reading the sign of the place we had stopped at.
Michael nodded as he removed his helmet. I had never even heard of the place, let alone seen it before. It certainly had a far more sophisticated and upscale look than anything in Springsville.
“I figured you wouldn’t be keen on going back to Brewskis,” he said with a smirk as his hands ran over my face, ostentatiously to remove my helmet. “So, I figured something classier was in order.”
“Oh, you didn’t have to do that,” I said. “We could’ve gone someplace you would’ve been comfortable. I’m...”
“You act like I’m a blue-collar guy who thinks dark beer is too refined,” he said. “You’ll quickly find out that there’s much more to me than you think. Just because I repair cars and bikes for a living and once served in the military doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate the finer things in life.”
Guess that’s one on me for assuming too much.
Very well then, Michael. Show me what else there is to you. Continue to surprise me.
Michael put my helmet in the seat of the motorcycle and walked about a half step ahead of me. I felt pretty sure that he was brushing his hand down, trying to take his own in mine, but I was trying to be good—for now, at least. He may have given me the ride of his life, but I wasn’t going to give everything to him that easily. The physical thrill produced by an admittedly fun ride didn’t mean I was emotionally connected to him yet.
It certainly only helped, though, that the placement of his hand on the small of my back sent pleasant shivers throughout my body.
