Wheels

I met you in the spring, four years after I moved from Italy to Oklahoma. A popcorn-addicted, beer-loving, self-proclaimed hillbilly who looked like Axl Rose. Still unsure of the depth of all the differences between us, I didn’t name you. As I told my friends about you, I referred to you as Okladude.

We started driving. You, confident to the point of recklessness, your big, callous hands on the steering wheel, and me, too anxious to drive, my eyes always hyper-aware of all the dangers outside of us.

In the mild winter of Oklahoma, we hit a deer with your mama’s truck. The backroads were so dark, and you were so drunk. I saw it first. I yelled, “Careful to the deer!” my English still flawed even after four years, and maybe you didn’t understand me or didn’t hear me at all.

You bought me a scooter to help me face my fear of driving, an off-brand Vespa that I called Gigio, like the goalie of the Italian national soccer team when we won the European championship. We watched the final game simultaneously the first time I went back home without you. You were on the couch of your mom’s trailer in Oklahoma, while I watched it on a big screen, sitting on the beach with my friends as we ate pizza, listening to the familiar language of the people around me as they cheered for a country that I would leave again only a few days later to come back to the US, to you.

I never actually drove Gigio, but you couldn’t stop. You didn’t care about all the Oklahomans ridiculing us. Scooters are so common in Italy, yet somehow perceived as feminine and dorky in the US — maybe because they aren’t as outrageously loud and imposing as motorcycles and pick-up trucks.

We were chased by a huge stray dog as we drove Gigio around the lake, once again all drunk. I panicked and wondered if I’d be able to kick a dog in the face while balancing myself behind you, my fingers sinking in the soft flesh of your belly as you kept driving and laughed and yelled abuse at the dog.

One day, as we drove your mama’s truck to get groceries, we crossed a big intersection and heard a loud thud. A black kitten had been hiding somewhere above the tire and had jumped off in the middle of the road. I threw myself off the truck, tried to lead the kitten away from the speeding cars and the deep sewer where he ended up. I did everything I could to save him.

I couldn’t. 

You told me to stop crying, that this was life. You were so angry, and helpless, and sad that you couldn’t console me, your face all twisted and red. “It’s just a fucking cat!”, you screamed.

I still think about that kitten.

And still, we kept going. Across Oklahoma, Tennessee, Arkansas, Texas, and Missouri, to travel someplace where we could both feel new and finally alike.

Last summer, we took a plane that landed in Rome. We drove all around my hometown, saw the beauties of Tuscany. I finally showed you my country, my people, my culture, after more than a year in a place that felt familiar only to you.

In the blistering Italian summer, we broke the side mirror of my dad’s car as we tried to squeeze into an alley that didn’t seem as narrow as it actually was. I know, we were in my hometown, I should have known better. But I had been gone too long, and every time I went back, I felt like I had forgotten something else, on top of all the other things I had already erased about myself. And yes, you’re right: I should have been driving.

One day, during our stay, you said that you wanted to play disc golf, a popular sport in Oklahoma but almost unknown in Italy. We drove for hours to Pescia, a small, anonymous town in the middle of nowhere, and then high up a mountain.

The road wasn’t easy. At some point, even you started being nervous, and I started feeling unsafe. We had broken the side mirror of my dad’s car just a few days before.

We were chased by a dog, accidentally killed a cat, and drunkenly hit a deer.

I got out. I was too scared of the steep cliff underneath us, separated from the road by a sad little thread that functioned as a warning and not a protection.

I refused to keep going. I started screaming. I lost my mind, and you yelled back at me.

“You’re behaving like a fucking baby,” or something along those lines.

In the end, I got back in. When we passed the cliff, you took pictures of me, my face crumpled with anxiety. I fake-smiled to pretend I was normal and brave.

We went back to Oklahoma. Ten days later, you drove a truck with all our possessions for twelve hundred miles on our way to Pennsylvania, where I had found a great job. You wanted to come with me, but you were the one driving.

In Gettysburg, both well aware of all the cold that will soon come, we still rely on Gigio, the scooter I can’t bring myself to drive, and Ol’ Blue, the pick-up truck that you bought with your savings. It’s a Chevrolet from 1981, with a rusty hood and bits and pieces that come off all the time. We cover short distances because we don’t want to get stranded in the middle of nowhere, in a state that feels unfamiliar to both of us.

It’s fall, and this is the most gorgeous foliage that we have ever seen. As we drive around the Pennsylvania countryside, we can’t stop pointing out reddening maple trees to each other, our faces lit with wonder. It’s going to snow soon, but Ol’ Blue will do.