Chapter 10: Ninety-Percent Mental
(next morning: 7:45am)
Moda's P.O.V.
I was in the middle of some more good sleep when I felt my body being rattled about and felt some drops of liquid being sprayed on my face. I opened my eyes to see Mr. Vercetti sitting on my bed holding a cup of water.
"Wake up, kid!" he whispered loudly still splashing the water in my face.
"Huh! I'm up! I'm awake!" I shout and he stops. "Christ! It's still early, Mr. Vercetti!" I pull the covers over my head.
"C'mon, kid!" he says in a bold, optimistic voice and snatches the covers off the bed exposing me curled up in the fetus posistion still wearing the clothes from yesterday. "We're going drivin' today!"
My eyes perk up and I sit up in the bed. "Really? You're gonna teach me how to drive!" I squeal.
"Yep, now...go change, kid...You look like a two dollar crack whore." he said giving me a disgusted look. I rolled my eyes and jokingly pushed him out my room.
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I took a shower, caring more about cleanliness than fragrance so I just used some regular soap. I stepped out, wearing only my bath towel wrapped around my skinny body and went into the closet to find something to wear. Seeing as how we weren't going anywhere special today, I put on a simple, thin, black velour sweatsuit with a wifebeater underneath. I also put on my white shelltoe Adida's with black stripes.
Just so I wouldn't feel naked, I put on some small, silver hoop earrings and styled my hair into a simple low ponytail. I didn't bothered with makeup. I rushed downstairs to the lobby to meet Vercetti to find him...to find ourselves...in a compromising posistion.
"You gotta be shittin' me, kid." he said with his jaw dropped as he stared at me. We were both wearing the same thing. We both wore black velour sweatsuits and Adidas shelltoes.
"Well, ONE of us has to change..." I stood with my arms crossed.
"I ain't changin, kid! I'm Tommy Vercetti!" he said. I rolled my eyes and walked out the door past him. At the bottom of the stairs, I rubbed my hands together in anticipation.
"So what are we drivin' today, Tommy?" I grinned, wondering what awesome car we were going to ride in.
"We are gonna drive..." he pressed a button on his keychain which opened a garage door. He pressed another button, disabling the alarm on a very average looking car. My smile fell. "This!" he pointed to a royal blue Admiral.
"THAT?" I asked. "A dinky ADMIRAL?"
"Listen, you gotta crawl before you walk. So just think of it as a 'crawl' car. Now get in." he said and stepped into the car to start it. I shrugged my shoulders and got in as well. I sat in the passenher's seat with my arms folded, looking out the window as Mr. Vercetti backed out the driveway. He ended up running over one of his minions in the process by "accident". Alarmed, I shouted.
"STOP THE CAR!" I said. The vehicle came to a pretty abrupt stop for it to be going so slow. I ended up hitting my head against the dashboard. Dazed, I sat back up.
"What's the problem!" Mr. Vercetti yelled.
"Uh...You just RAN OVER somebody!" I said with sarcasm and jumped out the car and bent over to get a closer look at the groaning victim.. "Somebody call, nine-one-one!" I shouted. Mr. Vercetti got out the car and grabbed my arm.
"You want the whole of Starfish Island to hear you, genius!"
"This man is HURT! Don't just stand there! Get some help!"
"I'm...okay..." said the man.
"See? He's...fine!" Tommy says in assurance (A/N: not sure if that's a word)
"Does that look FINE to you! He has fucking...tire marks all over his shirt!" I cursed with tears streaming down my cheek. "And I'm pretty sure that God didn't will legs to bend that way!" Mr. Vercetti quickly takes out his cell phone and dials the nearest hospital.
"Hey Mike, we got a hit-and-run...My house." he says unenthusiastically then hangs up. "See? Everything's...peachy!"
"You almost killed someone! Oh my God..." I said sobbing hysterically and hyperventilating. Mr. Vercetti plants his hands on my shoulders firmly while I try to catch my breath.
"Moda! Moda! Moda, calm down! Geez!" he shouts trying to get me to stop crying. After about 3 minutes, I regain my composure.
"Ya calm, kid?" He says casually sitting on the hood of the car as the paramedics (who had arrived amazingly fast) carried the poor man on a stretcher into the ambulance.
"I-I-I'm...fi-fi-fine..." I stammer. (A/N: note that I am trying to simulate the effect in real life when you finish crying and can't breathe. Like when you got a whoopin as a child and couldn't breath easily).
"Good then let's go...Christ!" he throws his hands in the air and jumps in the car. "Drama Queen..." I heard him mumble just before he got in.
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As we were crossing the bridge to town, I reached to turn on the radio to calm my frazzled nerves only to have Mr. Vercetti slap my hand away.
"Ow!" I pull my hand back. "Why? Why, Mr. Vercetti, why!" I exclaim.
"No music. You need to concentrate." He says with his eyes on the road, speeding through red lights. "Driving like a maniac takes a lot of concentration. It's ninety percent mental, kid. If there's anything you need to know while staying in Vice City is how to drive like a lunatic, or a fugitive, take your pick."
I listen to him preach.
"As you're running from the cops, you need to learn that getting away is not only about speed but..." he yanks the steering wheel, forcing the car to make a sharp left and forcing my body to make a sharp left as well.
"Aaaah!" I scream a the car does a two-wheelie then sets back down.
"...control." Mr. Vercetti says, still calm and looking at the road. He pulls over to the driveway of a hotel. "Your turn, kid." He gets out the car and I scootch over into the driver's seat. He opens the door and gets in. "Show me what you know, kid."
Now I was a little more nervous. I didn't know squat about driving. I didn't even go to driving school yet. Sure, my mom had let me back the car in and out the driveway a few times but...
"I...can't! I don't..." I stuttered.
"Just...shift the gear into drive." He instructed calmly. I did so. "Now...GO." he said reclining in the passenger seat with his hands behind his head as if to mock me. I gently applied the pressure of my foot to the pedal and eased out of the driveway. I drove down the road past Mr. Vercetti's nightclub going almost 10 miles per hour.
"What the fuck IS this, kid! I've seen people waiting in LINE go faster than you!" he commented
"Shaddup! I'm trying to be safe, here!" I said leaning forward with both hands on the steering wheel. Mr. Vercetti sighs.
"Moda, stop the car." he says. Frustrated, I hit the brakes and park the car.
"Move that piece of shit!" shouts someone from behind us.
"SHUT UP, PRICK! CAN'T YOU SEE WE'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF A LESSON, HERE!" I poke my head out the window and shout. The offender quickly makes a u-turn.
"Calm down! Look at you! You're all red in the face, Moda! Ya look like a...a tomato!" Mr. Vercetti tried to calm me down. "Here, get out the car right quick..." he said. I opened the door and got out the car. Behind us here were at least 4 cars all lined up and honking at us. Still needing to let ooff some steam, I flipped the bird at any driver who could see me. I grinned on the inside. I looked at Mr. Vercetti who had reclined the driver's seat all the way back and was laying in it.
"Get in!" he said. I ran around to the passenger seat. "No...get in over here!" he said. I shot him a blank look.
"Pfft! What, do you want me to sit on your lap or something?" I asked sarcastically.
"Bingo, now get in! I told myself I wasn't going to shoot anyone today and that honking's getting on my last damn nerve so get in." he commanded.
I walked back to the drivers side and managed to cram myself into the driver's seat. I was sitting on Mr. Vercetti's lap with the top of my head against the roof of the car. Talk about uncomfortable...
"Geez, Moda! Ever hear of Jane Fonda!" he strained under me.
"Whaddaya mean? I'm only 138 pounds!"
"Yeah, and fifty of it is crushing my femur!" (A/N: if I remember correctly, the 'femur' is the bone in your thigh, right?)
"Are you trying to say I have a huge butt!" I yelled.
"Whatever, kid!" I hear the engine rev. I look down and see Mr. Vercetti's foot on the gas pedal. He applies pressure to it and we're on the move again.
"Huh! What are you doing? What am I s'posed to do?" I asked in a panic.
"Just steer, kid! You're learning CONTROL. Ninety-percent mental!" he said.
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Back at the house
(about 6:00pm)
After a hard morning's work of "driving like a lunatic", we are finally home. I thought driving was just about road signs, speed limits, and traffic lines but apparently that's not all it's about in Tommy's Driving School. After the "control" lesson, we drove around the whole of Vice City until I somewhat memorized it. He also taught me how to swerve through traffic, park, make donuts on the pavement, and off the pavement, and jump out of a car before explosion (of course the car wasn't really on fire). Eventually we had gotten hungry so we stopped in the mall and he treated me to an Orange Julius (A/N: very delicious orange-cream drink and still exists if you didn't know).
Of course, some lessons needed faster, more efficient cars so Tommy had also crammed in a very, very quick lesson on "borrowing" stranger's cars. I asked him why he didn't just drive back to the house seeing as how he had a white Infermus still in the driveway (A/N: I know he doesn't have a driveway per-se but just work with me, people). He claimed he was "feeling lazy" and that I "needed another lesson". So now I also know how to hijack a car in broad daylight! But overall, this was fun.
I, that's right I, pulled into the driveway and turned off the car. Mr. Vercetti stumbled out of the passenger seat and almost collapsed on the front stairs.
"You...ya did well, kid. I'm proud of you!" he panted.
"Well, thanks! I did learn from the best." I pointed at him.
"Oh p'shaw and pish..." he said, playing along. We both laughed. (A/N: can you guess where I got that line from?) We walked up the stairs and into the house shoulder-to-shoulder like old pals.
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NON-NARRATIVE MODE
Across the street from the Vercetti estate there was a parked, gray Sentinel. Next to the Sentinel was a tall, rigid palm tree. Suddenly, a figure had fallen from the tree next to the car. The figure had landed on her feet. Standing up, she regained her composure and dusted herself off. Around her neck there was a lanyard with a high-definition camera on it. She held the camera to her chest.
"Best investment I've ever made." she whispered to it. "Your defenses are getting weak, Tommy. Especially with your new :girlfriend: around" she spoke to herself, getting in her car and driving off into the distance.
End Chapter
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I think this is one of the more "cutesy" chapters in the story. The last paragraph I didn't mean for it to sound all story-bookish like that "there was a dark...dark...house" ghost story. I thought the driving lesson skit would be fun to write and hilarious to read and imagine. Especially the part when dude got ran over.
Oh and please make a mental note that for some reason, certain characters (on the keyboard) that I use while editing the chapters won't show up in the actual viewing of the story so it may look a little weird. Things like asteriks, and brackets and so on won't show up for me so I may use other things to add emphasis like :this: or +this+ or maybe even #this# just so it doesn't look likethis (that was an example, not a typo). But just make a note of that, okay? Thanks!
Speaking of thanks, thank you SOOO much for the reviews. I am really, really grateful and I hope you will continue reading (or read the previous chapters again and review em' all...just kidding! but not really...)! Thanks again!