"Are you scared?" she asked, and the manner in which she asked, with that nonchalance but with a slight smirk, made me feel like I had to prove her wrong. I was afraid. I had been afraid of bicycles my whole life, thanks to my mother's firm grip on what was safe and what wasn't. "Those things kill people," she'd say whenever I asked. "You want to break your neck? Study your books."
So I studied. Twenty years of learning, and there I stood, supposedly adult, staring at this machine as though it would bite.
The field was empty except for a few guys playing football in the distance. Perhaps the afternoon sunlight made everything glow golden and possible. Precious had wheeled the bike over from wherever she'd been riding, her cheeks were still flushed. She looked alive in a manner that I envied.
"I never..." I started, then stopped. How do you explain to someone that you've never done something so basic? Something kids master at six?
"I know," she said, and there was no judgment in it. Just fact. "That's why I'm asking."
My palms were already sweating. The bike looked gigantic suddenly, angles and possible movement. Red frame, black handles, those thin tires that seemed designed to slip on anything. No helmet anywhere. No knee pads. Just metal and rubber and my racing heart.
"Okay," I said, and the word was out before I could retract it. "Okay, but..."
"But nothing." She was already guiding me toward it, one hand on my shoulder. "You hold here, and here. Put your foot on this pedal-- uh.. no, the other one. Right foot first."
Her hands were steadier than mine as she helped me onto the seat. The ground suddenly felt a great distance away, though it couldn't have been more than three feet. Everything wobbled - the bike, my own confidence, the entire universe.
"I got you," she said to me, and I could feel her grip on the back of the seat, strong and reassuring. "Just pedal. Don't think, just pedal."
The first few pushes were crazy. My legs were someone else's, shaky and uncoordinated. The handlebars wobbled left, then right. I was certain I was going to fall.
But she was there, jogging alongside me, her hand steady on my back. "You're doing it," she kept saying. "You're actually doing it."
Eventually the wobbling eased up. The bike started to feel less like a crazed beast and more like an extension of myself. My legs developed a rhythm.
"I think I got it," I said, and that's when I made the error of glancing backward.
She was ten feet behind me, hands on her hips, smiling.
"Wait!" I yelled, but waiting was too late. The bike was moving, I was moving, and there was nothing to do but pedal or fall. So I pedaled.
The fear was present but mixed with something additional that caused me to want to laugh and scream simultaneously. The wind was whipping into my face, carrying the smell of grass and potential. My legs pumped harder, and the bike responded, picking up speed.
I was flying.
In that moment, the ground blurring beneath me and the football players shrinking to small dots, I knew what I'd been missing. This feeling of movement, of momentum, of being hardly in control but somehow sensing that you would be.
The crash was inevitable, of course. I know that now. When you're going too fast on something you've never ridden before, physics has a few ideas on how it ends. I was riding over some bumpy ground and I just panicked when I realized I had no idea how to stop and the bike flipped like it was trying to shake me off.
Which it was.
I went down hard, rolling on the grass, the bike clattering beside me. My palms were grated raw, both knees bleeding through my jeans (nothing too serious, though). My elbow burned. But I was laughing as I lay there looking up at the sky.
She hurried over, her face with concern and badly restrained amusement. "You okay? That was... that was really not bad for a first try."
"Not bad?" I sat up, wiping blood from my palm. "I think I broke everything."
"Nah, you're fine. Bruises heal." She hauled me to my feet, then uprighted the bike. "You want to try again?"
"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, I really do." Obviously sarcasm.
We both laughed.
I experienced what it meant to throw caution to the wind and be flying through the air. Even only for a few seconds.
Even if it meant bruises.
>>> Images were generated with AI
