Suburban Goddess

“Excuse me, ma’am, can you please step out of the car with your license?”

“Yes, sir.” (There is no STEPPING out of this car. I rolled out as gracefully as I could.)

“Do you know why I pulled you over?”

“Actually, no sir.”

“When you pulled out of the parking lot, you pulled out into the middle lane instead of staying right.”

“Oh.” I had no idea that it was illegal to do so. Another reason you should have to take the driver’s test when you renew your license.

“Do you have your insurance card, Ms. MacLaughlin?”

Crap. I had the wrong purse. “Um, I don’t think so, officer. My purse is in the trunk. May I get it?”

“Sure, sure.” My passenger was starting to freak out inside. She gave me a wide-eyed OH MY GOD WE’RE GOING TO JAIL look. I shuffled around for a second and bonked my head on the soft top trying to get out. Since I was wearing heels, it caused me to stumbled a bit. K dropped her head into her hands. I gave the officer a sheepish grin and an apologetic smile as I unlocked the trunk. After shoving the items in my purse around for a moment, I gave the officer my best OOPS-I’m-An-Idiot look.

“Sir, I don’t seem to have my insurance card.”

“What kind of car is this?”

“A Lotus.”

“Really? What kind?”

“Um, a Lotus Elise.”

“Yeah, but what brand is that? Like a Lamborghini?”

“Um, no, a Lotus. It’s British.”

“You had anything to drink tonight, Ms. MacLaughlin?”

“Yes, sir, I had a couple glasses of wine. But we were there for a while. I only had two.” I swear, this was the God’s honest truth; I figured that even the jalapeno poppers wouldn’t mask the smell of merlot, and I am a die-hard believer in action-consequence. I was not drunk; there was no reason to lie.

“Could you step over here, ma’am? I’d like you to take a little sobriety test.”

At this point, I’m not even freaking out, but I see the car shaking as K, (who is drunk) is rocking back and forth. I stood with my feet together (in my ass-jacker heels, no small feat), and followed the officer’s finger with my eyes.

“You can get back in the car, ma’am.”

“Okay.” I climb back in the car and realize with dread that I’ve left my keys in the trunk lock. I watched as the red light of the timed alarm started blinking ominously. Please God, don’t let it go off until the officer gets back…. K looked at me with panic. “Are we going to jail?”

“No. I’m not drunk.”

“But you don’t have insurance!”

“I HAVE INSURANCE. I just don’t have my CARD.”

The officer returned with his ticket pad. “I’m gonna let you off with a warning, Ms. MacLaughlin. You ladies head straight home, and don’t wind this thing up, okay?”

“Yes, sir,” I answered with a smile, watching the light. Ten, nine, eight….

“You might need these…” he smiled, handing me the keys. I quickly shoved them in the ignition and hit the deactivate button.

“Thank you, sir.” I smiled back, and said a silent prayer of thanks. As he pulled around us to drive away, I started to laugh. K looked at me like I was crazy.

“What’s so freaking funny?”

“Because I can imagine him telling his trooper buddies later; you should have seen that Amazon try to get out of that little car!”

This entry was posted on December 31, 2006 at 9:48 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.