‘Try the throttle,’ said Garovel. ‘Under your right hand. The brake is there, too.’
The bike surged forward, faster than Hector expected. He pulled on the brake, and the back tire came up. He fell out of the seat. The bike skidded slowly into him on its side.
Garovel floated over to him. ‘Well. I guess the paint job wasn’t important.’
The plan was to spend the entire day learning, of course. Garovel had allowed him to skip school, even, which gave Hector some idea of how important the reaper considered this trip to be. And as expected, the going was quite slow. He first practiced low-speed turns. Garovel advised him that for this type of motorcycle, turning at higher speeds would require countersteering, but to even reach those higher speeds, he had to be able to shift gears in a passable manner, which was perhaps the hardest part.
Shifting gears was an actual skill that he had to develop. It meant closing the throttle, holding the clutch, moving the lever with his left foot into the correct position, then easing off the clutch and throttling to pick up speed. Hector often released the clutch too quickly and ended up stalling the engine, but after a while, he started to get the hang of it.
Before attempting higher speeds, however, they decided to take a break. Hector had to fetch more fuel, anyway, and not being confident enough to actually ride to a gas station meant walking all the way there, purchasing a pair of canisters, filling them up, and overpaying the bearded clerk so that he didn’t think too hard about what Hector wanted it for. He also grabbed a bite to eat and took the opportunity to meditate for a little while.
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.