The best things take a little time

Once upon a time, in a house by the sea, there lived a young girl. She worked in the nearest village, but this was some miles away, so it was sensible that she learned to drive.
I wrote about this girl at that time, which was about five years ago. I was still on a franchise with BSM, and driving a Vauxhall Corsa. Now, the young girl didn't find driving easy. It wasn't so much that she couldn't control the car, it was more a fear of other road users. We had several lessons in a quiet car park before she felt that she could venture out onto public roads. Then, to start with, she would get very anxious when other vehicles approached from any direction.
The weeks turned into months and the months turned into years. Sometimes I wouldn't see her for months at a time. However, slowly but surely, she was developing into a nice, controlled driver.
Whilst with BSM I changed from the Corsa to a Fiat 500. In time, I left BSM  and set up my own driving school, leasing a Clio, then a Fiesta before buying my current Alfa.
The young girl moved to Inverness, changed jobs and, finally, took (and passed) her theory test. "How do you feel about taking your test? " I asked her. "No, I don't think I could drive on my own" she replied. I thought she could, but the trouble was, she had relied on me for so long, it was just too easy to ask me what to do, even though she admitted she knew what to do.
Finally, the decision was made. She was going to book her test.
In the hour lesson before her test she had everything thrown at her. The Stornaway ferry had come in and she had to deal with that traffic, a coachload of tourists had arrived in Ullapool and were wandering aimlessly around, oblivious to us approaching. And the bin men were making their way around the village, stepping out from behind their lorry.
"What if that happens to me in the test? " she asked.
"Well, you have just dealt with it, without any help from me, so it's no problem" I replied.
Forty minutes later, I stood at the Fire Station as she completed her test. I could see the examiner say something to her, then she opened the door and looked at me, tears flowing down her cheeks.
"I passed. I PASSED!"
She ran to me and threw her arms around me. "I can't believe it. He just said I passed."
It's always a high whenever a pupil passes, but some are more special than others. And Hayley's was as special as it gets. It had taken five years (on and off), and she had had lessons in five different cars, but she had passed her test and now had her freedom.

In the excitement she had forgotten to pay me, so she text me and asked if I could meet her in Inverness the next day. "Of course. Better still, I can meet you after you finish work and you can drive home - your first drive as a qualified driver."
I met her as she finished work and she got in the driver's seat. "I've forgotten what to do already - I only passed yesterday."
"No you haven't. You can drive home and I'm not going to say a word."
"But which way will I go?"
"I'll leave that up to you."
Just typical.... Her drive home coincided with schools finishing and hundreds of schoolchildren streaming out of school.
"I'm not going to say a word" I reminded her, as she turned to ask me a question.
She got home, without any trouble at all, and without any help from me.
"That was ok. I didn't feel under any pressure"
And that was perhaps the key. Perhaps she had always put herself under pressure to pass and that had caused her to continually doubt her abilities.
This weekend she is going to look to buy a car. I always get pleasure from seeing ex-pupils driving around. I will be positively beaming when I see Hayley driving around on her own.