Living Dreams

The Story that almost Ended

If I had it my way, I would never leave my house. But at the same time, I can’t bear to stay there another minute. Not enough doors with locks to keep me safe and alone.

That’s why I am trying to get my driver’s license. I want to be able to come and go as I wish. I’m not free. If I was free, then I would be happy. Maybe if I could drive and be perfectly alone, things would be better.

I write when I drive. In my head. I try to string together a couple of metaphors and make clever observations but I forget everything a second later. I try to connect everything. I am in the city. I come to a one-way street and connect it to writing. For me, writing is a one-way conversation. No one can interrupt me like they always do in real life. I want to be heard but I just can’t figure out how to talk to people without messing up. I hate it. I just want to write and let people read it if they wish. Comment too; leave me your thoughts.

I will not punch a clock. The fuel gauge is an illusion. I’ll go forever until I crash. I’ll sit on a laptop, suspended in this state of depression and anxiety—sometimes I’ll be numb—optimism and pessimism, doing too much or too little. Is this sentence a good idea? No, but watching the road is. Writing and driving, they’re the same thing. I am afraid to do something but I know I have to. I’m surrounded. These people are both smarter and dumber than me. Do they care if anyone else lives but themselves? I care about them but I also just want to go home. I’m timid in both situations. I want to speak my mind but I do not want to hurt anyone. I don’t want to speed but there’s someone tailing me!

How many times have I nearly died because one car was tailing another! I was walking and they couldn’t see me. Then they honked their horn and stopped. Confession: I told everyone I gave them this bitch stare and kept walking. I did. But once they were gone I was fighting back tears. My legs were shaking. Seeing Paisley Wolfe dragging herself home on the side of road is not uncommon where I live.

Today, I was going to check out a college. There was an accident on the side of the road. Why is it so hard to think about dying in the present when you’re looking to the future? A year and a half seems a lot farther away when you never reach it.

I was on this terrible road: potholes, sharp turns, narrow from the snowbanks. I was already speeding. There was a car right on my tail that won’t let up. There was a turn and you will die if you do anything above fifteen miles an hour. Here I was doing thirty-five. Next thing I knew, I’m facing oncoming traffic and they were not stopping. This was the only time I have ever felt truly alone. All of the sudden it’s up to me to not take out at least eight cars. It’s so unfair. I would have been going the speed limit. But I would have gotten rear-ended.

Is this how I want to die? My favorite band is playing on the stereo. I don’t necessarily like the people I am in the car with. Nothing I have ever written has been published and I haven’t become a well-known feminist icon or a humanitarian. I’m miserable. I don’t like waking up in the morning. I never got to take my revenge on any of my childhood bullies. I’m kind of hungry. Sure, I lost my virginity but it was under the most casual circumstances ever. I never finished that TV show. I hate my favorite book.

I spent my entire life as both a child and an adult. Earlier today, I put my car through the carwash. I’m behind the wheel, an adult amongst other adults but I watched the soap drizzle onto the windshield like whipped cream on ice cream and those blue noodles slap the car like it is being attacked by a giant octopus. Bewildered like a child. It was in my eyes, painted on my face over a generous layer of makeup. I was too mature for an immature young adult who was convinced she would change the world.

Then I got to thinking: all of the times I was convinced there was no point in existing. I’ll marry the wrong person. End up with kids that I do not want. Drown in debt. Live in a boring house. Taxes. The patriarchy. The heaviness I feel today will only get heavier. Is this my chance to right those wrongs that I refuse to face?

Is this how the book is supposed to end? On the second chapter with no one reading it? With the antagonists mourning beside the good characters. The shoulders of the world shrugged as it moves forward. Will it be my fault that I do not get a happy ending?

And even if I do live by some miracle. I sit close to the steering wheel so I can reach the pedals. The airbag will destroy my face. I think of the woman who stalks my dreams and what a car accident did to her. They don’t want to keep me beautiful. They just want to keep me alive. It has taken me years to be able to smile when I look in the mirror. I just wrote an entire book about a girl who needed to find herself beautiful. It is not a bad thing. Confidence is good. I’m confident everywhere but in the face of death. Staring into those dark orbs for eyes, I suddenly become pathetically indecisive.

And if not me, victims will be made of the other drivers and passengers in the eight cars around me. I don’t want to die. And I have no right to drag other people with me. I don’t know them. What if they’re newlyweds, students, parents, or children? No one deserves to die. Accidents don’t deserve to happen.

I have speeches to make in twenty years. I have books to write. Money to donate. A world to help. I like myself, which says a lot considering where I used to be. I need to make other people love themselves.

I inched the wheel a little to the right and drove forward. I glanced in the mirror and saw that car is still tailing me. I slowed down even more and felt them die a little on the inside before backing off.

Happy ending right? Well, here comes the loneliness again. It’s like people don’t realize that we experience things differently. They have driving experience, so why doesn’t everyone else? They feel okay, so everyone else does too. This wouldn’t make me feel bad, I can say these things to her because she won’t feel bad too.

You want to scream but you can’t because you need to keep control of the wheel. You want to cry but you can’t let the tears blind you. Your legs go numb but you can’t let them as if you have a choice. Being asked questions but you can’t speak because the panic is choking you.

My life was still in danger long afterwards. I didn’t want to drive anymore. I made stupid mistakes, as if I wanted to crash. Maybe I did. Maybe I wanted to be alone.

I want to be free. I want to come and go as I please. I want to fight my way into a good life. But I think I’ll get killed on my way to the battleground.