: Prompting Needed_

Joy Ride

The wind whistled by as David pulled another thorn out from his calf. Just like he had for the last five he had extracted, he winced and hissed in a sharp breath to fight the sting. It wasn't manly. It wasn't dignified. But somewhere, living in the same part of his brain that had told himself that he'd be able to hop right back on a bike at the age of fifty-five, a little voice assured him that wincing – and gasping – would fight the pain. The sixth point slid out from his leg easily and with a firm dollop of welling blood. His leg was beginning to look like that arm prop from the opening scene to Saving Private Ryan. He adjusted his position to look at other places where the branches of the briar patch may had stabbed him. He ran a hand over the skin too to feel for the intrusive spines. All he felt was blood, skin, hair. "Jeez Louise," he muttered. Cars drove past him in the lazy, swerving way they do when trying to avoid a man sitting on the curb. David was too low to see their faces and for that he was glad. He wiped his hands on the grass before he got up then spun in a small circle to find his son's bike tilting drunkenly in the bush.

"Flippin' idiot," he breathed in self-admonishment.

As he walked the bike uphill to get back home, he made sure to recline the machine so that it rolled only on the back tire. The front tire wobbled drunkenly on the front turny-part, and he saw that the wire attached to pull the brakes had come undone in the fall. His leg began to sting worse in protest at the slight climb. He rolled his shoulder forward a bit to pull against the warm ache that was beginning to feel like a small fire in his thigh. All this to prove that you could, he thought. The hill ahead – the one that had dragged him down to hell moments ago – continued to loom. Every step was telling him his leg was losing blood and every tenth step made him look down to see that he was fine. The cuts had clotted. It just hurt.

"Hey, Dave," a friendly voice called. David looked up and saw that his neighbor Allison was keeping pace with him in her SUV.

Oh great, he griped internally. Aloud, he replied in a light voice, "Hey, Allison. Taking a joy ride?" And how in the heck did you afford that after getting fired?

"Oh, no, but it looks like you did." She pointed at his legs and laughed. She actually laughed at him. David felt his face flush. "What happened? Where's Kevin?"

"He's at home," he said, just barely avoiding gritting his teeth against both the tiny points of fire in his leg and the flames he felt on his cheeks. "I was testing this bike, you see and..." He trailed off. There was no spinning his little moment of youthful reclamation. The entire event had been chock-full of him being a heel. "I'm not as young as I used to be." That last sentence came out a white flag, signaling the end to the conversation he so deperately wanted right then.

"Well, okay." Allison nodded, placed her hands at 'ten and two', then nodded again. "Do... do you need a lift?" She jerked her head towards the rear of her new car. "I've got the room."

David scrutinized her face for a second before shaking his head. Gosh dang it, she's just being nice, he thought. He shook his head then forced a wide smile at his helpful neighbor. "No, thanks. I've gotta walk all this off." He waved a hand at his lower half. Allison, thankfully, didn't pry further and instead wished him well as she sped away, up the hill. He watched her go then stopped when he saw Kevin running down the hill towards him. His son was taking the wild, carefree leaps down the paved hill that only the young and invincible can achieve. A pang of worry started to bubble up when David noticed that Kevin's shoes were untied. Other little details about his flailing son caught his attention, too. In one hand was a crushed cellophane wrapper to his favorite fiber bar. There was a smudge of either dirt or chocolate on the boy's face. His hair had obviously not been brushed this morning. All this was processed and catalogued before his kid jumped and skipped to a stop a few feet away. Kevin peeled off the wrapper from the obliterated bar and took a noisy, open-mouthed bite between gasps.

"Dang, Dad, you okay? Holy smokes, my bike!" Kevin dropped the bar and ran to the pendulous front tire and cradled it like a lost child. "What did you do?" Then he seemed to really look at his father. David stood and wavered. His one hand balanced the bike on the rear wheel and the other massaged a sore spot developing on his hip. Kevin's eyes dropped to the dried blood and the sock that had begun to soak up the tiny spots before the wounds had closed.

Kevin waited four whole seconds before he doubled over in laughter. David's face began to warm again before he, too, started to feel the tickle of laughter creep up inside of him. The two guffawed at each other long enough for the neighbor in the house at which he had stopped to peek out and ask if they were okay.

David waved off the concern and then walked... well, limped was now more the term... back to the house with his son.