An Open Sky

Chapter Thirty-Seven ~Alexa~

I tossed my backpack into the back seat, slipping my hood back down over my shoulders. I shakily inserted the key and brought the heat pouring into me and rubbed my rain-dampened hands together. I pulled out into the line of cars possessed by anxious students gathering by the road, having had enough confinement for one day. I longed to regain my freedom.

                I glanced down the road. There shouldn’t have been so long of a line considering the school was home to barely three hundred students. As I drove through the blinding rain, I could make out the frantic flashing lights of an ambulance. I jumped to find a brightly colored police officer knocking on my window. Reluctantly, I rolled it down, barely hearing him over the rain that was storming through my car.

                “Stay on the left side of the road…accident…will direct you.”

                I nodded, rolling up my window and examining the dampened fabric of the passenger seat. I pulled forward, following the arms of the man directing traffic. He was crumpled down into is jacket, bracing himself against the wind. My eyes drifted to the pile of at least three cars off to my right. The two outer cars had damage to the front and back, suggesting that the metallic silver car was once in between the two. My eyes followed a trail of glass to the rutted heap of metal that was once recognized as a car.

                The car had completed several rolls before breaking through the barrier into the ditch below. I wasn’t sure if what I’d seen was even a full car. My imagination put me into the driver’s seat. My stomach churned as I pictured myself rolling, crying, bleeding…

                A car horn blared behind me, the urgency of it pushing me forward.

                I clicked on the radio, searching for comfort, but only becoming more unsettled. I couldn’t quite figure out the source of my discomfort. I didn’t know who was involved in the accident; I hadn’t recognized the cars, but maybe the very mystery of it emitted my distress.

                I finally pulled into an empty garage and stepped into an empty house. It had an ominous feeling when I was alone. The darkened house, not helping my mood, was once again left abandoned as I pulled back out of the garage.

                I parked across the street from the Frontier Bar, deciding to pay Dale a visit. His smiling face would take the gloom off of things.

                I stepped through the doors, the rain thudding gently on the sidewalk behind me. I walked to the counter, sliding in a seat across from an unfamiliar face. She turned to me.

                “How can I help you?” Her smile was bright, teeth matching her whitening hair. She had soft wrinkles surrounding her warm brown eyes. The gleam behind them told me that she had quite the story to tell. Confronted by her hospitality and not Dale’s, I frowned.

                “Where’s Dale? He’s normally working now.” I made no attempt to hide my disappointment.

                “Oh, he’s at the hospital,” I could feel my eyes bulge out of my head. She glanced up at me and continued, “Oh no, not him, sorry for the scare there sweetie.” She patted my arm; I flinched. Sweetie? I’m not eight. Do I look like a child to you? “He’s there visiting a boy. Poor kid was in a pretty bad car accident, I guess. I heard he’d been living with Dale for a few days now, just got a new car and everything.”  

                I tried to ignore my quickening heartbeat. “What, um, what color was the car?” I wished I wouldn’t have asked, out of fear for the answer.

                “I believe it was a silver Dodge Stratus. Dale seemed pretty proud of the deal he’d gotten for it. I’d seen the boy here a few times; Dale said he was a good kid, a strong worker.”

                My face flushed, all the heat escaping my body. My stomach was once again churning. Aidan’s face flashed before my eyes, as the face of a boy hunched like a vulture behind the counter of a bar, not the boy crushed and broken inside of a car.

                “Thank you,” I said, sliding out of my seat.

                “Are you okay?” She called after me, “Don’t you want something?”

                I didn’t take my time to reply.