Impact
“Ooh, I’m so excited!” Esther squealed gleefully as she walked down the sidewalk. The school band was on a trip to the beach. Esther was with Leah, her girlfriend, and Felix, a percussionist. All the kids were divided into groups of three or four - they were not allowed to go anywhere without their group. Esther’s bikini was covered in a loose shirt and old gym shorts. Leah’s one-piece was only hidden partially by a cardigan, and Felix wore a cheap shirt in addition to his swim trunks.
“Did you bring sunscreen? I think I forgot to buy some,” Leah worried, digging through the bag hanging from her arm, only partially paying attention to what was in front of her.
“Of course,” Esther waved off her worry dismissively. “You know how easy I burn.”
Felix came to a stop, and the girls paused too, confused. Esther turned around in time to see him shift his position to be behind the girls rather than beside them. She followed his glare to find a man in a hoodie across the street shuffling away. “Leah, you should have covered up better,” he mumbled, resuming his walk as if nothing had just happened.
“What? Why, what was he doing?” Leah asked.
“Possibly nothing, but the fact he fled when I caught on makes me think otherwise. I think he was trying to get a pic of you,” he explained.
“Ew,” Esther shuddered.
“I’m not even in a bikini,” Leah said, shocked. “There are people all over the place in all kinds of swimsuits. It’s a beachside town, for God’s sake. I thought it would be okay.”
Esther wanted to comment that Leah should never assume it was safe to expose skin, but the mood was already ruined enough, and she didn’t want to bring it down further. Instead, she searched for a topic change. Her eyes immediately caught sight of some clothing on display through a window. She paused, looking at the outfits on the mannequins. “Wow, look at that shirt. So chic.”
“Want to stop and do some quick shopping?” Felix asked.
“Oh, I’m afraid I’d just buy the whole store,” Esther said, the bracelet of another mannequin catching her attention. “Go on ahead, I’ll catch up in a second. Just wanna window shop real quick.”
The group did not, in fact, move on without her. Felix and Leah simply stood to the side and started a conversation while they waited for Esther to finish looking at different displays. Over a couple of minutes, Esther had wandered farther down the sidewalk without them noticing. That was when a dress across the street caught her attention.
“Hey guys, I’m gonna check out over there!” Esther yelled toward the other two. She waited for a moment, but there was no response or reaction from them. They must not be able to hear her. She moved over to the nearby intersection, texting Leah to let her know she was going to cross the street. When she put her phone back in her purse, the walk light was on.
As Esther crossed the road, a car approached from her left. She wasn’t concerned; there was a red light. She didn’t know the driver was in a rush to get to a job interview and was perfectly willing to run a red on an empty intersection. She didn’t know the driver would fail to notice her.
Leah jumped upon hearing the sound of squealing tires nearby. She searched around as if she were in imminent danger. “What was that?” she asked, but quickly noticed a car farther down the road, eschew in an intersection. After a brief moment, the car peeled off in a burst of speed, leaving behind something lying on the road
“Leah, where’s Esther?” Felix asked, his voice taut with worry.
A few people on the sidewalks had started to slowly and hesitantly approach the shape lying in the road, but nobody got close enough to see the damage. Leah and Felix ran up in a panic, but Leah had to immediately back away again, hyperventilating.
Felix remained stoic, checking for major injuries and a pulse, seemingly unaffected by the bloody body or even the bone sticking out of the skin. He told an onlooker to call the police before carefully feeling around for what might be broken.
Leah, on the other hand, couldn’t look at the twisted body of her girlfriend. She stood a distance away, back turned to Felix and Esther, watching a line of blood drip down the hill as her vision blurred with tears.
“Sir, I’m sorry, but we’re receiving a lot of noise complaints from others. Some of these people are in grieving, we’re gonna have to ask you to take your class outside,” the nurse asked. “We have a small fountain by the main entrance, there should be enough benches for your class there.”
“Can I at least get an update? We’ve been waiting for two hours with no word,” Mr. Gooden said.
“Well, sir, Esther needs surgery, but she’s not in a stable enough condition yet,” she said. “Our doctors are doing their best, I assure you.”
Mr. Gooden sighed and thanked the lady, who quickly ran off. He turned to his class and ushered them outside, explaining why things were taking so long. “This is all my fault,” Mylie. A flutist, wailed as they stepped outside. “I was the one who suggested we take the trip. None of this would have happened if I hadn’t suggested going to the beach.”
The class was quick to assure her it wasn’t her fault. Leah spoke up. “No, I should have stayed with her as she window-shopped. If I had kept a closer eye on her...”
“I can’t even remember the license plate of the idiot!” Felix complained, upset.
“Stop it,” Mr. Gooden interrupted before anybody else could blame themselves. “You guys blaming yourselves is senseless. It’s as if Esther’s mother blamed herself because this never would have happened if she wasn’t born. Nobody here doubts that if somebody had been present, they would have made a difference. The fact you weren’t present isn’t your fault. Esther isn’t a defenseless lamb that needs escorting everywhere, you had no obligation to follow her every step.”
The class fell silent. And they remained silent. The entirety of a high school band, silent for several hours. The rambunctious teens, all lost in their own thoughts, beside themselves with worry for their beloved classmate.
