Chapter 1: The Beginning
He opened his eyes not yet feeling the unbearable pain that was to come. In the moment of peaceful shock, he looked down at his hands. Blood coated the skin in a way that he wondered what his hands used to look like. Still, he found the strength to cup them against his stomach to keep his organs from spilling out with each breath.
He recognized the black asphalt under him. He’d been thrown from the car. Twisting his head, he confirmed the whole story. The jagged metal of his car has been pushed perpendicular to the street blocking what traffic should be there. There is a smell of smoke and gas. Directly next to his car was another that had veered into his lane and now twisted its metal into the man’s torso like two creatures attacking one another.
There was a smell of smoke and gas, and he didn’t know if he could take his remaining sense of smell as a good sign or not. Maybe an ambulance could get there before it was too late. Delirium floated into his head, and it felt like he was floating. His body started turning cold. Visually, he could see himself shaking, but he didn’t feel it. His body wasn’t his own anymore.
With that, he knew the truth. This is where he will die. His failing brain wouldn’t let him make any peace with it other than the objective fact that it was true. All he can find himself capable of at that point was looking at the wreckage he was leaving behind.
Twenty feet from his twitching dying body on the other car, a driver laid on the hood in a blanket of glass that sliced her skin open more and more every time she tried to move. She was crying and trying to say something. The words were hard to make out.
It was a nice day. The sun was out. A gentle breeze carried the smells of a hundred gardens on the air. The trees rustled like the leaves were laughing. The man hated it all. It was too nice of a day for this to happen. Why couldn’t it be raining and dark. Why couldn’t the world be as miserable as he was. Life was a bitch like that sometimes.
The road was empty before the crash, but now a small crowd formed circling around the dying man and woman. They watched in panic trying desperately to figure out what to do. Sirens screamed through the air. They were still too far from being able to help in any real way. But they gave the false hope the crowd is looking for. At least, they could have some relief.
There was screaming and taking pictures, and everything played out like some kind of deranged theater production. The man looked back to the woman on the hood. He listened intently to the words she was saying. He listened as if solving this riddle will be the last job he had on Earth, and he needed to make it work.
“Uh.. I… Uh…”
‘What is it?’ he telepathically asked the suffering driver. ‘What do you need? Spit it out.’
“I… need…” she breathed deeply building her strength. Through blood filled lungs she finally said, “I need to see the doctor.” She repeated herself, “I need to see the doctor. I need to see the doctor.” Over and over, she said the sentence until the pain became too much and she was left muttering choked syllables through suffocated breathes.
The man dropped his head back to the pavement. He breathed deeply feeling death slowly grip him away. A feeling of anger overwhelmed him as he thought how stupid it was to call for a doctor. A doctor couldn’t do anything for either of them anymore.
He took a final look into the woman’s eyes. For the first time in his life, he empathized with someone. He shared her feelings, her fear. In the moment, he understood the urge to need something to help you feel safe. The red tear-filled eyes only wanted someone to be with her and take it all away. As foolish as it was, it made sense. The man’s final thought before fading away was this. All he wanted was to be home.
