Mercy

CHAPTER 7

They left 95 to merge onto 109, a busy two-lane road that wound through a number of quiet suburbs. Sam’s home was ten minutes away. Julie planned to park her bike in Sam’s garage and drive her Prius into Cambridge, arriving in plenty of time to greet Trevor-with his library book, she hoped. Her electric car did not turn heads like her motorcycle, but she got occasional questions from people considering a purchase, and a few scowls from some who typecast her as a tree-hugging liberal.

A white Honda Civic, driving erratically in front of Sam, triggered Julie’s concern. The first sign of trouble came when the Civic swerved onto the shoulder where the road curved sharply. The car wheels chopped up dirt and gravel, kicking loose stone onto the road before the driver corrected the error. The sky had darkened enough so Julie could see light from a cell phone illuminate the driver in a bluish haze.

Damn menace, she thought.

Sam motored along behind the Civic while Julie slowed to put some distance between her bike and the distracted driver. She wanted Sam to do the same; sometimes he trusted that his riding skills would trump other people’s stupidity.

The road turned. Julie could not see around the bend, but she did note that the double yellow dividing line was a solid one.

Do not pass. Blind curve.

Maybe they need a line for “don’t look at your phone while driving,” she thought.

The Civic veered again to the right. Julie’s breaths came in short bursts. She suddenly felt unsteady on her bike as her anxiety spiked.

She glanced at the speedometer.

Forty.

She had no wiggle room if that Civic did something really foolish. Before Julie could honk out a warning to Sam, the Civic swerved yet again, this time steering into the left lane just at the point when the blind curve straightened.

Immediately, Julie saw what was coming down the road. A red pickup truck (Ford, Dodge, impossible to say) was headed right for the Civic. The world downshifted into slow motion.

Julie, who had sensed the danger, knew for certain that the Civic had drifted too far left to avoid a collision.

These cars are going to hit… slow down… pull off to the side of the road.

She braked, preparing to pull over. The driver of the pickup blared his horn and slammed on his brakes. The truck went into a skid and the Civic turned hard right. Long black skid marks marred the road where the Civic’s tires failed to gain traction. Sam braked maybe a second after Julie, but he was in front of her, closest to the coming crash.

The next moments happened fast, too fast to take it all in, and yet each brutal detail came at her like single frames of an advancing filmstrip. The pickup swerved to avoid a head-on collision, but the Civic smacked into the truck’s rear. There was a ferocious crunch of metal on metal. Glass shattered. The impact changed the trajectory of the pickup and sent it at an angle into the oncoming traffic. It crossed the highway dividing line and came shooting toward Sam like a half-ton missile.

Sam was pulling to the side of the road, leaning his body and bike as far right as he could without tipping over. As this happened, the Civic spun in a complete circle before it skirted across the left lane, then shot off the road entirely and crashed into the trees. Branches snapped fiercely and more glass exploded as if a bomb had gone off inside the car, followed by a whoosh when the Civic’s air bag deployed.

Julie applied her brakes hard. Her bike teetered without going over. Sam accelerated, trying to avoid a direct hit with the pickup as it veered into their lane. Julie was overcome with a terrible knowing. The pickup was traveling too fast and Sam was not going fast enough. The front left fender of the pickup collided hard with the rear tire of Sam’s motorcycle. The pickup slipped into a harder skid as the rear wheel of Sam’s bike lifted off the road.

The bike’s front wheel spun across the pavement like a runaway gyroscope before it lost traction entirely. The bike went airborne, with Sam riding it the whole way. How high was he when he finally let go-five feet? Maybe more. His body was still moving forward. It looked like both he and the bike were flying.

Sam flipped over in the air and landed hard on his back as the bike’s rear wheel struck him in the chest. The bike bounced off him, then the pavement, with a loud metallic crunch. It flipped again, and again, until momentum carried the crumpled heap of metal off into the trees where it came to a stop, front wheel still spinning.

Julie threw her body weight hard right and skidded to a full stop, letting her bike fall away as she tumbled to the ground. She had slowed down enough for a soft landing.

Sam had not slowed at all. He skidded helplessly down the road on his back. Ten feet… fifteen… twenty…

Julie thought she heard him screaming, only to realize it was her own terrified voice. She pushed to her feet and ran toward Sam. Her body lurched awkwardly from side to side as she fought to regain her balance. Blood roared in her ears. A blaring horn was stuck on one long wailing note. From the corner of her eye, she could see the metal carcass of Sam’s motorcycle caught in a tangle of weeds.

Sam lay spread-eagled on his back in the middle of the road, his head and shoulders extended over the yellow dividing line. An approaching car shuddered to a stop just before it would have crushed Sam beneath its wheels. A trail of blood followed Sam’s path down the road, ending at his body.

Julie registered that Sam’s leg was bent at an awkward angle. His right wrist looked misshapen, obviously fractured. But she saw Sam’s head loll from side to side, and her heart leapt.

Thank God, he’s alive. He’s alive!

She ran toward him, screaming at full volume, “Somebody call nine-one-one!”