Tonight

              The moonlight fell upon the dashboard and spread over the rounded glove compartment. Street lamp’s sharp amber rays peeked into the windows and disappeared, giving just enough light to get a glimpse of two hands clasped in the center of the bench seat.  Cool air blew through the windows and kissed Cole’s face as his truck tore down a narrow farm to market road. The song “Tonight, Tonight” by the Smashing Pumpkins filled the cab and seemed to blow out the windows.

                This was Cole’s first night off in over a month and he had been dying to take his girlfriend Sandra out as he had promised. Her small frail hand fit inside of his like a glove. Her finger nails scratched into his palms in a circular motion giving him brief bouts of goose bumps.  The small white flowers that dotted the blue tank top clung tight to her body and seemed to glow in the moonlight. Her soft blonde hair stood up in thin lengthy strands as the wind blew through it.  “How the hell did I manage to catch this one?” he thought to himself.  It took three years to find her, the one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. 

                They needed to be in the next town in 20 minutes to see a show at the newly restored drive in theater. She had been so excited to see the sign announcing its return to the community and had reminded Cole about it every Friday ever since. He liked how simple she was. She didn’t have any need to go out to fancy restaurants or go shopping. He liked how something like a six dollar double feature made her baby blues light up. His foot pressed steadily on the gas and his left hand white knuckle gripped the steering wheel as he rounded the sharp corners. He heard the click of Sandra’s seat belt and felt her scoot close to him. She put her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek and neck. It took everything he had to keep his eyes on the road and not run off into the ditch. Hot breath intensified on his ear lobe as she whispered “I love you” for the first time. His heart skipped a beat and a smile stretched across his face. It took him by surprise, but he didn’t hesitate a second to say it back. For once in his hard life of 20 years he was truly happy.  It occurred to him how a night like this could make a lifetime of pain almost forgettable. When she came into his life, it was like he awoke from a long uncomfortable sleep. 

                The CD skipped to the next track and “1979” came on. He took his eyes off the road for small instances in a double taking fashion and looked at her while she thumbed through the CD book. He smiled as her eyes met his. “What?” she said. “Nothing” he said. A playful smile stretched across her face as she threw the CD book into the seat next to her and scooted even closer to him. She threw her arms around his neck and brought his head to her level. He hesitated for a moment, trying to keep his eyes on the road. She kissed the side of his mouth, coaxing him into a kiss that he would not be able to resist.  The sudden contact was a rush of adrenaline for them both. Heat from Sandra’s nostrils puffed onto his upper lip as she reacted to the butterflies. Everything seemed to move in slow motion for the two. Time fell into a crawl. Her hair whiplashed around their faces and the music became a cluttered noise in the background somewhere.

                Everything began to speed up again suddenly as the corner of his left eye began to redden and intensify. Realizing what it was, he broke from the kiss to see a wall of head lights coming his way. He swerved away from the center stripe he was almost straddling, but the Jeep caught the front driver side corner of the pick up as they passed. The truck spun and out of control and rolled twice into the ditch. As it spun and rolled he heard Sandra scream amongst the dull sound of crunching steel and the breaking of glass. The truck came back to a rest on its wheels in the muddy ditch.

The imposing smell of gasoline made Cole regain consciousness abruptly. The rusty taste of blood caked the corners of his lips from the stinging cuts inside of his mouth. His head pounded and so did his heart. Without looking, he reached over to his right and found nothing but a cold seat and scattered trash.  His eyes fell upon the shattered windshield in front of him. His side of the windshield had been spider cracked all across it, but the passenger side was completely gone. Fearing the absolute worst had happened, he tried to push the door open, but found it to be crushed shut. He pushed the button on his seat belt and let it slide across his chest. He grabbed the sides of the widow and began to pull himself out of the wreckage. He fell onto the muddy road side bellow. His body felt as though it may fall apart at any time and that he may have to relearn how to walk. He struggled to put one foot in front of the other as he attempted to move toward the road, but the sharp pains in his lower back and knees prevented him from making any real progress. He managed to hold his body at least half way upright. Walking the way he did reminded him of the way one would walk after jumping off a spinning tire swing, walking in a sideways zig zag motion with no ability to hold ones bearing. A hot flash of heat singed the hairs on his neck as the pickup exploded sending him to his face. It happened so fast that he didn’t even feel the white hot chunk of steel push through the back of his shoulder and stopped, sticking out of his right peck.  His nerves awoke and the pain nearly made him pass out as he attempted to remove it. Realizing that he couldn’t do it alone, he picked himself up once more. The only thing that kept him from passing out on the ground until help arrived was the thought of Sandra. He couldn’t stop thinking of how a night like this could fuck up so suddenly, leaving people hurt or possibly dead. In a daze, he scanned the darkened horizon for any sign of Sandra. His head bobbled from side to side and his blood stained body shook as he hopelessly searched through the high grass.

                A flicker of light from the burning heap highlighted something 20 feet away in the ditch. A punch of hope and fear landed square on his heart as he realized that that something appeared to be blue. He began to make his way over to it and the closer he got, the more that object began to take form. He dropped to his knees beside her and took her broken body in his arms. He held her head in the crook of his arm as his eyes scanned her body and focused on a bloody tear in the side of the shirt. Her face was pale and eerily glowed with the flicker of the fire off in the distance. Her eyelids hung at half mast as she looked up at him. A small hand found its way onto his forearm and gave it a weak squeeze as their eyes met. A tear fell from the corner of her eye as she began to cough and shake from the cold and loss of blood. He leaned over to kiss her forehead and felt her small body become limp in his arms. His eyes filled with tears as he looked to the sky. It was the clearest sky he had ever seen. The stars gave off an abnormal amount of light; making them seem unreal and hollow, like fluorescent light bulbs hanging in the dark distance. He closed his eyes to let the salty drops race down his cheeks as his chest ached and intensified with every beat of his heart. He heard the faint sound of sirens off in the distance and the smell of burning rubber and dewy grass began to fade as the sirens got louder. Their whine began to turn into a high pitched pinging sound. His head began to spin as everything seemed to fall away around him. The feelings of heartbreak and emptiness seemed to be torn away from him as he began to squeeze his eyes tighter in attempt hold onto those feelings as if they were confetti being sucked out a car window. The pulsing sound got louder until he opened his eyes.

                They opened to a dusty ceiling fan whooshing over his head. The early morning light poured in through the cracks of the blinds and dripped onto the floor. He hit the “off” button on his alarm clock and brought himself up to a sitting position at the edge of the bed. He rubbed his right eye with the heel of his hand and picked up a half spent pack of Luckystrikes next to a creased and faded picture of a girl in a blue tank top. He touched the flame to the end of the cigarette and soon let a stream of smoke out and began to scratch the back of his neck. He let his hand slide down to his right shoulder and down to his right peck, over a 7 year old scar.