hey hey new project time while other one stews
this one has kids with powerrrrrrrrs/fantasy I am much more comfortable writing powers than real life
this is so ridiculously inspired by Skins I can't even.
let's see if it actually pans out mannn
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-1-
All I have left is a ten dollar bill and a water bottle full of peach vodka. Home is miles away, the highway is empty. Pretty sure no one would pick up a teenager in all black, hair matted around her face. Birds could live in my hair. Birds could’ve shit in it. Maybe they have. I haven’t bothered to check. Birds are fine. These cold clumps of trees are fine. Better than people, anyway. I swig the vodka and make a face. The peach flavor makes me feel like I’m drinking essence du Barbie. At least it makes the numbers blur. At least, with no people around me, I can’t see the numbers to begin with. My hand runs over the guardrail. Freezing iron slides sharp under my palm. Why me?
Another swig.
Why me, God?
The sky is clear, stars puncturing black like crystal fangs marks. No moon. I can see for miles, the road winding around the cliff face. The forest looms below. The air is still. Two headlights blare behind me, my shadow growing tall in a few seconds. Just like that, my peace is shattered. The rumble of the engine slows. A van. A woman with a ponytail and a face. I don’t look at it.
“Need a ride, sweetie?”
“I’m fine, really.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re in the middle of nowhere!”
She’s got a point. My bed would be nice. Mom’s probably worried. I climb in, thanking her. She turns up the heat and smiles. Sick curiosity rises in my throat. I glance at her. There, above her head in bright red letters, like a neon sign hanging invisibly, is the date she’ll die; 20:01 4-11-2013. That’s precisely four minutes from now.
I take another swig. I should probably get out of this car.
I could tell her to stop driving. I could. Or I could distract her for four minutes. Make her miss her death on the road.
“Can you pull over?” I deadpan. The woman glances my way.
“Are you alright?”
“Gotta puke.”
She takes in my disheveled appearance and the bottle in my hand. She pulls over, and I jump out. Run at top speed. Stumble a little, because I’m halfway to piss drunk. Hide behind the bushes and watch her get out, call for me. She gets on her phone. Probably calling the po-po. I check my own phone; two minutes left. A hundred and twenty seconds. The van sputters exhaust into the air. She’s standing yards away from it. Good. Whatever drunk idiot hits her, whatever gust of wind blows the van over the side, whatever raccoon darts in front of her and makes her swerve won’t kill her now.
“I’m telling you, it was a girl in a leather jacket! Jeans. Really dark hair, all messed up. Her face was dirty, like she’d been sleeping in the woods! Uh, five seven? Brown eyes. Maybe a hundred fifteen pounds? I don’t know, I’m not good at guessing!”
Wrong, I mouth, and take another swig of vodka. A hundred thirty pounds. Size twelve since age eight. Get it right, woman. I check my phone. Forty seconds.
“I’ve mostly certainly not been drinking!” The woman yells into the phone. “She was! She had a bottle in her hand!”
It’s a Saturday night. Of course I have a bottle. Twenty eight seconds.
“I am not on any pills, for crissakes! Stop accusing me of things and get someone out here to find her! She’s just a kid.”
Wrong again, lady. If I was just a kid, I wouldn’t be waiting belly-down in these bushes for you to die. Eleven seconds. I hold my breath. This time, it has to work. I kept her off the road. She shouldn’t die.
“Officer! Thank god. Please, just listen to me. I’m driving on 45 west and I see this girl on the side of the road -”
Five. Don’t blink.
“She’s wearing a leather jacket and jeans -”
One.
The sound of thunder, a hammer splitting the earth open. Something crumbles on the cliff above, dirt raining down. The woman doesn’t even have time to look up. The mudslide pulses down the cliff and sweeps into her van, the sound of screaming metal as the van and guardrail meet, as the van goes flying off the cliff side. I see her face for one second more, the timer above her head vanishing. Red letters blink out as her body is pummeled like a rag doll, carried away by the wave of dirt, and spun over the edge of the road and into the dark trees below.
I vomit everything onto my shoes. I sit on the road, my back resting against the molted lumps of dirt that killed the woman. More vodka. More will wash away the taste of puke. Of death. They always die. No matter what I do, something always gets them. I was stupid for thinking I could save this one.
Red and blue lights rotate in the corner of my eye. Police cars pull up, officers spilling out. They wrap me in blankets and call for a helicopter to find the woman. I tell them not to bother. She’s dead. They shovel dirt off the road and ask me questions.
“Family?”
“Mom. She’s at home, probably crying. She likes crying.”
The officer - a woman - softens her expression. “Why’s that?”
“Getting divorced.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. They’ve been getting divorced for seven years now.”
“Is that what you were doing hitchhiking out here? Trying to get away from her?”
“I thought all super-smart cops retired and became private investigators? That’s how it is on BBC, anyway.”
“You’re drunk.” She says. Observation, not accusation.
“Yes. But you, ma’am, are not. And that’s all that matters.”
“Look,” She pushes her bangs from her eyes. “I’ve been in your shoes. I’m not going to write you up for underage drinking. I know it’s hard. Just promise me you won’t do it again.”
I hold up a drowsy pinky. She holds out hers, and we lock them. She turns back to her clipboard.
“Let’s get you home, delinquent.”
She slides into the driver’s side of a squad car. I ride in the passenger seat. I haven’t looked above her head yet, but I glance now - the red numbers glow in the darkness of the car. 14:22, 9-19-2020. She’s got six years left. That’s good. Six years is better than a week. She’s too nice to be killed in a week.
They all are.
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