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[Keetmanshoop]

The soft impact and crunch of the snow as I step into the forest reminds me of the worst thing that ever happened to me. I was 19 at the time, in the front passenger seat of my friend's car. He was driving and three others were in the back, I didn't know two of them, hell, I don't even recall their names now. My best friend sat directly behind me, cracking wise, making my sides hurt, and filling the air with the melody of laughter.

We pulled up to a stop sign on the back road. Clear both ways, he turned left. The crunch of metal and violence of my ear slamming into the window were the only things I could think about in that parody of time; I was the only one who existed. My temples pounded and my forehead was constricted. The world was darkened and blurry and made no sense as I tried to gain my bearings. Something warm was impossibly dripping up my face, pooling over my head as the ultimate act of rebellion against the world.

I struggled against the binding agent on my chest until I dropped onto my shoulders. I looked to my side and saw my friend oddly contorted on the ceiling. His face was toward me, his feet were almost kicking him in the back of the head. We were upside down, the world made sense again. My foot hit my friend as I uprighted myself. The door wouldn't open, the window was broken out but the snow was too strong for me to fight. I sat there looking at my friend's probably dead body. I watched his blood pool around him and almost combine with the red river coming from the backseat.

I struggled in the shattered glass to peer around my seat. I couldn't tell who was where. They were a combination of arms, legs, and bloody cuts. I felt my stomach punch my mouth but I wanted to get out of there even more. I scraped at the white window until the snow turned red, but I crawled out and laid on my back to catch my breath. The mid-afternoon sky was gray and tasted like exhaust. My stomach punched my mouth again and I rolled over as my lunch met the crunchy snow.

The clouds lazily sauntered by. They kept the sun's secrets from me no matter how long I laid there. The cold nipped at my nose and fingers, and soon I didn't feel them as I departed into the comfort of darkness. The silence washed over and welcomed me.

I felt something invade my arm and spread through my flesh, rupturing the calm underneath and stealing my peaceful ignorance. A blinding light showed itself to me then. It was spherical, almost oval maybe, I couldn't tell exactly but I did know that everything would be fine now as I could feel my entire body dusting off slumber. I was prone in a white room with the chaos of life around me. Hidden faces moved too quickly for me to follow but I didn't try, I let them stay as they were as long as they let me stay as I was. There was some pain in my arms, legs, and head but it was like a dull heartbeat instead of the sharp stabbing of being ripped apart. They disappeared again and I was left to my dark sanctuary.

After I adjusted to the brightness again, I knew something was wrong. There was no tunnel, no light bearing down to remove me, no pain. I felt like I was in limbo again but the pictures were prettier. Another hidden face showed up and moved its mask as sounds entered my consciousness, slipping into my cold brain and letting me know that I would be home before I knew it. What was it I knew? I couldn't feel anything, I couldn't smell anything, my ears took too long to decipher even minute communication so what was it I knew?

My reply was short: a single grunt was all I could muster to the mask. It let me be and the pale, eggshell world stayed the same until I closed my eyes and saw even more vivid images, some of friends, some of family, some of books I read as a child. What stood out most were the periods betwixt the slides: dark and treacherous voids that gnawed my memories away without any teeth.

The bitter wind brought me back to the present. I was leaning against a tree, the bark of a poplar reminding me of my recovery from the crash: smooth with a few knots breaking the monotony. The doctors and therapists discharged me five months after I started therapy. I was glad to be out of there, the desperation, the hopelessness, the stink of anger at everything that was not the problem, it all combined to create the air I breathed. I didn’t take pity on those who remained, they knew what they had to do and instead wanted to feel loved temporarily. They were more lost than before they wound up there.

I come back every year on the day I lived when four others died within arm's reach of me. I've been told to move on, to remember the good times I had with my friends, but how do you remove death from your life? Continue living, I guess, but I don't have a day where I don't relive what happened, whether something I hear or see triggers it or it's a nightmare that drains me in the middle of the night and refuses to let me sleep.

I love you guys. I'll never find better people in the world.

[EG NeoMorph]

Holy crap dude... You should have no problem selling your stories if they are as good as this... I started to read it and it didn't sink in until I read it the next time through (damned morphine) and then it hit me like the crash itself. VERY FOOKIN EVOCATIVE to say the least.

Maybe it's because I have been in something similar but it really talked to me...

Big question... did it happen to you or is it fiction... either way it's 11/10 for a good short story... Promise me you will send me some of your work in the future...

[mistajace]

that was so well done.. i too am curious of the origin of this story. nice work.

[AmbientPanda]

post more please. we miss the excerpts from your book, and stuff like this.

awesome job.

[EG NeoMorph]

One thing I've been wondering about with this story... if it was clear both ways, THEN WHAT HIT THEM? The only thing I can think is that it was a rear-ender.

The only time I have been in a crash which tumbled the car was when I was in a CB DF hunt where a guy goes off into the wilderness and then starts transmitting... you try to find them by driving around and working the direction via signal strength... guy I was with had an old ricer and we were coming up to a junction in the middle of nowhere, really fast... He attempted a flashy handbrake turn. I say attempted because when he pulled hard on the handbrake it turned into handbroke instead as the cable snapped lol. We ended up flipped upside down in a ditch. A guy in a classic Triumph 2500 PI ended up with his car in a field that had bushes all around it and none of the bushes were disturbed... he had hit a humpback bridge fast not knowing that the road bent sharply to the left right after lol... and a girl in a mini (car, not dress) had to be towed out of a ditch.

Was a pretty messed up hunt that day lol. Was amazing that nobody was injured badly. Worst was a sprained wrist (me) and a twisted ankle (my driver).

[Keetmanshoop]

Big question... did it happen to you or is it fiction...

Total fiction. I just sat down and started writing one day and that's what came out.

[EG NeoMorph]

Well all I can say is that you must have been channelling a crash victim because that was awesome dude. Flash fiction at its best.

[EG Haggard Spartan]

I'll give my response later for u Eronios. Well done my friend.

[Red Intensity]

Big question... did it happen to you or is it fiction...

Total fiction. I just sat down and started writing one day and that's what came out.

It would take me days of preparation just to think of a scenario as believable and viable as that, and even then it would end in a crescendo of bloodshed.

Anyway, good short story.

[EG Haggard Spartan]

This really took me to the situation. Having witnessed an extremely terrible accident, this is really well done.

Glad to have you back Eronios, I expect a lot more stuff here in the future, love reading your work.

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