End

“Tori?” I asked. “Can you take me?”
“Take you where?”
“To the scene of the accident.”
…

Tori kicked at a stone, sending it skittering down the hard-packed, dirt road to disappear somewhere in the trees on either side. The day was sunny, but the overhanging tree branches stretched to meet overhead, creating a long, dark tunnel that curved and bent with the land; the end could not be seen. The darkness was tinted green. Through small gaps in the underbrush peeked bright flashes of rolling fields dotted with hay bales. Tori’s long, brown hair fluttered in the faint breeze. Mine didn’t.

The further down the tunnel we went, the colder the atmosphere seemed to be. I started to recognize small details like specifically places mailboxes or the patterns of the potholes. Up ahead, the curve in the road grew closer, closer.

“C’mon, Carrie. I can do it. It’s easy. I’ve done it a thousand times.”

And then, there it was. There I was, again. It was the same bend in the road, where the road became bored with running straight and decided to curve gently. Here, my seventeen year old life ended.

“No.” I shook my head hastily. Bad idea, I thought. But for some reason, I couldn’t get my voice to echo the certainty I felt. “I don’t think that’s very smart,” I heard myself say, jokingly. “C’mon, man. It’s late, I need to get home. It’s almost past my curfew.” Outside the window was nothing but blackness swept away by the sweep of the headlights on passing trees and mailboxes brightened by reflective tape.

His eyes glistened, reflecting the yellow glow of the headlights. He laughed. “But it’ll be fun! Like an amusement park ride. There’s nothing to worry about. I’ll get you home safe. I promise.”

I promise…I promise…

But you lied.

It was the same place, but nothing looked right. The house off in the distance was familiar; I remembered there being small pinpoints of light beyond the blazing headlights of that other car. But the house looked…untouched, somehow. Pure. Indifferent. The accident and my death meant nothing to it. The same was true of the trees, the road.

I wanted them all to fall to ruin. I wanted the trees to be standing skeletons, haunted forever by something they couldn’t change. I wanted the house to be standing empty, never again to know what it’s like to be safe and cared for; it shouldn’t be allowed to hear the laughter of a loved one. It’s windows should be shut up like empty, soulless eyes. The garden should be wild with weeds; the brightly-colored flowers should be dead. I wanted the whole place to burn. Destroyed. Gone forever.

Clearing her throat, Tori said, “Glass. From the windshield. And the headlights. And both windows. The car was totaled.” With a trembling hand, she pointed at the hard-packed dirt.

Bending, I peered closely at the dirt through my feet. It sparkled sadly in the faint light.
Tori turned and pointed at a tree. “He tried. Tristan. To avoid the car.” One tree stood out from the rest due to a long gash in its trunk. “He almost succeeded. That’s why he lived…and you didn’t. His side was the tree, but the passenger side of the oncoming car hit you. There wasn’t a passenger in the other car. You were the only one who died. Just you.” Tori swallowed hard. “Just you.”

“Here goes!” Tristan whooped, spinning the steering wheel.

“No!” I complained weakly.

Too late. The rear tires of the car slid sideways, faster than I’d thought they were capable of. We might as well have been driving on ice, for all the friction they met. The whole car spun, and my stomach was left behind. I could feel Tristan’s eyes on me; he was smiling, happy. I should have been happy, too. But I wasn’t.

Two suns rose on the horizon. Huge suns. Coming closer.

“Oh SHIT.”

I knew, instinctively, that I’d never see Tori again. And that hurt more than whip of my neck as my head was thrown forward, then backward. I wouldn’t ever see her waiting for me after the last bell had rung, and that hurt more than the metal thrusting wetly through my thigh muscle. We wouldn’t stay up all night in my bedroom, fan-girling over the latest of our favorite series, and that hurt more than the smothering squeeze of the air bag, crushing my ribs and making it impossible to breath. I would never again hear her laugh, and that hurt more than Tristan’s scream. “CARRIE!”

Because even after the rest of the world faded to blackness, the knowledge that I would never tell her goodbye remained with me.

Tears spilled down Tori’s cheeks, dotting her face like the glass ground into the road, gleaming and grotesquely beautiful. There was something striking about The End.

“I hate him,” she choked out. “And I will never. Ever. Forgive him.”