Part of my Past

                I keep mentioning all of my past struggles in Macomb, but I never really tell you more, besides the girl that didn’t love me back. So I guess this blog post will be the hardest one for me to write. This is about the only thing I have come to terms with. I tried my best to just write and not hide behind my writing in this post.

                It was the first day of my senior year in high school, Wednesday August 18, 2010. I was taking two challenging classes, and then the rest were easier classes that I wanted to try. I was in the marching band, almost one fourth of our school was in marching band. So for the last few weeks of summer the band would give up most of their time to learning drill. Since school started, the eight hour Saturdays and three hour weekdays of band ended. However, every Wednesday during school we had a three hour night practice. Eventually after running through the sets just “one last time” about five or six times, we picked up chips and headed in. It had been a fairly long day, and I really just wanted to head home. I skipped the normal interactions and bad jokes with my friends to head home a little bit early. I pressed the unlock button on my keys to the 2007 Rav 4. I hopped in and was off as fast as I could.

                I always took this way home. It was about four minutes faster, and considering it was four miles either way, it was way too enticing. My parents advised me against, especially at night. I had to take an unprotected left turn onto a highway. It wasn’t something that seemed worrisome; I was never negligent about driving. As I took the road leading up to the intersection at the highway, Katy Perry’s “California Girls” was playing on the radio. I eased over the bumpy railroad tracks that were about a quarter mile from the intersection. As I proceeded around the slight curve in the road approaching the stopsign, I did a preemptive look both ways. Nothing. When I reached a full stop, I quickly glanced left to make sure, and then right as well. I started to pull out, committing myself to the turn. I heard the horn of a motorcycle just in time to pull my attention to the left. A split second of vision, a motorcycle coming in at forty five miles per hour at my door. I got out “Shit” before the impact and the side airbag deployed pushing my face from the window. My cars momentum put it in the turning lane before it stopped completely.

 I fumbled through my pockets for my phone. Nothing hurt. I guess that was okay, everything moved, and I was relieved. When I found my phone first I dialed 811, then erased and dialed 921. Finally after a long exhale, I slowly dialed 911 and reported the accident. On the phone, everything became real; I realized gravity of the events I caused. I could look out my window to see the driver of the motorcycle on the road. I could hear his screams, I could hear his pain. People came to my door as I was on the phone, trying to help me out. The door wouldn’t open. It wasn’t smashed shut, it was locked. Cars lock doors when airbags deploy. I obviously knew that, it was just the last thing on my mind. I freaked out because the door wouldn’t open and I scrambled to the back seat to try to open those doors. That door was obviously locked too, so all of my fear and confusion was locked inside a small damaged container and I still had to describe my location to 911. Eventually as my mind opened, I realized the locked doors and got out.

I started that slow walk, now with more cars pulled over to watch the events transpire. I approached the crowd surrounding the motorcycle driver, and nodded at questions like “are you okay?” “Has some one called 911?”  I finally saw the driver, and everything hit. I saw the pain in his face, and I wanted so badly to take it for him. It was my fault. But that wasn’t it. I saw through the pain in his face and saw him. A classmate. A senior in high school, someone I had been associated with since I could remember. I wasn’t friends with him, but I was connected to him, and all this pain he was going through was my fault. He had no helmet, and all the guilt and fear I had multiplied. When the emergency response came, they asked me to stand at the curb until they could safely get him off the road. It was the longest time in my life. Standing from afar as I had to witness all of the pain I caused and all of the worry in the faces of everyone nearby. I hated them, everyone trying to be compassionate, trying to help out, all it did was make me feel worse. Eventually as the ambulance drove off, they tended to me.

“Are you hurt?”

                “No.” That’s where it came down the hardest, the shock started to go away and the trauma could set in. I wasn’t in pain, I was unscathed. Yet, my classmate was in an ambulance. The tears finally started to come.

                “Do you want me to take a look at you?”

                “No. I’m fine.”

                More questions were asked, and I droned through them because there were more pressing issues on my mind then proper protocol. My parents arrived, and we spent time waiting for the whole process to finish. We sat in silence for a bit, and I cried. Eventually they spoke and I cried even more. I was just a fucking kid. How could anyone expect me to put up with this anymore? I didn’t want to be attacked by a barrage of questions. I just wanted it all to be over. I guess I did talk eventually, and the whole day ended at some point. A lot went on, and I don’t remember.

                Two years after the accident and I can’t fully accept everything that happened. I can stomach the initial earthquake it caused, but the aftershocks did so much more damage. The other driver suffered a broken wrist and fractured hip, but he quickly recovered. I still only saw him occasionally, and can only hope that’s all the pain I caused him. Some things haven’t gone away. I can never take that same way home, it makes me nervous thinking about it. Any time I drive and have to take a left hand turn, my right hand spasms and I have to bring it close to my mouth to stop myself from hyperventilating. I have spent minutes sitting at one intersection looking both ways to confirm there is nothing coming. I constantly ask people sitting in the car with me to look also. I’m scared of ever letting it happen again, having to go through so much pain, and still have to tell everyone that I’m uninjured.