The Attempt

She was speeding on the express highway. The sun seemed reluctant to show up through the thickening morning mist. The strong wind blew on her face causing her eyes to water. Her hair was flying wildly. She knew she will have to struggle for hours later in the day to untangle them, if ever those hours are granted, but she didn’t mind. The tires screeched with slightest change in the direction of the car.

She could see the truck coming; it reminded her of a rhinoceros she had seen on the National Geographic channel, a bully charging towards a potential threat. She headed straight towards the truck. The truck grew in size like a feeding larva. Her palms were sweating now. The truck’s horn blared continuously; they were minutes away from colliding. She wanted to go on and on: did she have anything worthwhile in her life that had the power to stop her? Help her change her mind? At that instant she could not think of any. His silence had closed the only door to her happiness. Now, the possibility of meeting St.Peter in the heaven seemed very real.

Seconds away from death, a small voice in the hidden depths of her soul cried out to her, urging to start her life anew. At that instant, her mind experienced a rare moment of clarity amidst all that insanity. With tremendous willpower she managed to swerve her car to the side, missing the truck by millimeters. The fading echo of the honks trailed behind the giant truck. The car crashed into the railings, its bumper and hood crumpling like a cardboard box. The grating noise of a metal against another pierced her ears. By a hair’s breadth, she had escaped flying through those railings into the valley below.

Her heart was thundering against her rib cage. With a lump in her throat, she looked at her cold, shaking hands. She felt she had no energy in her legs. Was this purely a physiological reaction of the body or, is this the way one feels after a suicide attempt? she wondered. She sat silently, staring into the horizon for what seemed to be an eternity. The occasional zipping vehicles didn’t bother to acknowledge the odd position of her vehicle on the road. The rhythmic ticking sound of the cooling engine calmed her mind.

The happier moments of her life seemed more intense now and the sad sagas, somewhat superficial. It surprised her that her entire life had flashed like a reel in a fast forward mode during the split second decision she had made.

She had not remembered him though.