"Hey!" The boy turns around and the blonde girl next to him stops too. She pauses with an unexpected grace that she's unaware of, but I see it. The boys light brown hair covers his face in shadows in the dark fall light but it doesn't matter; I know his face well anyway. I say his name in a teasing, overly flirty way that makes it seem like I'm not flirting at all.
"Come on." He yells back answering the question even before I ask. It's the same almost every night after play practice:
"He, can you give me a ride tonight?"
"You don't even need to ask anymore, you live like 4 houses away. You could just follow me to my car and just hop in for all I care." Light laughter that I would die to hear.
So now our nightly exchange is down to only a few words. I try my best not to ask every night but driving home with him is much better than waiting for my dad to pick me up. Plus, my dad isn't an attractive high school senior.
I run up to them with my back pack smacking against my back and I feel the few items I actually have in it jump. They've already started walking by the time I reach them and the last lamp on the school is past us now.
"Hey hold on." He reaches behind me and I turn my head to see him zip up my open back pack. Luckily it's almost pitch dark so he can't see my embarrassed look.
"Thanks," I say adding a sincere tone you can only pick up from acting practice. The girl reaches over and gives me a playful slap and a small laugh. We've been close friends for almost a year now so this small gesture makes me feel better instead of worse. Most nights it's just him and I so it's strange to have her along with us. I know they're closer friends than he and I but that's exactly what they are: Friends. I take an inward sigh of relief.
I see the familiar grey dodge neon up ahead and slip into an open spot behind the passenger seat. The two doors open around me and he throws his backpack in an empty seat while she sits ahead of me. The doors close one after the other and I hear the echo in the silent space. The driver's side door opens and he slips less than silently into the driver's seat.
"So…" he says as he shifts the car into reverse, "how do you guys think the touch up practice went?" When we're clear of the other cars around us he stops and shifts the car into drive smoothly.
"Pretty good I guess. It was nice to have the 'fun run'," I say referring to the one practice we get where our director lets us do the show like a dramatic soap opera or a western film. The whole cast got into it, especially when our normal songs were replaced with 80's songs from our directors IPod. "Like a Virgin" was a hit.
"It was alright, it's hard to do with the ensemble though," I hear ahead of me and I can't help but agree. The large cast makes things unbearable sometimes.
"Yea, they got a little too carried away; I couldn't even hear the actual lines."
The radio is turned down as we drive past the school and nearby gas station. Light conversation bounces through the car and light jokes about our other cast members as we drive about five minutes.
At an intersection we stop behind a white compact car and I lean back into my seat to wait out the red light. We're far away from the light about 6 cars away from the intersection. I can hear them still talking as I close my eyes and feel the heat kick out a strong gust of warm air. Their voices sound drained and tired as they talk in annoyed tones about the change in some new thing at school. I open my eyes as we lurch forward and gain speed.
Cars ahead of us spread out and move faster and faster and we start to follow their same pattern. The car moves forward with growing momentum and I see a strange movement from the white car ahead of us.
My mind doesn't register any sign of danger as the car moves right, into the lane next to us. But the white has moved to slow. The opening it closed and now it's stuck straddling the white line and the driver does the first thing that comes to mind:
Brake.
The driver doesn't look back to see the 3 teenagers in the car behind him. The driver doesn't look back to see his left tail light is right in front of the passenger seat. The driver doesn't look back to see our faces turn away, waiting for the impact.
In front of me I see my friend shield her chest with her hand as if somehow that will help her if we collide with a two ton object. His grip tightens on the steering wheel and I see the outline of his fingers illuminated by red brake lights. My eyes widen and just over the passenger seat I can see red break through the windshield. Red light streams through the glass and fills the car with a foreshadowing of blood.
For a moment my world stops and my view is fixed on the solid red light. Red. Everything is red. With one red light a million questions flashes into my mind.
"Why is he stopping?"
"Why do we have to be behind this car?"
"Is this how I'll die?"
"Is this how we'll all die?"
"Will it hurt?"
My questions are only answered by the ear splitting screech of braking tires.