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| Photo by Lenore Edman |
She hadn’t declared a major yet, because there were simply too many fascinating things to learn for her to simply narrow it down to one.
Andi wandered the stacks at the university library on a regular basis as well. She loved being around the books, and having easy access to information about almost anything she wanted to know. Plus the library was quiet, and she felt safe and comfortable there.
Since she had a couple weeks to kill in Cumberland, it seemed to her the best way to spend her time was at the library when she wasn’t otherwise occupied. It was home to her as much as the house she’d grown up in there in Cumberland.
At the moment, she was carrying a stack of six or seven books. One was about how to make soap, one about small business marketing, another about aboriginal mythology (she mainly wondered how, exactly, the Cumberland library had come to have it in their possession), a novel by her favorite author, and a couple of classics she’d meant to read. One of them was The Old Man and The Sea, by Ernest Hemingway.
The library had been nearly silent, as usual, while she walked through, casually browsing. Soon she found herself getting close to the far corner of the library, the books back here were mostly automotive repair manuals, and other similar books.
In the corner of the room, there were a few desks. The chairs were pulled together into a group. Sitting in the chairs were a group of high school kids in flannel shirts and baseball caps. Farm kids, they looked almost identical to the kids who had made her teenage years in Cumberland a living hell.
The kids in Cumberland weren’t all bad, but the ones that were tended to be big, ignorant, and mean. And Andi didn’t exactly fit in. Where most of the other kids in her school were interested in football, beer and what was in the pants of their favorite classmates, she was curious about what might be happening in the world outside of Cumberland.
The batch of teens sitting in the library, a couple of girls and three boys, were doing more talking than reading. Andi saw one of the girls glance at her, and whisper to the others. They all briefly looked at her, and started laughing. There was more murmured conversation, and giggles.
In high school, she would have been ashamed and have slunk off to another part of the library to avoid them. Now, however, Andi was twenty years old, and decided she didn’t have to take that from a bunch of stupid high school kids.
As such, she shushed them. Andi saw them all turn and stare at her, hostile. She wasn’t about to be intimidated by a bunch of seventeen year olds, though. She finished wandering that aisle in no particular rush, and decided to go to a different part of the library next. As she walked, she felt the weight of their stares, and she had to fight down an urge to turn and look at them.
When she was satisfied that she had enough books to keep her amused for a couple of days, she went to the front of the library and checked out. She still felt like she was being watched, but she dismissed the feeling and left the library. She was excited to get home and start digging through her new books.
It was still early in the afternoon, and it was a bright, clear day. It wasn’t super cold, yet, but it would be soon. In a couple of weeks, the ice on the lakes would be solid enough for fishermen to drive on, dragging their ice fishing shacks out to their favorite spots on the ice. Andi wondered how much fishing went on in the little temporary towns on the ice compared to how much drinking went on. She suspected there was probably more drinking than fishing, which was OK with her so long as someone sober drove the rest home.
Luckily there hadn’t been too much snow yet this year, so the walk from the library to her car wasn’t too treacherous and icy, just windy and a bit chilly. There had been plenty of rain in November and early December, and there were icy spots on the road in places that were shaded. The car was a white 1998 Chevrolet Malibu. She liked it, although she wished she had something a little smaller at school, since having a four door meant everyone wanted a ride somewhere.
Andi tossed her bag full of book in the back seat, hopped in and started it up. She’d been in the library long enough that the heater was blowing cold air again, so she turned that off. She’d be able to turn it on again in a mile or so, once the engine had heated up.
As she was pulling out of the parking lot of the library, starting her drive home, she heard the roar of a motorcycle’s exhaust. In the warm months, that wouldn’t be unusual at all, but in December it was curious. She looked around to see who the hardy soul was out riding in late December, but couldn’t see anyone. Soon she wondered if she’d actually heard it at all.
A couple minutes later, she turned the heat on again, and warm air rushed out of the vents in the dash.
Black Magic Woman was playing on the radio, and Andi sang along as she drove. She had been a bit lost in thought when she noticed a beat-up farm truck in her rear view mirror. Beat up trucks weren’t particularly unusual in Cumberland. What was unusual was that there appeared to be five people in the truck, and it was getting closer and closer to her.
Soon it was mere feet away from her rear bumper. All Andi could see in her rear view mirror was the grill of the truck, it seemed. The truck backed off, momentarily, and Andi was able to get a glimpse of who was in the truck.
It was the teens from the library.
Shit, Andi thought, wouldn’t you just know they’d decide they needed to show me up for shushing them when they were being disruptive assholes? Fucking farmers.
She was annoyed, but also scared. There was a whole lot of nothing out here, and it was cold. If they ran her off the road, she could be in real bad trouble if she was in a spot where she couldn’t get any cell phone reception.
The truck got closer again, and even closer than they’d been the last time. There was nowhere to pull over, at least not safely. The road didn’t have much of a shoulder, and if she lost control it was a sharp drop down the ditch and into trees.
The driver of the truck blew the horn, and Andi nearly jumped out of her skin. Her adrenaline was already pumping, and that cranked things up even more.
This is bad, this is bad, this is bad, ran crazily through her head as she scanned the side of the road for somewhere, anywhere, she could pull over and get them out from behind her.
Her stereo was still on, and Sugar, Sugar, of all things, was what the DJ had picked. Great, I’m going to die, and I’m going to die with this retarded song in my head, Andi thought.
The road dipped, and curved to the left. Andi noticed the road was covered by the shadow of the nearby trees, and had exactly enough time to say, “Shit,” when she felt the steering go loose and her car began to slide across the road, rather than continuing to turn.
After a couple of sickening moments of utter panic, the tires regained traction, and she was able to get the car pointed in the right direction before it careened off the road into the trees.
The pickup truck that had been following so close, however, was not so lucky. Andi caught a glimpse of the truck going right off the side of the road, and rolling over twice before hitting the trees that bordered the ditch.
She slowed down, briefly, and started pulling to the side of the road before she remembered that she didn’t have to stop to help people who were chasing her. And that it might, in fact, be a real bad idea to get anywhere near them now that they’d crashed and presumably wrecked their truck. Bullies rarely took responsibility for the outcomes of their actions, and frequently took out their frustrations on innocent bystanders.
As she was considering this, she glanced into her rearview mirror again just in time to see the truck erupt in a fireball.
“Holy shit,” Andi exclaimed. She couldn't believe her eyes.
She decided that she needed to at least call 911. Andi pulled to the side of the road, and was glad to discover that she did actually have some cell phone reception. She called, gave the dispatcher all the information she had, and then since there was nothing else she could do, she pulled back out onto the road and started driving home again.
A few moments later, she heard something that definitely sounded like a loud motorcycle roaring past, but she couldn’t see anything. She wondered if she was perhaps going crazy, or if maybe she should make an appointment to see her doctor.
As she drove, she decided she’d wait and see if she kept hearing phantom motorcycles. If she did, she decided, she’d talk to her doctor. If she didn’t, she’d just decide it had been a weird day and leave it at that.
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