Darrel arrowed the Chevelle – red with black side lines, rattler hood with chromed out turbocharger, 1974 – down the interstate like a running-back sprinting after a QB hand-off, trying for a fifty yard touch down. None of the other drivers seemed to know where the gas pedal was. An old beat up Chevy puttered along in front of Darrel in the left lane. The high-speed lane. But this guy, this guy in this Chevy, he got the high beams and blurts for the horn. Most driver’s saw how fast he was coming on and got out of his way.
Avoidance had become a national past time. Darrel knew that, he had it figured out. At school he didn’t have to beat people up if he looked at them right. They just curled up in a ball, put their tales between their legs and scurried away. That was a good thing.
In tenth grade he got in one too many fights for the school administration to avoid. He was suspended from the football team until the next year, at least. This was a bad thing; football had been Darrel’s life. But his parents and neighbors seemed to have a good handle on avoidance.
“Darrel, honey. Do you know anything, anything about the Westerson’s mailbox?” his mother would ask, all timid and quivering. Just like the dweebs at school that were doing his homework. “It was… um…” deep breath, come on mom, come on Maggie, deep breath, “it was vandalized last night and, uh, well, we don’t really know who did it.” And there they were, those big puppy dog eyes. Not hopeful for the truth, no, hopeful for the excuse.
Avoid the problem, it will go away. Everything will be okay.
He denied the mailbox, of course, and all the other things that came up until they quit asking him. Lindsey was the first one. The first time they – his mother, Maggie; his dad was mostly a go along to get along kind of guy – asked him about her, about Lindsey. Well, he didn’t really remember. It wasn’t a good thing. They, she, didn’t ask about much of anything anymore.
Now, halfway through his senior year at Sowell West, he got the Chevelle. A Christmas present, and he was proud of himself. Proud that he only had to raise his voice once and slam his door, what… two, three times. His father wanted to buy and old rust bucket and rebuilt it together, some kind of new-age hippie thing bonding thing. They relented about the car about the same time he got kicked off the football team. His father, Doug, came up with a solution; he just bought Darrel the car. Doug successfully avoided just about everything. Merry Christmas.
Of course, Christmas was a week ago and school was letting back in after the weekend. But Darrel was headed to Lindsey’s. The way Lindsey smiled without really smiling. The red of her hair. And her eyes. He wasn’t really sure what he saw that night. A lot of things weren’t clear in his mind. Even less from the battering it took. But some things stood out clear, like Lindsey. Everything about her, mostly her eyes, yet he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Something happened in that basement that night.
Sometimes in dreams he’d come close to it, but even the subconscious ran from that basement. That cold basement, below ground. Surrounded by earth, a bare bulb hanging above. Shining down, not on smooth concrete and not quite shining, the light gave shadows to old rock walls that stayed damp. A dirt floor that didn’t send up dust with each step.
But he turned to look at her and… nothing. When the vehicle of the dream took him as close to that membrane separating everything the human mind collected and nothingness. Blackness.
Her eyes were the most, they drew him and he went. He drove that car like a running-back making the play of his life. Like a man on a mission, determined and set, not to be swayed or stopped. He drove fast and hard to Lindsey. Hard and fast to her, to her eyes.
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