Darrel rolled that ’74 Chevelle down the interstate as if his life depended on it. And who knows, maybe it did? The pale lights reflected off his pale skin. His dark, almost black, hair hung somewhere between his eyebrows and his eyes. The contrast made with is pale skin and hollowed out cheeks was striking. By now people weren’t avoiding making him mad, they were avoiding him. The look in his eyes – Lindsey loves them, there’s that – drove people to the other side of the hallway, side walk, grocery store. He rolled the ’74 Chevelle down the interstate. He drove away from the people that worried about him, some who loved him.
The road was deserted. Nothing stood in the way of the darkness ahead. A freak ice storm had grounded flights, and booked hotels. Vacations were cancelled and in some neighborhoods the heavy crust of ice cancelled electricity. Despite is mother’s slight attempt to make him stay in, just for tonight – in the morning Darrel, please – he rattled the keys in his hand and smiled at her. She didn’t see the skull wearing a dark, almost black, wig. Maggie saw her strong boy. He knows what he’s doing, that was just a surface thought. Underneath, Maggie just wanted to avoid, avoid Darrel. Maybe the world.
His knuckles remained white around the steering wheel. No expression of fear on his face, just that grin. That grin that made people look somewhere else.
His brain looked somewhere else, too. He was in that place he was headed now. Only everything was fuzzy. The bare bulb, that was certain. And the ground, the dirt floor that didn’t give up dust was there. Even the creak of the wooden stairs as she led him down creaked now in his ears. Where is this place? He said to her through a mouth full of honey. She giggled, he remembered that. Then they were crossing this underground place. This place with sharp shadows, the kind that scare children – and if Darrel were completely honest, it scared him a little bit too. But she had her hand stretched out behind her and held his, leading him across this place. The light from the ever still, naked bulb hanging in the large room faded as they approached what looked like a doorway.
Did I ever tell you about…she said.
And now everything is shaking. The sharp light from the bulb turns into the full moon on snow glow of his dash lights. The left half of his car was bouncing along in the gravel and dirt and grass that made up the edge of the median.
If it were possible for Darrel’s fingers to tighten around the steering wheel any more, they did in that minute. The shadows in the hollows of his cheeks grew with his grin. He righted the car on the icy pavement, giving it just the right mixture of throttle and coast. He was rolling down the highway again. Fast and hard, that was Darrel. Heading towards darkness with nothing in his way.
If death were riding shotgun that night, death kept him safe.
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