By Shawn P. Madison
Sparks flew as the old car slammed to the roadway, scraping its undercarriage on the gritty pavement after cresting that last small hill.
“Oh, shit!” the young man swore under his breath as he fought to get the metal hulk back under control. The roaring sound of the ancient engine mixed with the screaming of the sirens close behind was not helping him with the headache currently pounding like a jackhammer at the back of his skull.
“Damn, damn, damn,” he muttered and tried to push the gas pedal even further though it already lay flat against the floorboard. “Just frigging great.”
His eyes darted to the rearview mirror for a scant second, spying the cool face of the cop in the car not very far behind. Cool was a good adjective, he decided, and began to laugh to hide his suddenly growing fear.
Fear...there was a new concept. He had never been in this situation before. Not that this was his first carjack, no, but he certainly didn’t make a habit of it. And he had never been chased like this before. Never.
This cop was relentless. He couldn’t shake him and he stayed so damn close. Very close. Through all the red lights, the screeching tires, the one ways going the wrong way, this cop was tight on his ass.
Of course, these small towns and country roads didn’t give him much traffic to wreak havoc in. Cops just couldn’t pursue like this bastard was in heavy city traffic. And one more thing he couldn’t figure. With that big brand new LTD and the mother of an engine hiding under the shiny white hood, why didn’t this guy just scream around his driver’s side and end this little ride?
Why the chase?
Why the wait?
And why was it just this one Goddamn cop?
Where were all the other cops that should have joined the chase by now? Where were all the Billy Clydes and Bubbas built like linebackers that would most likely kick his Godforsaken ass all the way back to whatever pathetic little jail cell he would inevitably be thrown into?
“DAMN!” he shouted out the open window and into the wind.
It had been such an easy carjack, too. That little old lady got one look at his huge .45 and stopped the car dead on what passed for Main Street. What? Almost four or five ‘towns’ ago?
He got her screaming old butt out of the car fast and simple and had taken off. Nobody got hurt and only a few people walking on the street were around to witness it. What had gone wrong?
Frigging Jimmy Martinez, that’s what went wrong! That little prick tried to cheat him out of the deal, the sweet mother of a deal that he had set up himself. His deal, for Chris’sakes, and Martinez tried to screw him out of it.
When that little bastard pulled out that .22, a damn .22, and stuck it in his face on that street corner...made him get out of the car in the middle of frigging nowhere, USA.
Then, the son of a bitch took off with the money. ALL of the money! He had pulled his own gun and fired off two shots, that had felt pretty good. But he didn’t succeed in doing anything but blow out the back window of Jimmy’s new Mustang. All he could do was watch as the bastard roared down the street and out of sight.
That’s when the old lady in the Bonneville, a really OLD Bonneville, came crawling around the corner, blowing blue smoke all the way. His instincts had taken over and he jacked her before he could think things through.
What a Goddamn mistake! He knew, deep down, he knew that a frigging Bonneville from the late 1970's couldn’t chase down a ‘96 Mustang but he had definitely not been thinking straight.
Then, out of nowhere, this frigging cop shows up and rides his ass for what must have been twenty miles now.
“Goddamn it!” He screamed and glanced up at his mirror again. Cool son of a bitch, hiding behind his shades, hands steady on the wheel, didn’t even look like he was breathing.
“Screw you, pal,” he muttered to himself and slammed on his brakes halfway through a vicious curve in the road. The huge beast of a car began to fishtail, skidding across the pavement, leaving a good amount of rubber behind.
He screamed all the way as the car left the road surface and hit dirt and grass, still muddy from the rain the day before last. It takes a lot of effort to roll an old Bonneville but when the tires dug into the mud, leaving a swath of tracks a good hundred feet long, and then slipped down the small embankment, the driver’s side wheels left the ground and the metallic monster flipped. It rolled over three times, kicking up grass and throwing debris from the smashed windows, before landing on wheels and slamming broadside into a huge old pine tree.
***
Sheriff’s Deputy Bobby Robinson slipped his vehicle into park about thirty yards further up the road from where the old Bonneville finally came to a stop. Another hundred or so yards up the road lay the gravel driveway of Pete Cook’s place and almost directly across the road from that was Jeff Maxwell’s huge old house. Both of them, good families, would be eating dinner around this time and had most likely heard the roar of the crash. Being small-town, nosy types, they would come out to see what was going on. Nothing much usually happened in this part of Pender County, so people had to catch whatever excitement and entertainment they could get their hands on.
Better make this fast, he thought to himself and began to make his way toward the wreck. He had cut the sirens but left his lights on just in case someone else came around that curve going a little faster than the law allowed.
He covered the distance quickly and was just in time to see the little bastard trying to get the crumpled driver’s side door open. His head and nose were bleeding but his eyes were wide open and alert. Deputy Robinson could practically smell the fear coming off of the kid.
“Hold it there young man,” he said slowly and crisply while he leveled the standard issue shotgun squarely at the kid’s face. “Now climb out the window real slow.”
“Are you frigging crazy?” The kid laughed. “I’m pegged in here like a Goddamn sardine, bleeding from a dozen places, my legs are probably broken...”
“Shut the hell up and get out of the car,” Robinson said, cutting him off.
Something in his voice made the kid get quiet and crawl out of the remnants of the Bonneville, moaning with pain through gritted teeth. It was all Robinson could do to keep himself from tearing the kid apart as the badly injured body slammed to the mud and knelt on shaky knees.
“Call a damn ambulance,” the kid snarled. “Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?”
“Nothing like that today, son,” Robinson replied flatly and the kid’s face drained of color.
“Well, then slap on the cuffs and be done with it,” he said, almost pleading. “Look, you won the chase, okay. You won, you frigging beat me, alright? It’s over now. Take me wherever it is you take people to in this shithole place.”
Robinson shook his head from side to side and strengthened his grip on the shotgun. “No, sorry son, nothing like that today either.”
“What in the hell are you talking about, man?” The kid asked and looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps.
“How are you today, Pete?” Robinson asked of the approaching figure.
“Just fine, Robert,” the older man replied and turned to look at the injured young man on his knees in front of the crumpled car. “Is this the boy who killed your momma, Robert?” Peter Cook asked. “I just heard about it on the radio not ten minutes ago.”
“Yes, sir, this would be him,” Robinson answered in a steady voice.
“What in the hell? I didn’t kill nobody, asshole,” the kid screamed. “Look, I stole this frigging load of shit and led you on a nice little Sunday drive but I didn’t kill nobody!”
“And I told you once before, son,” Robinson said. “Shut the hell up.”
“I sure am sorry about your momma, Robert,” Cook said as he turned his gaze toward the deputy. “She was a good woman. It’s a damn shame, too. What with all she went through after losing your dad last year. She was a strong woman, your momma.”
“Yes, sir, she was,” Robinson replied. “But that doesn’t change the fact that I’ll be putting her in the ground on Saturday, right alongside my father.”
“No, it sure doesn’t change that, Robert.”
“What in the hell are you two talking about?” The kid pleaded. “Look, I’m hurt bad and bleeding and I probably have a damn concussion but I sure as hell know that I didn’t kill nobody! Especially not your Goddamn mother!”
“Everything alright down there?” Came a new voice from up on the road.
“Yes, sir, Mr. Maxwell,” Robinson shouted, not taking his eyes off the young man he’d chased. “All is fine. Sorry to interrupt your dinner but this will all be over very soon.”
“Very well, then,” Maxwell replied, crossed his arms over his chest and waited for the ugly incident to end.
“Just arrest me already,” the kid began.
Without warning, Robinson adjusted his aim toward the car and fired the shotgun, punching a fist-sized hole through the rear door panel. Neither Pete Cook nor Jeff Maxwell flinched at the report of the shotgun blast but the scared young man dove to the muddy ground and covered his head.
“Listen up young man,” Robinson said. “The older woman you stole this car from at gunpoint earlier today was my mother.”
“Oh shit, I didn’t kill her, man, I swear!”
“Yes, you did, son,” Robinson continued. “She had a massive heart attack not twenty seconds after you left her on the corner of Main Street and Oakridge. She was dead before she hit the ground. I got the call almost immediately. News travels fast in this part of North Carolina, son.”
“Look, I didn’t kill her! Please!”
Robinson ignored the kid. “That car was my daddy’s. He bought it new in ‘78 and drove it every day of his life until he died last June. That car meant everything to my momma. His smell was all over it. The seat had shaped itself to his body on the driver’s side. The floorboard was scuffed shiny where his left foot rested. That car was all my momma had left of my daddy and you took that away from her. With a gun in your hand you robbed my mother of the one thing that meant the most to her.”
“Jesus Christ, man, I’m sorry,” the kid sobbed.
“I don’t care about that, son,” Robinson said. “I don’t care why you did it. I don’t care that you made me chase you over twenty miles. I don’t care to even know your name, son.”
Robinson’s hands tightened on the shotgun and the kid broke into a crying fit. “Listen, man,” he pleaded again. “You kill me here in front of these people and you’re throwing your life away! Just bring me in and let me serve my time! I didn’t mean for any of that to happen, man, I swear it to God!”
“There won’t be any witnesses here today, son.”
Through his tears the kid looked around with incredulous eyes. “Jesus Christ, they’re standing right there!”
Robinson cocked his head in Cook’s direction. “Pete, are you standing here now?”
“No, not me, Robert,” Cook replied. “I’m eating dinner with my family.”
“How about you, Mr. Maxwell?” Robinson shouted to the other man.
“Robert, I haven’t even seen you today,” Maxwell shouted down his reply.
Robinson smiled and removed his sunglasses. “That’s what I thought,” he said and pulled the trigger.
***
He shrieked at the top of his lungs before he realized that nothing else had happened except for his wetting his Goddamn pants.
“How does it feel, son?” The deputy asked him. “How does it feel to get a second chance at life?”
He just looked at the uniformed man standing in front of him and then at the other two men observing, all of their faces set grim and emotionless, and he began to laugh.
He laughed long and hard as they all three watched him. The shotgun was at the deputy’s side now and he laughed at the fact that he was still alive. This small town cop prick had him pretty scared there for a while but it had all been a sham--just a trick to scare the shit out of him. “It feels pretty damn good, officer,” he said at last and struggled back to his knees. “A second chance feels pretty damn good.”
The deputy lowered his head and let his sunglasses drop to wet ground. “Son, it’s just too damn bad my momma didn’t get a second chance.” In less than a second, a shiny automatic cleared the officer’s right hip holster, it’s muzzle loomed large, it was so damn close...
His laughter stopped immediately as he felt the impact of the bullets lift him up and slam the breath out of his lungs. He hit the crumpled shell of the Bonneville with his back; his mind momentarily registered the shock to his spine. His last thought was of the pain and that little prick Jimmy Martinez and how he would kill that bastard if he ever got the chance...
***
Robinson had his 9mm automatic holstered before the kid’s body slid to the mud. He reached over to pick up his sunglasses and sank to his knees in the muddy grass not ten feet from the body of the young man who had killed his mother, who stole her last years from her without so much as a thought. Such a selfish act for such a young man.
He broke into tears then, at the thought of his mom’s terror staring down the muzzle of the gun held by this kid. Her complete horror as her one prized possession was taken from her by force.
“It’s alright, Robert,” Pete Cook said from his side and gripped the deputy’s shoulder. “You done right by your momma today.”
“I know, Pete,” Robinson sobbed. “But it doesn’t stop all this hurting.”
“Listen, Robert,” Cook said. “Me and Maxwell are going to go back up to our houses now. You find that young boy’s gun and put it in his hand. Then you get up to your car and call this mess in. You hear me, Robert?”
“Yeah, Pete, I hear you,” Robinson said and got to his feet. “He was just a little shit kid, Pete. Just a damn kid.”
“But he killed your momma, Robert,” Cook said and grabbed the deputy’s right arm firmly. “And he gave up his childhood the moment he pulled that gun on your momma. You know that and I know that.”
Robinson shook his head up and down and cleared the tears from his eyes with his uniform sleeve. “Thanks, Pete.”
The two men shook hands and Cook waved up to Maxwell. Within minutes, they were both safely back inside and Robinson was in his car to report the incident. Burying his mother would not be half as easy as it had been to bury his father. His daddy had smoked and drank himself to the grave. His mother had done nothing of the kind. She had led a peaceful life and never meant anyone or anything any harm. She had done nothing more than pick the wrong time of day to head into town...
Sheriff’s Deputy Robert Robinson wept as he completed the radio call, placed the handset back into its cradle and waited for the county coroner to arrive on the scene.
END
BIO: Shawn P. Madison lives in a new house in Suffolk, Virginia, where the grass has grown in nicely and all of the books he has collected through the years now fit. He has written in the genres of action, childrens, contemporary, fantasy, horror, humor, mystery, non-fiction and science fiction. He has published more than sixty short stories in thirty different magazines and anthologies, both electronic and print, and his first novel, GUARDER LORE, was released by NovelBooks, Inc. (www.novelbooksinc.com) in March of 2002. Shawn and his wife share their house with two old friends: a much larger than normal cat and a dog who thinks he's human. Together, they all hope to make Virginia their permanent home. To learn more about Shawn and his writing, please visit his website at: http://legendarts.com/shawn/ or feel free to contact Shawn via e-mail at: asm89@aol.com
© 2003 Shawn P. Madison