Thirty, he thought, the speed limit was
forty-five. His hand barely glided atop the wind as it hung out the car window.
His mother wasn’t a risk taker. Not like him. He was the boy who would trade
his entire childhood if it meant being old enough to drive. The minimum age was
all he needed to be, no sense in being older than necessary.
“Dylan put your arm in the car before it
gets chopped off,” his mother shouted.
He did as told, no need for an argument.
He really did wish his mother had a
heavier foot. Not that he was in a hurry to get to where they were going
anyway. He just loved speed, every aspect of it. He was yet to be told by more
experienced children that the faster one accelerates the greater the risk of crashing.
But he was a risk taker.
The car finally stopped. Mrs. Rooney was
waiting on the front porch of the house already eager to greet the two. Dylan
was the first out of the car and Mrs. Rooney swiftly made her acquaintance with
a motherly embrace smothering Dylan’s head into her blouse.
“Oh, bless your heart.” She added a quick
kiss on the top of his head. “Martha, you’re saving my life I hope you know."
“Oh, it’s no problem really. Dylan is glad
to help Ryan, aren’t you Dill?” She gave her son a strict stare.
“You bet Mrs. Rooney. No problem,” he said.
But there was a problem, for he never
actually agreed to be there voluntarily. His mother had to bribe him. No chores
for a week and a new set of Matchbox cars was the payment he would receive if
he spent four hours with Ryan trying to help him socialize, whatever that
meant. He went to school with Ryan up until a couple years ago when his mother
pulled him out to home school him. Ryan was not like any other child. He was
much slower at getting chores done and couldn’t respond to people as quickly as other kids. Everything about him was slow, which is what annoyed Dylan the
most.
But Mrs. Rooney came to their house crying
on his mother’s shoulder because Ryan stopped talking all together. The
sanctity of a mother’s tears will slow down the rapidly maturing heart of any
child, including Dylan. As much as he yearned to grow up he couldn’t prevent
the feeling of helplessness that came with the sight of a grownup crying. So he
agreed to accept the bribe.
SLOW BOREDOM
In the bedroom, Ryan sat in a solid blue
covered chair with his arms drooping down from his shoulders. Dylan sat across
from him avoiding eye contact. He mostly stared at the carpet which was a very
bland brown, not exciting.
“You wanna play cards?” Dylan asked, but no
response was given. “Can you hear me?”
He waved his hands in front of Ryan’s eyes.
It scared him a little because it seemed as if there was no life in Ryan at
all. What was up with this kid? One thing Dylan noticed was that Ryan was not
blinking. He almost decided to go downstairs and call Mrs. Rooney because
something seemed wrong, but he suddenly had a flash of memory. It was as if his
mind had a buried treasure and he suddenly uncovered it. He remembered several
years ago when he and Ryan were both in first grade together. The teacher asked
the students who could name their state capital, Dylan knew the answer was Trenton because that’s
where his grandma lived, but it was Ryan’s hand that shot up in the air first
and it was Ryan who correctly answered the teacher before Dylan’s voice even
had time to roll from his tongue.
He could not stop thinking about the
memory. If this were the old West, Ryan’s quick hand would have beat Dylan’s.
There was no recovery from defeat, either you are faster than the other man or
you are dead. It was so simple.
So this must mean that Ryan was once not
like he is now. He was fast, so he must be faking it. He must be pretending to
be slow on purpose. But why would anyone do that? Dylan took this as a
challenge. He moved his chair closer to Ryan and he opened his eyes wide and
glared into the dark abyss that Ryan now wore over his vision. He was going to
have a stare contest.
For two minutes Dylan managed to keep from
blinking, but was getting tired. Ryan didn’t show any signs of fatigue. It was
if he wasn’t in his own body. Dylan would not quit however, he would expose
Ryan for being a fraud. Water and salt began to liquefy and Dylan’s eyes turned
a glossy blue, but he kept looking into Ryan’s eyes, lost and consumed by them.
Then he heard a familiar noise, an engine. He heard the distinct sound of a car
engine as if it were inside Ryan’s head. As soon as the sound faded he saw what
looked like a car speeding into the darkness that Ryan’s eyes held. Immediately
Dylan blinked, not because he was giving up but to see if he saw what he
thought he saw.
The water ran down his cheeks and he leaned
closer to Ryan looking into him to find the car again. He didn’t see it. So he
spread open Ryan’s eyelids to look deeper, intruding his space, but he didn’t
care at this point. He knew what he heard and saw, a blue car trapped inside
Ryan’s mind. Maybe his obsession with cars was really getting a hold of him. He
let Ryan go and stepped back. He couldn’t be going crazy, he had only been
there an hour. Three more to go, he thought. If he didn’t find something to
entertain him he was sure he would end up like Ryan.
He walked to the closet in the back of the
room and poked his head around inside. His eyes lit up at the sight of it, a
dusty red car, sized just for an eight year old. It was one of those battery
operated cars, but this one had no battery. This would surely keep him busy
for the rest of his visit. There was no limit to an imagination built for
speed. He pushed the car out of the closet and faced it toward Ryan so he could
keep an eye on him. He still sat there motionlessly. He almost felt bad about
giving up on him, but he knew he could not allow himself to end up like him,
which is what would have happened if he did not feed his adrenaline rush.
He opened the door and sat in.
SPEED CITY
The car picked up speed and before he knew
it he was no longer in Ryan’s room. He was on the road, behind the wheel, and
driving super fast. He didn’t know what exactly took place, but he wasn’t
afraid. Children do not ask themselves “how” or “why” when their dreams become real;
they just live it before it gets taken away from them.
The red battery car was now a red Ferrari.
His hands were now gloved. His mind was now free. An endless road of paved
highway layed out in front him and he had it all to himself. He drove until the
sun set and rose again topping two hundred miles per hour. A weird feeling came
over him a feeling as if he were becoming one with the car.
There were four things he noticed during
his joy riding: there were no doors on the car only windows, his gas gauge
always read full, he never felt tired, and he never had the craving for food.
He was sure he must be hungry since a day had gone by without eating. He
thought about these things for a little while and then forgot them. These were
the thoughts that end dreams. So he sped on leaving them behind.
After a week Dylan had explored the entire
territory and there was nowhere else to drive that he had not already been. His
speedometer began to lower to one hundred and fifty miles per hour. Suddenly,
two cars appeared on each side of his. Both were dark green with red lining.
They were models he had never seen before, they resembled miniature cruise
ships. A voice spoke through his CB radio.
“I wouldn’t be doing that if I were you”,
said the voice. It was coming from the car on the left.
Dylan did not notice the radio there before
and he was sure he inspected the whole car. He picked up the radio and answered
back.
“Who are you?”
“My handle is Keebler. And she over there
is Delilah.”
“Call me Deli,” she said through the radio.
“Where did you come from?” Dylan asked.
“First things first, what’s your handle?”
Keebler asked fervently.
He was about to say his real name but then
realized that a handle was a radio name, something made up. “Speedo”, he said
proudly.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Speedo”, Deli
said. She shook her long red hair at him as a friendly gesture.
“I’ve been riding through these parts for a
week now. I should have run into you earlier. Where did you come from?” Dylan
spoke into the radio.
“This is our speed zone. Think of this
world as layers on an onion. You just happened to be at the top layer while we
are at a lower layer.” Keebler said. “You have been alone because no one is
fast enough to reach that zone.”
Dylan couldn’t keep the smile off his face.
Its not every day he received praises for his driving.
“No one you say?”
“You’re bragging kid,” Deli retorted,
“You’re speed resembles your youth. A couple years and you’ll be mid zoning
like us.”
“Youth?” Dylan did not like that word. It
was as if Deli insulted him indirectly.
“The younger you are the more passion fuels
your vehicle. As you get older that fuel begins depleting,” Keebler’s high
voice said. “Which reminds me why we’re here, you had a drastic change in
velocity. Did you hit a speed trap?”
“Speed trap?” Dylan did not understand.
“Speed traps are set up at every zone,
beware of them,” said Deli.
Dylan
did not remember hitting anything. It was a desolate road in the fast zone.
“I slowed down voluntarily,” Dylan said.
Both Deli and Keebler were shocked. They
started speaking all at once into the radio and Dylan could not make out any
words.
“Are you crazy?” Deli shouted. “You don’t
ever slow down. That’s the number one rule. You can’t. Or else he will come.
And he will challenge. And he will win.”
“Who will come?” Dylan asked.
“Blue Blaze. He sets up the speed traps. He
has been here so long that his passion is fully depleted and must live in the
lowest zone. So he fuels on the passion of others waiting for them to hit a
speed trap and enter his layer. You see once you enter another zone you leave
open a brief doorway to the zone you were in. That’s how he sets up the speed
traps. After he has killed the person and robed them of their fuel he sets up
more traps on every level he can get to until all of that passion is run out.”
Keebler has been speaking in a low voice as if someone were listening.
“He is evil, Speedo. You do not want to
cross bumpers with him,” Deli added.
Dylan thought about this Blue Blaze
forgetting the dangers of too much thinking. Blue Blaze must have never gotten
to the fastest zone because there would have been speed traps there. So from
what Dylan can piece together he alone was the fastest person to ever enter
this crazy world. That brought great confidence as well as a big ego, something
he hadn’t yet learned to control.
“I will be careful,” Dylan replied to Deli.
“Good. Its time we are off Deli,” Keebler
said.
“Ay Ay Captain,” Replied Deli.
Two loud boat horns rocked Dylan’s car from
each side and before he could realize he was alone again.
SPEED TRAP
He thought about going back up to his level
but he finally had time to look at the road which was different here from his own.
For one it wasn’t as smoothly paved, he found himself swerving around potholes.
In the horizon he could see the soft outline of a city. This didn’t exist in
his layer and he decided to explore this territory before returning to the
highest speed zone.
The sun was coming down and he kept his
course for the city keeping his speed at 150 miles per hour. He didn’t know exactly how much
more or how much less speed would shift layers because as he thought of an onion
he remembered the many that existed even within the tiniest one. So he kept his
speed constant and continuous.
He had been driving for days and still not
a bit of hunger affected him. What surprised him even more was that he didn’t
have to use the bathroom. The strangeness of it all seemed overwhelming to him
for a second, but he suddenly remembered that thoughts end dreams. So he kept
driving without a thought in his head. That’s when it happened.
It was dark and he must not have seen it or
maybe he did see it but without thinking he simply didn’t register that it was
there. His car slammed into a force of wind that had been bundled up in the
middle of the street. It was a confined ball that decelerated the car and
himself at the same time because he didn’t fly out the windshield. It was as if
he was a baseball and he was caught by a huge glove. His speedometer dropped to
thirty and suddenly the wind was gone and he was cruising down the same road
headed for the same city that seemed to be much closer than he realized.
He knew what had happened. Speed trap. What
did that mean? Was Blue Blaze watching him? He wasn’t afraid. Dylan knew his
power in this world and if he was challenged he would accept and he would be
victorious. His confidence was about to be challenged.
Headlights from a car opposite him were
turned on down the long stretch of road. Static came across his radio and then
a voice.
“I’ve been waiting,” the voice was dark and
echoed sinisterly.
Dylan
didn’t respond he tried stepping on his gas pedal but it wouldn’t go above
thirty. He noticed his gas gauge had gone down a quarter. He picked up his
radio.
“Blue Blaze I presume,” Dylan was cool and
vigilant in his response.
“Speedo I presume,” the voice reeked out.
Both cars were coming closer together head
on. A couple football fields away he estimated.
“I accept,” Dylan said before he could be
asked.
“You never had a choice.”
“How does this work?”
“We stay straight on this path toward each
other. The first person to swerve out of the way loses,” Blue Blaze explained.
“What are the stakes?”
“Life or death.”
Dylan knew that Blue Blaze would not swerve
first. He knew the risks of surviving the crash were not in his favor. But he
was a risk taker. His decision was made, he would not swerve.
Both cars were headed straight for each
other. Dylan tried to push above thirty but it seemed Blue Blaze controlled
this zone and he was coming at him around fifty miles per hour. It was time;
Dylan reached his seatbelt and realized that one did not exist. Blue Blaze’s
car was now in clear view. It was a mixture of all shades of blue with a shark
fin on its hood. He could see Blue Blaze’s face. Time seemed to slow down when
he recognized the face of Ryan driving the car. This was a different Ryan, his
eyes were alive, his face was intense, and he was speaking clearly. Without
thinking Dylan swerved to the right causing a side collision with Ryan’s car.
The blue car flipped over the red car exposing sharp metal shards. The metal
pierced into the red car and hooked itself in. Dylan’s car had been like a
shield deflecting any front end damage and the car suddenly started to speed
up. Dylan maneuvered the wheel to keep on the road, but he was now dragging
Ryan’s car with him. The car sped up past 100 miles per hour, suddenly the
gauge broke and the car was accelerating faster than can be measured. The Blue
car accelerated with it.
Dylan had no control over the car anymore.
He was nauseated, his head was bleeding and his body scraped up. Out his driver’s
window was Ryan’s car. He could see the face of Blue Blaze, who seemed to be
frightened, for control was out of his hands as well. They were headed straight
into the city aimed to crash against one of the buildings. Dylan grabbed the
radio.
“Ryan you have to get out. If not were both
going to die.”
“Who are you? How do you know who I am?”
“Listen to me; I am in your room right now.
I am in your car, that’s how I got here. You have to get out of here. You have
to get back to your mother.”
“There is no leaving this place,” Ryan
snapped back. “You think I haven’t tried? It consumes you, stay here long
enough and it turns you into something you hate. There are no doors; you become
one with the car.”
They were speeding up even more and now
they were almost in the city. The building would be there final resting place.
All around Dylan could see abandoned cars on the sides of the road. Victims of
Ryan or Blue Blaze?
“Ryan there is a way. Out the window, I
can’t climb out I’m stuck to your car. But you can. Kick it open and climb out
and you will be home.”
“We’re going too fast, I’ll be dead if I
jump out?”
“Your mothers tears. I’ve seen them. They
will slow you down as you jump out. They are the only thing that can,” Dylan
said.
Suddenly the cars were approaching the
building. The next few seconds were a blur to him. There was no time left. He
could see Ryan trying to kick open his window, the blood trickled down into his
mouth, and he stared face to face with death, his next zone. He closed his eyes
right before he crashed into the wall of brick and cement.
RYAN'S RETURN
He was screaming when he was pulled out of
the car. Blood was covering his face and his mouth and he landed face first
into the bland brown rug in Ryan’s room. He did not understand it, but children
tend to not ask questions when they cheat death. He shouted for joy and kissed
the rug. The blood stain gave the carpet more pizzazz he thought. He then could
see two feet standing in front of him. He looked up and saw Ryan holding his
hand out. He confidently grabbed it and stood up.
“Blue Blaze I presume?”
“Speedo?” The both laughed.
It was his mother’s tears that had saved
Ryan from death that day. They carried him home the moment he jumped out the
car window.
It’s difficult to account for the things
that took place that day. But Dylan was considered a hero for rescuing Ryan
from the grips of dementia. Later on psychologists would say that it was Ryan’s
response to his mother and father’s divorce. Adults were always trying to
complicate a perfectly simple situation that they don’t understand. They
forget how to use their imaginations and that sometimes children just get
trapped in them. Dylan had enough of driving for a while and the boy that would
have once traded in his entire childhood to grow up, decided to avoid the speed
trap at all costs.
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