Stephanie froze all of a sudden once she saw what her father had done. His grey dress shirt, once clean and professional, now looked scruffy with a couple of buttons untucked and his sleeves tucked in. What caught her attention was a couple of blood spots on the shirt itself and his right fist was covered in blood as well, fearing that he may end up beating her own mother to submission. She sees Colin getting closer and closer to her, before planting both of his hands on the driver’s side windows.
It’s going to be fine, honey. Come along with me. Those are the words that her own father mustered at her face, only separated by just a sheet of glass. Then, she let out a scowl in her face as a response.
“No.”
Stephanie put the gear lever into Drive and slammed the gas pedal hard, causing her car to lurched forward and knock Colin into the concrete. She heard a resounding thud outside, and double-footed the rectangular brake pedal, locking the front tires on its way to a complete stop and leaving tire marks ahead. After taking a deep breath to calm herself down, she grabbed the door handle and climbed outside of the car to see how much damage she caused to her father. She walks to him at a slower than usual pace, her legs shaking so much from the gusty winds sweeping upon her. She took one look at Colin, and covered her mouth with her hands. His now emotionless face has laid above a puddle of blood that slowly envelopes itself into the tarmac, with spits of rain drops now beginning to mix in with the puddle as well.
Stephanie, fearing that someone will witness the incident and blame her for the killing of Colin, ran as fast as she could to her car. As the rain grew heavier, she scrambled back inside her Mustang and after buckling up her seat belt again, drove away from the scene of the accident in a hurry, leaving out tire screeches behind. As she negotiates her neighborhood before converging to the main road, she starts to breathe more often and her hands are shaking as if the air conditioner had turned on in her car. I’m sorry Colin, but I have no choice. With the winding roads in front of her, her right sandaled foot pushed the gas pedal further, causing the speedometer needle to climb from 30 to 40 miles per hour.
The rain drops are getting more frequent on her windshield the faster she goes on the main road. Rattling noises coming from the engine grew so loud that her eardrums should have been damaged by this point, but the intensity Stephanie is having put them in the back burner. Both of her hands are moving the steering wheel left and right, weaving around the slow-moving traffic she encounters more often than not. Her right foot is pinning the gas pedal deep into the carpets, with the needle going up from 45, 50, 55, to 60 miles per hour. Stephanie was going so fast that she didn’t notice how many red traffic lights and intersection she run over with, though at the same time she was surprised that no police cruiser ever saw her speeding.
That all changed when she entered a downhill stretch that leads to a busy intersection this time around. She saw the speedometer needle is now pointing at 70, and it’s time to take a breather. Her right foot let off the gas pedal after a long time and plastered itself on the brake pedal. The farther the pedal travels though, the more nervous her body has become. She pushed it as far as she possibly could, until she heard a resounding clunk. She looked underneath the dashboard, and her eyes widened to find that the brake pedal went all the way to the carpeted floorboard. Not believing what she just saw, she pumped the brake pedal three more times to make sure she wasn't dreaming.
Still nothing.
She looked upwards and flipped down the wiper stalk, so that the windscreen wipers would clean the necessary amount of rain drops for her to see the road. After the wipers did their job, she can just see the traffic light has turned from yellow to red in a matter of seconds. Oh for crying out loud. Her hands tightened themselves on the steering wheel, preparing for the worst. She mashes the brake pedal with both of her sandaled feet now for six times, and all of them resulted in a clunk sound every single time.
Droplets of tears are starting to come out of Stephanie's eye socket and trickling down through her cheek, signaling that she might end up sealing her fate in just a few moments. With her legs now getting tired of pumping the useless brake pedal for what felt like forever and the speedometer needle now reaching 85 miles per hour, she felt that karma has finally reached upon her and it's time for her to go. She clinched the steering wheel even tighter and closed her eyelids before reaching the intersection. Maybe it was true that she would never have been in this situation if she intervened ten years ago. It would have brought her closer to Martha if that fateful encounter didn't happen. But one thing is for certain, she better go out with a bang.
Stephanie overshoots a red traffic light for the final time and overhears a truck horn blaring at her left ear. She felt a tremendous force coming from the driver's side of her Mustang, along with the shattered glass scarring her face. Even though that tremendous force is destroying her own body, she didn't care for it. She is finally put out of her miserable life.
