~ The Incident ~
As Steve approached the intersection, the tiny hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. He'd felt the presence of an oncoming vehicle--from behind. Then he'd heard it. The roar of its engine ascending on him like an oncoming freight train. As a runner, he felt vulnerable and moved a little more to the left side of the shoulder of the road. Louder. Louder the roar filled his ears. Just as he was at the crossroads, at the stop sign, a pickup truck careened--without stopping--through the intersection taking the same left turn he had planned. He noticed the truck's speed was too great for the turn. It pitched to the right and almost rolled. Its left tires lifted off the pavement as its right tires screeched and stuttered as the truck brutally slid sideways through the intersection.
Steve looked up into the truck. He wanted to see the driver that was putting his life in danger. Just as he looked into the cab of the truck to get a look at the offending driver, he heard a girl's scream emanate from within.
He saw the driver, a disheveled man about 40ish, holding the steering wheel with one hand and his other arm was wrapped around the shoulders of what looked to be a young girl.
What Steve didn't see, or hear, as that pickup truck's tires squealed and chattered through the intersection, was the girl's body slide violently across the seat as the truck made an all too fast and sharp left hand turn. As the truck lurched and tilted to the right, as momentum and centrifugal force attempted to tip the truck on its side, the girl's shoes slammed into the right side view mirror as her feet hurled through the window she managed to open a few miles back. The crazed driver's hand around her shoulders slipped, but he caught the crook of her elbow. If he hadn't, she would have exited the truck's window with the side view mirror that she managed to kick clean off the truck. The mirror rolled to the ground by the side of the road.
The driver gunned the truck's engine, and its tires screeched and smoked as it sped away ahead of Steve. The smell of rubber filled Steve's lungs. Stunned, his heart raced. His legs weakened.
He noticed the truck's license plate as the truck sped away. His internal beat told him he'd just completed running two miles. '12:16PM,' he said to himself.
He looked around to see if anyone else had seen this horrendous act of reckless driving. Not another car was in sight. There was nothing around, no houses, no stores, or gas stations. Simply two lonely roads crossing paths.
He'd only gotten a brief look at the driver and an even briefer look at the girl's face. He thought she looked to be about fourteen or fifteen, but he really wasn't good a guessing people's age.
He couldn't make out what the girl's scream was about since the pickup had made such a squeal of its own sliding through the intersection. Was the young girl's scream a cry for help. Or perhaps it was the scream of a joyous thrill ride. Was the older man her father. Was the father and daughter having an argument. Was the older man her boyfriend. She looked to be underage, but this was hill country after all; who knows what they get away with up here. Those were the thoughts that raced through his head as his mind grappled to understand what he'd just witnessed.
Still stunned, his heart pounded as he stumbled along the road in an attempt continued his run. He was not sure what to make of the situation. He replayed in his head the scenarios he had just concocted about the driver and the young girl. His first thought was to flag down the next car and ask to use their cell and call the police; the girl's scream may have been a cry for help. But the more he ran through those possible options, the more the odds seemed to him that the scream was in reaction to the crazy driving habits of the driver. 'A truck almost flipping in an intersection would invoke a scream from its passenger, wouldn't it?' he asked himself.
Steve's penchant for not wanting to get involved, coupled with his desire to start his vacation off on the right foot (peaceful and without responsibilities to anyone) led him to decide that, yes, the reckless driving he'd just witnessed warranted a scream from the young female passenger. He decided to put it out of his mind and continue his run, his Zen.
That was the event that interrupted Steve's run two miles and sixteen minutes into it. An event he would remember his whole life. An event that would haunt him for the next three years.
Steve had been a runner ever since his high school days on the track team. Running was his escape, his tool of choice when he needed to de-stress. He'd become particularly apt at judging when he had run a mile. No matter what the pace he was keeping, or the terrain he was running on, he was able to instinctively know when he had completed another mile. He checked himself against the gadget du jour, the pedometer, the iphone, the fitbit, he'd tried them all. Running was Zen for Steve. He kept track of the distance not by counting his strides, or attempting to keep a mental clock; he kept track of his distance by the beat of his soul. He often meditated while he ran and could block out most thought--he did need to pay attention to traffic and such for his own safety, but he could block out the noise of life. He didn't think about academia, his students, his current girlfriend and her pending expiration date, or his ailing mother. He simply ran and heard the internal beat of his soul. He had a sixth sense when those soul beats added up to a mile.
And so it was on that particular June day. He had awoken to his first day of his summer vacation in a rental cottage in a small remote town in the Adirondack mountains. Warm mottled sunlight illuminated the piny woods around the cottage. It was his thirty-third birthday. He'd spent the morning after breakfast reading. By noon he felt like he needed a run. He tightened the laces of his running shoes on the steps of the front porch to the cottage. He had checked the time, it was 12:00PM sharp as he set out running down the quiet country road in front of the cottage. He was unfamiliar with the area so he simply picked a direction; he was heading south. Steve was consistently averaging eight minute miles at that time, unless he was running in really steep terrain, but the road he was on was fairly flat, with little dips and rises, but nothing significant.
He came to that fateful intersection when his internal beat told him he just completed two miles. The time would have been 12:16PM.
~ Hero found ~
Almost three years later, Steve was sitting at his office desk staring out the window over the campus grounds. The warm sun of early May blossomed the flowerbeds, and the spring semester would soon be winding down. He was between lectures. It was the time in his schedule he allotted to see students who were compelled to meet with him. Usually, these students were struggling and they hoped a face-to-face would somehow miraculously raise their grade. He was not one to trade sex for grades. It's not that he didn't often fantasize about some of his young undergrads, it was that he valued his career too much to risk that sort of complication. He would perform his usual psychology number on the student; he would tell them what they already knew, that they were lazy and not putting enough effort into his class. He had just sent one young teary-eyed redhead out of his office when the department administrative assistant interrupted him: "I have a young lady here. She says it's urgent she speaks with you. She is not one of your students. What should I tell her?"
Bewildered, and yet intrigued, he said, "Send her in."
When Rachel walked in to Steve's office he felt he had known her from somewhere, but he couldn't place her. His mind raced through his thirty-six year history, but he came up blank. Before him stood a young girl, he estimated all of eighteen or nineteen. To his eyes, she had a pleasing looking face, not model gorgeous, but cute nevertheless. From his view, her body looked stunning--curvaceous in all the right places. He thought she had a farm wholesome quality about her--sexy, but ready to milk a cow if needed.
She stood there staring at him. Too long a silence had fallen on the room. He wanted to break the silence and ask her what she wanted, but he froze; there was something about her that arrested him.
"Do you know who I am?" Questioned the young girl standing in front of his desk.
"No. I mean, you look familiar, but, sorry, I can't place you."
"I'm Rachel Hunt."
Steve's sudden paled complexion gave away the shock his brain was going through. He felt the prickled heat of guilt wash over him. Beads of sweat formed on his brow and palms.
