The Wreck

It was Sunday. I was driving. Cassidy and I were on our way to see the play "Little Women" that some of my friends were in.

I was turning left. I looked left. I looked right. Cass and I were talking. I looked left again. I looked right again. I went.

"There's a car there," she said.

Hm?

I winced and steeled myself for one of those Wow, Close Call moments. But this time, it didn't happen like that.

A bump, a crunch, a scrape. A shocked, "Oh shit" from my mouth.

I pulled over, completely shocked at what had just happened.

"Is he stopping?" I asked Cassidy. "Is he pulling over?"

I hoped he wouldn't. I hoped he would just keep going. If he kept going, we could go home and figure it out without all the insurance and fault and complications. But no. He pulled over.

"What do we do?" I asked Cass. I know my eyes were about the size of golf balls. I didn't know what to do. I had no idea. I had absolutely no clue.

"We get out of the car," Cassidy said. "We have to talk to him."

I looked in the rear view mirror. It was a guy. He had long hair and a scruffy beard and what registered in my mind as a band T-shirt. Honestly--

"But he's creepy," I said.

Cassidy sort of laughed a tiny bit. "Well, that's unfortunate. But we still have to get out."

So we did. And he did too. You could tell he was a musician. He wasn't that old. We later found out he's 17, younger than I am.

I shook my head. "I'm so sorry," I said. I couldn't think of anything else that fit the situation.

He sort of shook his head and shrugged a little. "It's alright," he said. "Are you both okay?"

I nodded. "Yeah, we're fine. Are you?" I mentally kicked myself. That should have been the first thing I said to him. It was my fault. It was very, completely, definitely, totally ALL my fault. I said so, even though I know you're not supposed to do that.

Then Cass told me I was going to have to call my parents. I hadn't actually thought that far ahead. I kind of wasn't planning to call them. In my mind, I think I figured if we were all okay, I could just go home and fix the car--

Oh. The car. The Kia Soul with red and black interior. That I had just recently named. {Jaxx, in case you wondered.}

The damange really wasn't that bad. The front right headlight area was a little crunched. And it was leaking some kind of fluid. So. Aw.

I did call my dad. He was fairly calm and said he'd come. The part that hurt was my mom in the background. In a voice that said "I-Knew-She-Was-An-Effing-Screw-Up-Kid," she said, "She got in a wreck, didn't she?" Ouch, Mom.

So the guy I hit, Cassidy and I just sort of hung out for a while. He was really nice. He kept saying that he was glad we were all okay, and that it was fine, etc. Thank God I didn't hit like some horrible old person.

Before my dad got there, a police man showed up. Greattttt. Any chance of getting this over with easily is now over.

The officer got our licenses and stuff, and my dad was there soon. I just kept saying that I was so sorry and I'd pay for as much of everything as I possibly could, and then keep paying. My dad's words were, "Yeah, this is a gift that's gonna keep giving for about three years because of insurance." Oh. Cool.

Nothing of note happened for a while, besides the guy I hit's parents coming. They were also awesome. The first thing his mom said to me was, "I'm glad everyone is okay, that's the most important thing." They were all so sweet and calm. I'm amazed.

I freaking love living where I live, guys. Turns out we personally know the man who handles the guy's insurance. Ha. Wow.

After a really long time, the officer started to wrap up the paper work in his car. My dad and I went over.

Cop: "She's so young and nobody was really hurt, so I'm not going to give her a ticket. This whole thing is going to be bad enough as it is."

OH MY GOSH THANK YOU SO MUCH HOLY FREAKING COW THANK YOU OH MY WORD LORD JESUS THANK YOU YAY.

Wow.

"The Aftermath" coming tomorrow, haha. The post got too long.

~Stephanie