[LOBO]
Occasionally my job takes me downstate.
And I don't really mind. When time permits, I'll even take the back roads instead of I-57. While from the map it looks a boring plaid, the corn farmers plant lavender on the roadsides; you can see the purple-edged road wind over mild hills almost to the horizon. Last week a crop duster "buzzed" me -I was both exhilarated and terrified frankly. I thought he was crashing.
Inspired by the weather, I took my motorcycle this time. It's a respectable 929cc crotch rocket I acquired recently during an intersection of "bargain" and "random circumstance" instead of personal taste.
But this is exactly what brought on my encounter with the rider in black.
Male presumably. But this rider is always so thoroughly covered in black leather and high-tech looking protective gear, I couldn't tell you the color of his skin. The bike, also completely black, is a make I don't recognize despite numerous attempts. It is enviously cool. This driver's signature, however, is that he usually blows by me at some freakish speed right around the same time and same place every day.
But today he slips into the lane beside me and revs his engine twice.
I rev back.
Race.
He gives universal "watch for cops" hand signals, and counts down from three with his fingers.
-And he is gone. A spec on the horizon.
I grin as I rip through my own gears in pursuit. As the engine roars underneath me, and I am lost in the road completely. A glance at the speedometer has me at 156 miles an hour, however even that slight nod has my sunglasses being ripped from my face by the wind. Miraculously I catch them, and as I struggle them back to my nose I smell and taste melting steel, smoke, and rubber -while being pelted with a painful mist of particulate matter.
Shrapnel.
The rider in black had crashed ahead.
-And I was screaming up on the accident scene.
I was so close behind him the debris field was still spreading. The combine and the two cars involved in the accident were still lurching to a stop as I weaved through the macabre event still taking place untouched, almost as if I were a rumor or a ghost; someone deaf who had blinked would never have known I was ever there at all.
As for the driver, what I caught a glance of I hope to soon forget.
At least until I go to work tomorrow.
