Waiting for the Crash (continued)

The weight and immovability of the Dodge's vast mass will push the contents of the Merc's stomach back, into the cabin, where the tubes and valves and marinated moving parts will bore into the flesh of your legs, easily finding blood and muscle and bone. Your head will snap forward, then back, maybe enough for your neck to break. Your perennial refusal to wear a seatbelt should ensure your ejection through the windshield, but with your legs anchored by the engine block, your face will avoid the broken glass skin peel and instead bounce furiously into the blooming, pupal airbag.

Eventually the cars will all come to a rest, radiating a false and temporary sense of calm. Someone else will call the state police; maybe they'll pull over to the shoulder first, wait around to give a statement, take a time out from their hectic schedule to do what they can for a fellow human being. Maybe they'll only slow down slightly as they make the call and speed up again once the necessary information is relayed.

If the whiplash hasn't broken your neck, you'll probably still be alive at this point, maybe even conscious. You won't make it as far as the hospital because there's only so much they can do about the internal bleeding without an OR, but you will last until the ambulance arrives and you may be able to answer the EMT's questions: what's your name? Is there anyone I can call? You will tell them your name easily enough, but you'll hesitate with the second question. Should you tell them Bob? It would be easy enough, a single syllable and a gesture towards your cell phone with its indefatigable address book. Haven't you already put him through enough, though? Wouldn't this, the news that you are damaged and broken and unable to be put back together again, wouldn't this be the final insult? Wouldn't it be another example of how you push him, and push him and wait for him to crack?

It's something you've done since the start. There have been the men, the near continuous roll-call of colleagues and personal trainers and fellow PTA members, relationships consummated on team-building away-days or in narrow apartments on bitter afternoons. You always told yourself that Bob put you in these positions, that if he hadn't gotten so fat and repulsive you'd have been more than happy to maintain conjugal fidelity.

If he had just taken the time out to do some sit-ups, come to the gym with you a couple of times a week, if he had only been able to stop the tumor growth of that belly, slithering forward each year over his belt. You've managed to stay in shape, and god knows it hasn't been easy. Between the diets and the pills and the exercise regime, you've worked hard - all the while maintaining your roles as main bread-winner and doting mother - and at least part of your motivation lay in wanting to make sure Bob didn't find you disgusting, didn't go elsewhere.

Or if he'd just made the effort to have more in common with you, if he'd joined the PTA, or come to some of your work functions with more enthusiasm and less of a sour smile on his face. If he'd done that you wouldn't have needed to seek out other men, seek out their warm, dark bodies and pull them close to you. But the truth is that it started before the wedding, before his belly grew and before his sour smile established nexus. It started back when you still sought out Bob's body, when the thought of him was still a thrill. You want to blame Bob, to make him responsible for what you've done. You want to grab him by the scruff of his neck and say There! Look what you made me do! It's the opportunity you want, the opportunity to blame him, face-to-face. You want the confrontation, the loaded question one night when the kids have been put to bed and the washing up has been done and only thing left is to watch
Law & Order in silence. (to be continued)

Illustration © John Caldwell