Ground Control

What was that loud cracking sound? Why was I on the ground? My leg hurts. I'm on the ground. I'm on...the...ground? Cars. Get up. cars. Erik, where's Erik? Yellow light. Get up. My head, helmet. The bike is by my feet. I'm on the ground. Where's Erik? Get up. My hands, where are my hands? The ground? get up.

I scrambled to my feet, the wet pavement making impressions on the palms of my hands like scales. I looked around. Cars, bikes, we're going to get hit. Erik. Erik is talking to...other people? People...on the ground? That's when it hit me, we had been in an accident.


It was a good dinner to unwind from the first day of work. We both experienced stressful situations and unplanned occurances seemed to have crept into both of our days. We had waited out the rain by means of a hot fudge sundae and a hot cocoa, the same kind my Aunt Kay used to make. Just sipping it had brought me back to cast iron gas stoves with the smell of the gas wafting with real chocolate warming up on the burner. The rain had calmed and I held close to Erik, the warmth of his body warding off the goose bumps that seemed destined to take over. We cruised through town talking of lesson plans we still had to make. As we approached the road to our house, Erik insisted I wave to the woman on the corner at her food stand. He had eaten there the other day and had made friends with the owner/cook and the patrons. As I turned to wave we came to the branch of our road.
“Did she see you?” Erik asked as he stopped at the T to our road placing his feet firmly on the ground. The blinker shone a bright yellow, illuminating the wall to our right and reflecting off the damp leaves of the trees and bushes.
“No, but a lady sitting there did. She waved to me. She looked really nice and excited to see us.” I told him as I looked down our road.
We waited for the oncoming traffic to pass, and then started to make our turn. The next thing I knew I was on the ground, my helmet had just slammed onto the pavement and my neck jerked with the shock. Yellow blinking lights shone off the wet pavement and the neon green bike was lying at my knees. I jumped up to get out of the road as I saw Erik go towards the others. Who were they? How many were there? What the hell just happened? The bike lay on the ground, its front wheel touching the side of another. My eye was immediately drawn to a small child, was he hurt? Then I saw a woman and a young man, maybe a teenager. Wait, the woman is holding her stomach, God, she’s pregnant. My knee started to sting and I quickly checked as I heard Erik ask them if they were okay. A truck that was behind us stopped and blocked the traffic. It seemed like there were lots of people stopped. All 3 of the others weren’t wearing helmets. God, had my head hit?
“Molly, move the bike.” Erik instructed. Dazed, I lifted the bike up and moved it to the side, the blinker still going.
“You okay? Okay?” Erik asked the couple standing at their bike. The little boy was in the road so I told him to come over and I checked him, “Are you okay?” I asked giving him the thumbs up. Scanning him, there was no blood.
“What happened?” The lady from behind us in the truck asked.
“We were here,” Erik said stepping into the road, “I was stopped and my blinker was on. We were turning. We live right there.” He gestured down the road.
“Okay. Okay. I saw. He come on side?” she asked.
“No, on this side. I turn,” he made the action of steering the bike, “and he hit me. Here. Like this.” He made a T bone collision with his hands. “Are you okay?” He asked the people again as they stood huddled together.
The lady spoke to them in Thai and they nodded, moving towards their bike.
I sighed as they took off. If she hadn’t been there to communicate, god knows. What would happen? Thai police? It wasn’t our fault. My knee stung and my hand throbbed as I climbed back on the bike. We wheeled toward our house, the neighbors out in an ogling pack.
“You okay?” They asked.
“We’re okay.” We answered, “Shaken.” One of the neighbors walked to us, checking my hands and asking if we were okay and what happened. We looked over the bike and made our way inside, recapping what had happened. Gosh, good thing we were wearing a helmet. Helmet 2 points. Blinker none. I just wanted to get inside.