A novel I won't write - Bike Mike and Samantha Jones

I have ideas. I write them down. And then I do nothing. Because it takes too much self-discipline and time to write a book. So here it is...

Maybe it's a story. Maybe it's part of a novel I won't write.

It was 2:30 am and purely coincidental.

 

No, thinking about it, it probably wasn't.

 

It was more likely that divine provenance had puppeteered all of it, that it was - cue the music: Dun-dun DUN! - meant to be.

 

Let's examine it and decide for ourselves.

 

2:30 am and she was wide awake again, finding patterns behind her eyelids if she looked really hard into the dark and then blinked, hard.  It's a pretty boring game.

 

Losing the battle between relaxation techniques and medication, she headed to the medicine cabinet and wrestled the lid off the orange bottle, shook out some pills, put one between her teeth, shook the rest back in again and then took care to wind and press the lid just right to get it all closed up again.  She flipped the pill into her mouth with her tongue and bent over the faucet, lapping water from her cupped hand.

That's about the exact moment, as well as she can remember, that she heard it.

 

First there was the whining noise that those kinds of motorbikes make, the ones that go too fast.  She heard the change of key in the gearing and, just about to sail down a thought-stream of indignation and arseholes on fast bikes riding like the clappers on residential roads late at night, she heard the bang.  

 

That horrible bang that always comes as part of a quartet along with the crunch of metal, the squeal of brakes and some kind of low, frightening thudding noise.

 

She didn't really think through her actions. No plan, just reaction.

 

She put on slippers, grabbed a jacket, found her keys and left the house before the dogs even realized she was going somewhere.  Neither of them even came to the door.

 

She could walk, of course, the two blocks behind her house to where she knew it happened, but the car would give her light, so she clambered into it and took off, not bothering to put on her seatbelt.

 

She found the bike easily enough.  It was on the side of the road, perfectly parked in a 4 hour maximum parking zone... it was just lying on its side.

 

She drove past it, knowing he must have come off before the bike skidded away from him, and drove in a circle at 90 degrees to the road lanes, her lights scanning the park.  He was collapsed against the trunk of a tree.

 

Now that she had him, she called 911, explaining what had happened - or what she thought might have happened - and asking for an ambulance to come to the North East corner of the park as quickly as possible.

 

She got the courage to walk over to him - the body was big, it had to be a man - and see him.  She knew she couldn't move him, shouldnt touch him, even.  

 

Holy shit.... was he dead?

 

"The ambulance is coming.  It's coming."  She started to cry.

 

A grrrrmph sound came from inside his helmet, startling her.

 

"Don't move, don't!" She knelt down at his side.  "In the movies they always say never to move the head or neck..."

 

Another grrrrmph, quieter this time.

 

He was lying on his back, in full protective biker gear.  Gently, very gently, she took his left hand in hers, and they waited together.

 

The rest of it all was kind of a blur.  Having the EMTs shoo her away so they could stabilize him.  Explaining to the police officer that she didn't know the man, but could he please giver her cell number to the hospital so that any family might let her know how he was doing.  Getting into her car and very, very gingerly, driving around the block to go home, now that the sleeping tablets she'd taken were really kicking in.  Then.... bed.  Blissful bed.

 

It must have been at least two weeks till she got the phone call - probably three.  She was at work, bantering with her colleagues over something or other, all standing up so they could peer over the cube walls and have a conversation.  

 

"Hello?"

 

"Hi.  Is this... Samantha Jones?"

   

"Yes."

 

"I'm Mike.  The guy you saved at the motorbike accident."

 

He was still in hospital, and he wanted to thank her for what she did.  Because he was going to be in a rehab facility for a while, could she visit him sometime?

 

And so, possibly despite her better judgement, a few days later, Sam arrived to the swish of the automated lobby doors.  Once it was confirmed that she was on the list of approved guests - for that day only and only until 4pm - she was directed to his room.

 

She wasn't quite sure what she'd expected, but it wasn't this.  It wasn't to start to cry, long, silent rivulets down her face, as soon as his eyes met hers.  Standing next to his bed, she felt humiliated at her reaction, rubbing her cheeks with her sleeves and sniffing loudly.  Then she saw that he was crying too, and that was strangely calming.

 

"These are for you," she whispered hoarsely, holding out a bright bunch of flowers in a vase.  "I said you were a biker guy and asked them to not do something too feminine..."she turned the vase so he could see the rest of the arrangement, then set it down on a table at the side of the room.  

 

"It's lovely," he said, "and... these are for you."  He pointed to a very large bouquet standing on the same table.

 

"Oh," she stammered, "you didn't---"

 

"I did.  I want to thank you.  You saved my life."

 

"Don't be silly," she blushed.  "Someone would have seen..."

But they both knew it wasn't true.  He'd been thrown into the shadows of the trees in the park, and his bike had ended up 30 feet away in a legitimate parking space.  Anyone who saw it would have just thought it had been vandalized because it was on it's side.  In the time that they had waited for the ambulance, noone else had come out of their houses to see what was going on, no lights in the windows came on at all. 

 

She started to cry again, all the trauma of that night resurfacing, and turned back to the bed, taking his hand just like she had done in the park.  

 

"I was so scared," she whispered.

 

"Me too," he said.  "But you didn't seem scared at all."

  

"I'd taken a sleeping pill.  By the time I drove myself home I was probably as high as a kite."

They both started giggling and he squeezed her hand, softly.

 

"I'm Samantha, by the way," she said, moving her hand so that she shook his, formally.

 

"Mike," he said, grinning.

And so it began.

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