Passing Fate

My first real car was a 1977 Trans Am.  Black w/gold trim, honeycomb rims, machined dashplate, t-tops - the works.  Looked just like Bandit's.  Well, except that mine was missing half the pinstriping, had a dent in nearly every body panel, and the passenger t-top fluttered, mercilessly threatening to take flight at any given moment.  The interior lighting consisted of one tiny, lone bulb buried deep enough in the dash that you could barely read the speedometer at night, which wasn't really that much of a problem.  I mean, at sixteen, who really looks at the speedo anyway?  It also had the tendency to die specifically at inopportune times- like when your cruising slow by a gaggle of girls sitting at the Dairy Queen.

One night shortly after my purchase, I headed north for a night of cruising in "the city" (Population:  12,380.)  The city about a 30 minute drive away.  A 30 minute drive through nothing but corn, beans, and the occasional oil well.  After a full night of fruitless cruising, I started for home.  Somewhere amidst a break in the beans and oil fields, U.S. 45 dips into the woods and the trees loom up on either side, reaching toward each other overhead.

It was here that an early 70's hearse in absolutely pristine condition appeared from a dirt road that either didn't have a sign, or I missed it in the apparition of that spotless white hearse pulling onto the highway from a overly large path that led nowhere.  And when I say that it was spotless, I mean that thing was damn near glowing in the moonlight.

It crawled out onto the highway, and eased up to a cruising speed of about 45 mph.  Through the back glass I could see the shimmer of the equally immaculate white satin curtains contrasted against the darkness inside - black as a cave and somehow looked just as deep.

I followed that hearse for what seemed like hours.  I stared at it's glowing iridescence and gleaming chrome trim through the neverending and unpassable curves.  I followed that spook white hearse until my mind twisted tight with fear and wouldn't let me follow it any more.

I stomped that pedal down so hard I heard it smack against the floor over the bellowing roar of the engine, and almost immediately, I saw whisps of white flash from the exhaust of the hearse.  Veering into the oncoming lane, I inched my front wheels almost even with its white rear door.  Side by side we dove into a curve, the needle bouncing wildy past 70, leg muscles twitching against the bottomed-out pedal.  I glanced up at the driver's window, but saw nothing but the reflection of the double yellow line streaming by.  Pulling myself against the steering wheel, and strained to see something inside.  The speedometer continued to climb.  Then somewhere in the dark glass a fleck of white appeared.  Just a little spot at first, but as I gaineed on the hearse that tiny glare split in two.  The flecks of white flared out sideways, until they seemed to light up the inside of my car.

My engine stumbled and I snapped my head around to look at the dash, but the glare of two white lights speeding toward me changed my mind.  My feet were on the brake before the throttle came up.  The steering wheel grew tight in my hands.  Red 'alt' and 'oil' warnings flared out at me from the dash.   I pulled myself into the pedal trying to overcome the sudden loss of power brakes.   My tires howled and the ass-end of the car skated right, my hood still precariously in the wrong lane.  I don't remember counter-steering, but I do remember watching my front bumber magically slip back to the right side of the centerline just as the oncoming car blared past and disappeared around the curve.

I sat there in the suddenly quiet night, staring at my hands on the steering wheel.  The shook when I finally released it and tried to light a cigarette.  They shook even more when I looked up and saw the hearse - stopped some 500 yards up the road, the pearl-white back door now bathed in red from the brake lights.