CARTER'S ARMY: WILLIAM CARTER
1
Chapter 02 - By Christopher Patrick Lydon
November 28th
It was the end of the day, and as usual Will was running late
for his bus. He sprinted through the halls of the school trying to get to
his locker. He had been held up trying to finish a review problem with his
physics teacher. Miss Smith seemed in no hurry to explain it, expecting him
to wait patiently while she droned on about how object A when pushed affected
object B and gave C result. He had enough trouble trying to grasp the concept,
but when he had so little time until the bus left and he was stranded at school,
he really hadn't given it his full attention.
He flew down a flight of stairs trying to get to the basement
level of the school where, due to overcrowding, several banks of extra lockers
had been set up. It was tucked away from the rest of the school beside the
boiler room and the chemistry labs; due to its proximity away from the rest
of the school, it was a favorite hangout for those kids looking to grab a
smoke in the emergency exit well that led up to the student parking lot. A
little bit of shelter from the wind.
Will didn't mind having his locker down there; it was out of
the way and he could always chat to Brody who was often hanging about the
exit with some of his buddies. But Brody was off that day, and everyone else
had gone home as soon as school let out, so he was alone.
The ruined door to his locker soon soured his mood.
He stood and stared at the mess of his books turned out onto
the floor, and his notes scattered about torn and disorganized. His heart
sank as he dropped to pick them up, pushing them back into his locker in an
effort to preserve them. He couldn't help but sigh dejectedly as he picked
up the two halves of his English book, a faithful friend that had died valiantly.
He tossed it into the locker after his notes and stood up; he didn't have
time to report it that night, and he would have to wait until the morning.
He stopped when he saw his coat was missing. He swore loudly.
Who the hell stole a coat from someone in a snowstorm? It was so supremely
cruel that it just fit some of the guys who went to Will's high school. Will
reluctantly closed the door of his locker as best he could on only one hinge,
bending the twisted metal back into shape. He was screwed and he knew it.
He jogged back up to the main office of the school, but found
it locked up; only a janitor left sweeping the floor. He caught sight of Will
and shook his head. "They all went home, the storm. You'd better go home
as well. There is a big snowstorm coming and it is already pretty messy out
there!"
Will nodded as he hurried through the halls to where the buses
always waited day after day, hoping he wasn't too late.
He burst out of the doors just as the last bus pulled out of
the parking lot and headed out into the street. And Will felt hope evaporate
as he stood there watching large flakes of snow falling down around him. It
didn't truly hit him how bad his situation was until he turned back to the
doors to find they had locked behind him, he was trapped outside the school
in the storm. He realized only then that the storm was much stronger than
he had first thought. What he had seen when he had burst out of the school
was only the view from the lee side of the building. He didn't realize the
full danger ahead of him.
He pulled his plaid shirt closer about him to ward off the cold
as he struggled down the hill the school was built upon. He was glad for once
that he tried to keep up with the latest fashion and had worn a tee shirt
under it, otherwise had he just been in his tee shirt...
He slipped a little on the icy sidewalk that had yet to be cleared,
and managed to steady himself. His Aunt Majella lived about ten minutes from
his school; if he could make it there he would be able to call his dad for
a lift home. He dreaded the prospect; his father hated it when he missed a
bus. He could just hear the lecture now about responsibility and how he should
take better care of his property. As if he wanted to be struggling through
a snowstorm in just a thin shirt with no gloves.
He buried his hands into his armpits; trying to stay warm was
critical. It wasn't far, he just had to keep telling himself that. It didn't
matter that the snow came down harder, that his cap brim was now forming a
ledge of snow. As if on cue, the wind snatched it from his head and sent it
sailing into an embankment.
He stared after it mournfully; short of his climbing through
a four foot high snow bank which he simply wasn't dressed for, there was no
way to get it back. He swore again, it just wasn't his day. He struggled onwards,
determined to get out of the cold.
He didn't even notice as the black mustang slid to a halt beside
him.
"Are you nuts?" the driver called as he rolled down
his window.
Will glanced over at the captain of the hockey team and shivered,
"I missed the bus," he explained, continuing to walk; if he stopped
it meant he would be out in the cold longer.
Andrew let the car coast along beside the snow-covered sophomore,
"What happened to your coat?" he asked as he turned down the radio.
Will shrugged; "Someone trashed my locker..." he slipped
again on a patch of ice and again managed to stay upright.
Andrew shook his head; "I can give you a lift, beats walking
in this without a coat."
Will looked over at the classic Mustang. Andrew's car was the
envy of all the students at the school; it was a beautifully restored 1969
Coupe that seemed to epitomize Andrew. He embodied the kind of person that
the car had been designed for, young and full of energy. He nodded as he crossed
to the coupe and slid into the passenger seat, immediately glad of the car's
heater, even though he was still soaked to the skin from the melting snow.
Andrew looked over at him and undid his seatbelt. Shrugging
out of his varsity jacket he handed it over to Will. "Here, put this
on, you're soaked."
Will accepted the treasured jacket; it was as much a part of
Andrew's identity as the car was. He held it for a moment, feeling the soft
leather in his hands, before he put it on. It was already warm from Andrew's
body heat, and the combination of Andrew's sweat, cologne and worn leather
assailed his nose. He relaxed wrapped in the warm coat and sank into the seat,
glad just to be warm.
"So where am I taking you?" Andrew asked as he drove
the car down the hill and onto the street.
"My aunt's should be good; I can call my dad and get a
lift home..."
Andrew rolled his shoulders in a shrug, "Might as well
take you straight home, rather than let this storm get worse." He gunned
the engine and was satisfied that the tires had a firm grip on the snow-covered
road surface. The ploughs hadn't been past yet so driving was treacherous
and he kept it slow.
"You don't have to do that." Will assured, "I
mean you've already done so much..."
"It's no problem at all," Andrew said in reply, flashing
a charming smile, "I was going to head to practice after school but with
the storm it's probably best if I went home anyway. So where do you live?"
"Just outside of town - you know the access road?"
Will replied as he returned the smile, "It's the other side of Merrickville."
Andrew grinned, "Not that far from me then, cool."
As they drove to the road, Will found the snow was blowing so
heavily that he could not see anything through the windshield. He could catch
a glimpse of the road between snow gusts and he knew there was no traffic
on the road in that area, especially during the storm. But Andrew seemed determined
to go ahead and Will felt a bit reassured when he took a look at the gasoline
gauge. The car had almost a full tank.
On the westbound road Andrew drove the car onwards, pushing
through the northern wind, into the darkness, where they could see nothing
besides horizontally flying snow. The only thing Andrew could do to keep the
car on the road was to look out the driver's-side window to keep an eye on
the left edge of the road - taking advantage of his car to shield his view.
They could not drive more than five miles per hour. For the
entire five miles before the first stop sign, the car stayed in first gear.
Will had survived a few snow storms, one growing up in England,
and one the year before when he had first arrived in Canada travelling through
vast curtains of falling snow as his family had driven across the country
from Halifax to Ottawa along the Trans Canada highway; but this time it was
so different: hundreds of tons of snow was flying in a fierce wind, so that
he could not tell where the sky ended and the earth began, and there was almost
no chance for them to take a breath or find any reference in the gusty wind.
What is more, darkness was setting in. Will started to become nervous, since
Andrew could barely see five feet away, and he could slide the car off the
road at any moment. Will thought of urging him to go back into town, but it
would be very difficult to make a three-point turn without running a wheel
off the road. It was easier to keep going forward, in the meantime getting
farther into the wildness.
Even so, Andrew had to come to a complete stop four times, the
blowing snow was so dense. If it were not for the flying snow, they could
have caught glimpses of the fields they were passing. The endless fields,
lined up in rows and columns that stretched over 20 miles. Their emptiness
in the night often gave Will the feeling of an evil presence and he was relieved
that he couldn't see them at all. It was as if the storm had enveloped the
whole world!
As the car drifted through the snow Will felt as if he were
on a boat in a rough sea, or a leaf floating in the sky.
They came to a stop sign and made a right hand turn to the north;
two miles further there was an S-curve where the road had a yield sign for
CN trains bound for Toronto. Since they were travelling north against the
gusty wind, Andrew lost the advantage of having his car be a "vision
shield" to let him see whether he was still on the road. The wind was
blowing towards them; the snow would have been flying into their eyes if there
had not been a windshield. The northbound road was worse, since the snow was
thicker. Fortunately there was no oncoming traffic; otherwise they would have
instantly collided with each other. The car finally managed to reach the S-curve.
And Will became more nervous as they approached the curve, because it was
there that he had run into the ditch on his first driving lesson, turning
himself completely about on a still, sunny morning. It was the same place
that his Father had once run into a deer shortly after dusk. It was just a
bad curve.
Will prayed not to run into a deer and not to skid on ice. And
Andrew finally managed to get through the curve while keeping the car on the
road. It still took them about half an hour to cover the half-mile distance.
By going north for another mile they would come to the second
stop sign at a T-junction, where they would turn left and go west. Although
Andrew was only driving in first gear, he almost overshot the road into the
ditch. Will barely saw the stop sign on his right as the mustang travelled
another 15 feet on the slippery road before coming to a full stop. Andrew
blew out a sigh of relief as the car made the turn. Luckily there were no
cars coming from either direction. Now Andrew could again take advantage of
his car as a "vision shield" so he could find the edge of the road
through his left-hand window and stay on the road. Even so, several times
they went very close to the left edge and almost drove off the road.
The gusting was stronger. It was as if the whole world was being
wiped away.
Will knew they would pass by a farmhouse on their right which
was almost halfway home. Still, he completely missed the farmhouse, although
the house had its driveway lights on and was only 20 feet from the road. He
didn't realize this until he saw a dim light on his left-hand side. They were
passing a substation, and it was the gate's lithium light he saw which normally
hurt his eyes from miles away. He felt a kind of warmth, because he was finally
seeing something familiar. There were some wild trees on the roadside after
the gate. He could barely see their silhouettes in the blowing snow. And he
knew they would come to two more turns, and soon they would be on local highway
6.
He realized the reason he could see the outlines of the trees
was that they cut the wind a little bit. He should have also realized that
the nearby trees could also cause snowdrifts on the road, which could block
any kind of traffic. Very soon they realized they were running into trouble.
Snowdrifts extended across the whole area and piled up high, so that neither
of them could see where the road was. This realization was so sudden that
neither of them had time to think, but could only keep driving onward. Will
knew that if they stopped, the car would also turn into a snowdrift, with
them buried in the blowing snow. There was no squeal of brakes, no blaring
horn, only the sudden smashing impact and the impossibly loud cries of screeching
metal. The car lurched to the left, the back end swinging around on the wet,
slushy pavement. The impact threw Will against his seat belt so hard it cut
off his breath. The car spun like a child's top, whipping almost a full 360
degrees as the back end flew into the ditch. Will's head snapped back when
the car crunched to a halt. As suddenly as it started, it ended, leaving complete
silence except for the rapid clicking of a ruined motor cooling in the night's
grip.
