I huff—there seems to be no stop to my world. I have thirty minutes to get home, let the dogs out, and complete Mom’s errand. It’ll get done, and then I’ll retreat into a weekend-long solitary-confinement.

But damn, I’m tired. My thoughts drift to last weekend and my few hours fishing on the dock Sunday afternoon. I fell asleep in the Adirondack chair and woke to the sound of my rod slipping from my hands into the water. I spent the next hour debating whether to risk the lake’s alligator population for the rod or lose it forever.

Gators are less active in winter, I remembered, diving into the icy lake. Besides, I’d dealt with far more difficult things since returning to my hometown.

Losses no one understands, not that I ever talk about them.

Then, nearly losing my father.

Losing myself.

That same drowning sensation envelopes me. The quiet. The dark. Sinking into it. I go deeper, trying to find that damn rod.

Disaster only takes a second. One stupid, ridiculous, devastating second. Disaster can happen with one mistake. The heavy droop of my eyelids, my arms going slack, and tension evaporating with the gentle sinking of my head as my body overrules me. “Good luck, babe! Well, good luck, babe, you’ll have to….”

Have to get home… Have to stop the world just to stop the feeling… Whack! My head spins into a vicious pillow fight between my brothers and me. Colin’s pillow side-swipes my face, followed by Gil’s weaker attempt at my side and Luke’s attack from the other. Fucking assholes! Watch for Marigold!

Is that her? Screaming?

The music vanishes discordantly behind a deafening collision. I choke awake, my head snapping forward and then back. Not pillows. Airbags. The truck’s alarms blare under screeching tires as my boots slam against the brakes. I jerk the steering wheel behind the airbag, but it’s too late. No control. Sometimes, nothing can be done. The truck careens, zigzagging across the road and twisting to a perpendicular end mid-road, facing the wrong direction.

The world stops.

Shoving the bags away from me, I blink repeatedly. Fucking hell, what just happened?

I move my extremities and check myself over. I’m okay. I think I’m okay. But my first relieved breath is cut off in a devastating glance up. Through the shattered windshield and the steam jettisoning from the bent hood, I barely make out another car, a blue orb, shoved off the road like a discarded matchbox toy in the tree-lined ditch.

I’ve hit someone. I’ve fucking hit someone!