Page 24 of Unwillingly His

Snow drifted in through the broken glass and torn metal.

I looked out of the window closest to me, and it was just a solid white wall.

But if there was snow floating in, it had to be coming from somewhere. My mind was still fuzzy, and it took me a moment to realize I wasn’t on the seats.

I was on the roof of the car.

We had somehow flipped over.

My mother was dead, and I hadn’t seen his face yet, but I just knew my father was gone too.

“Help!” I cried out again, ignoring the screams of pain from my ribs as I tried to project my voice.

The window on the other side of my father was shattered, but I could only see out a few inches that weren’t blocked by a wall of snow. Those inches were covered with jagged pieces of glass. Even if I could get out that way, I would gut myself in the process.

There had to be a way out the front.

Maybe the driver had been able to get out and go for help. It took several agonizing minutes before I was able to actually get on my hands and knees. The shards of broken glass cut into my palms as I slowly made my way to the front of the car.

The driver was still buckled into his seat, hanging lifeless upside down with his blood dripping down into a puddle on the roof of the car. The way his head had been bashed in by the steering wheel was going to haunt my dreams forever.

Next to the ever-growing puddle of blood was a silver flask. It had to have been the driver’s. Had he been drunk? Had he killed my parents? My heart was cold, and I couldn’t even muster the energy to hate him, not yet.

My stomach rolled as I squeezed my eyes closed and looked away, trying to regain enough composure to figure out how to get out of the car.

The windshield was shattered, but it was also blocked in by snow, and the passenger-side window had the same problem. The only way out was through the open window on the driver’s other side, and I couldn’t get past the driver.

“Help!” I screamed.

I kept screaming it over and over, my voice getting stronger with each pass until my throat felt like it was on fire while the rest of my body was freezing. I kept screaming as long as I could, but eventually I didn’t have the strength.

My eyes slid closed as I collapsed on top of more pieces of broken glass, and the world went dark again.

There was no way to tell how long I was out. It wasn’t until I heard a faint voice calling that I was able to open my eyes again.

“This is the New York City Police Department. Is there anyone still in there?”

“Yes,” I tried calling out, but my throat was too dry, too raw, and my lungs hurt too much to take a deep breath.

“I don’t think there is anyone in there, cap,” the voice said.

I tried to call out again, but it was useless.

I had to make some noise. They couldn’t leave. I had to tell them I was here. If they left, I would die, cold and alone.

All because of one stupid limo driver who thought he could get away with drinking on the job in the middle of a snowstorm.

I wrapped my fingers around the cold slippery flask, now covered in half-frozen, thick blood, and hit it on the roof of the car.

Nausea rolled in my stomach as I struggled to keep a grip on the frigid metal, but I struck it again and again.

“Wait, I think I hear something,” one of the voices said, and I nearly cried in relief.

I hit harder, faster. I was so close to being saved, so close.

“I don’t know,” another voice said. “I don’t hear anything.”

With as much strength as I had, my entire body still and nearly frozen, I hit the flask on the roof harder and faster again.

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