Chapter Y, as in You’ll Never, Never Know

A roaring something or other jolts my brain, and I’m shaking as my eyes open as my head snaps up.  I’m flat on my stomach and looking toward a bright light, and it roars by again, and again, somewhat close by and very close by and close by.  I shake my head and water goes flying — it’s coming down hard — and to the left a grassy trench fills with water, almost before my eyes.  I pull my arm out from under my body — it’s a lump.  It doesn’t work.  I guess I’ve been laying on it, so I use the other to prop myself up.

I’m on the side of a busy highway, and I’m very vulnerable — there is nothing between me and the road.  In fact, I’m ON the road, on a very narrow shoulder between the road and the ditch.  I’m laying facing downhill and the water is running into my pant legs, and water streams around my shoulders and down.  I’ve started to get up but like I said my arm isn’t working, so I have to push myself up and get my feet under me, difficult on this wet road — and while looking behind me here!  A horrendous rushing and whirring sound, of 400 and 300 and 250 horsepower and tires and exhaust and revving and braking, and it’s so close by, by and by, and I’m soaked in my clothes and in this water coming down, and by …

I’m not even wondering how I got here — I mean, I’m lying, I’m wondering how I got here — but I’m more concerned with where I am going, for seconds, and for firsts how I am going to get there and survive along the way!  I shield my eyes and look across the road — traffic going one way and it ooks like there is a watery ditch on the other side.  The ditch on this side, it’s running fast, and opposite that a very steep bank that looks like it’s made of clay — no way to get up that.  No good to cross the ditch, no good to cross to the other side of the road (not to mention the roaring autos!) because of the ditch and same type of bank on the other side, still raining, look behind me and see darkness, darkness and sound and roaring mechanical fierceness coming down toward me.  I wave frantically at anyone to stop, help, tell me where I’m at or if I’m luckier where I’m going, and with the rain and water splashing from the road into my eyes and ears and mouth, I’m fed up, I’m going, walking!

Down the road, traffic to my back, I’m realizing how I’m squinting from the rain and moreso the brightness ahead, hard to see, but I’m feeling my aggravation tensing up all the way to the fingers of my working arm, the other still dangling at my side!, and I’m slogging toward some light (this light, how much good does it do me) and walking as close to the ditch as possible, with my right foot on the grass sloping down, left in the middle of the small shoulder, cars still whizzing whizzing whizzing by, and me, on the move, in the middle of I have no idea where, going I have no idea where.

Something roars and roars behind and all of a sudden beside me and I’m enveloped and pushed by water over and around my head and shoulders, snapping my head back and my body forward.  I stomp my right food on the grass but it’s already on the wet slope and the slope carries my foot down followed by my body into the cold rushing water, my body swings around to grab for the slope so I don’t go down but with one less arm than I should have.

I’m now swimming around in the wetness (I mean, not swimming, but you know, under the water) and flopping and trying to get back up.  I grab at something that looks like I can grab on to, that is stuck in the ground, and it comes out!  And I slide back down, and into the water and down the stream, dirty water in my mouth and I can’t see underneath and the cold …