Sunday 21 September 2014

Above the Vaulted Sky - Page 259

            Elle points and pulls at my clothes with her other hand. I follow the imaginary line and find the group of people around an upturned car.
            A woman lies on the ground underneath one of the wheels. I can only imagine her leg is mangled beyond comprehension beneath it. She screams and looks around, looking for the aid standing invisible all around her.
            ‘We can move it,’ I say. ‘And then hopefully someone will come for her.’
            ‘But the car’s huge,’ Elle says.
            ‘We can lever it away,’ I reply. ‘And with the bunch of us pushing it’ll move easily.’
            We move back to the group and I explain my plan. Immediately people begin picking up wreckage, bars and pieces of wood. It looks like we emerged on this side and crushed some sort of hut by the side of the road. I can only hope no one else was hurt by the explosion.
            The woman screams. I can’t imagine what it must look like to her, a group of bars and planks spontaneously deciding to push a car off of her leg.
            I wish I could reassure her, but I know that’s impossible, so I place my hands against the cars greasy underside and push with all my strength.
            We push forward collectively and the car begins to lean backwards.

            ‘Again!’ I cry and we band together with fresh determination. The car rolls backwards and slams against the ashphalt with an almighty crash. I look closer for a second and see that the wheels aren’t wheels like I knew, they look plastic and smooth with no tyre to speak of. I ignore it and turn to the lady on the floor.

No comments:

Post a Comment