The Rom-Commers(53)

“So you’re saying something terrible is a given.”

Charlie shrugged. “Pessimism’s always a safe bet.”

I was just about to argue with that when—right then—an orange cat scrambled full tilt out of some low bushes by the edge of the highway and shot across the road in front of us.

We were edging along a section of the drive that had a steep hill to our left, and, um—how to put it—nothing at all to the right. Just a curving road with no shoulder that dropped off so dramatically into a canyon that you couldn’t see any edge at all.

With only a laughably low aluminum guardrail to protect us.

The cat dropped out of nowhere from the hillside, skittered across the road, and shot under the guardrail to disappear. Charlie touched the brakes, but the cat was gone in a flash—but before we could even exhale, that’s when, from the exact same place in the exact same low bushes, another, much bigger animal leapt out.

I thought it was a dog at first. It was the size of a yellow lab.

But it wasn’t a yellow lab.

Charlie hit the brakes for real this time—hard enough for me to slam forward against my seat belt like I’d been smacked with a wooden board.

And then the chaos started.

The second animal was gone as fast as the first one was—but it had been much bigger, and faster, and closer, and if Charlie hadn’t jammed on the brakes, we would’ve hit it for sure.

Who knows—hitting it might’ve been worse.

But it was bad enough, either way.

We were on a curve so sharp that stopping short made the back wheels spin out. And then the whole lumbering seventies Blazer started fishtailing into a 360 across the pavement like we were on a carnival ride.

The worst carnival ride ever.

I remember Charlie and me—both screaming—as the world outside the car blurred past the windows and Charlie desperately worked the wheel to try to regain traction. I remember the exact pitch of the tires wailing across the asphalt. And I don’t know if it was Charlie’s maneuvering or just an accident of physics, but as the car straightened itself out, I realized we were now lurching toward the guardrail.

The measly, maybe two-foot-high, definitely not-to-code guardrail.

Which was the only thing standing between us and a deep ravine that dropped off to nothingness past the edge of the road.

Everything disappeared except for the rail itself, and it felt more like it was coming toward us than the other way around.

And then we hit it. Front wheels crossing the white line painted at the edge of the road head-on like a finish line—just as the snout of the Blazer hit the metal railing with unholy creaks and deep groans like thunder as the metal bent with the force of our impact.

The front axle of the Blazer went fully over the edge of a berm of dirt before we stopped.

And I immediately felt terrible for underestimating that poor guardrail.

It caught us. God bless it, it caught us.

We fully snapped two of the posts as we went over them, but the horizontal belt caught us like a muzzle and didn’t let go.

In the silence that followed, with the wind whistling through the axle underneath us, I pieced together an understanding of our position: the back tires were still on the road, the chassis of the Blazer was resting on the berm, and the two front wheels were fully over the edge.

In front of us, and all around, was only a vast empty sky, with a valley that I couldn’t really see—and didn’t dare to look for—down below.

As an aside, I’ll mention that the view of the sky was breathtaking—electric blue with stippled white clouds.

“Did that just happen?” I whispered out loud.

“I guess the good news is,” Charlie said, “we didn’t hit the dog.”

“That wasn’t a dog, Charlie,” I said.

“It wasn’t?” Charlie said. “I thought it was a Great Dane. Or maybe a deer.”

“It was a bit too mountain lion shaped to be a deer.”

“A mountain lion? That’s crazy!”

“You’re the one who told me about the mountain lions!”

“Yes—but I was just trying to scare you.”

“Mission accomplished.”

At that, the car shifted a little.

We both froze, holding each other’s stares, like Did we just imagine that?

Then quietly, in a whisper, Charlie said, “I think we must be teetering on the axle.”

“Let’s get out,” I whispered back. “Can we get out?”

Almost imperceptibly, Charlie shook his head. “There’s no getting out. We have to call for help.”

“Where’s your phone?” I whispered.

In slow-mo, Charlie reached up to slide it out of the breast pocket of his Oxford and dial 911—and I listened, frozen still, while he calmly explained all of our details to the dispatcher.

After Charlie hung up, he said, “Ten minutes or so,” in a non-whisper that I suspected was meant to signal somehow that we were okay enough for full volume. Then, when I didn’t say anything, he added, “Lucky for that guardrail.”

“Charlie,” I said, also making the choice to not whisper, but not 100 percent sure that the vibration of my vocal cords wouldn’t be enough to shift our position. “That thing could give way at any second.”