CAN'T YOU FEEL THE HEAT BETWEEN US — SAMANTHA MEMI
/I drove fast. The tires burned. I felt sorry for the tires. Not for the engine, only the tires. The tires came from a tree, a tree that had been bled, my tires were made from the blood of a tree. What could my engine have to compare with that? The full moon glimmered on the wet black road. Red eyes glittered from the forest. Were they the eyes of trees angry at my burning tree blood because of my impatience and love of speed. Did my tires scream to the trees Help! We’re burning our way to Hell. And the trees rustle, and the foxes and owls plan their revenge on the girl in the red sports car who drove so fast it hurt her tires, made them screech and smoke. Were the owls and foxes, weasels and rats planning an attack? Would I turn a bend at 100 miles an hour and find across the road a tree with red eyes glaring and no time to brake.
I turned into a bend, tires screeching. In the road a body, tyre marks clear and matte, streaked in the wet; tires which had found their way to Hell. I swerved to avoid the body lying there, unmoving, dead. My tires slid along the road. I twisted the steering wheel hard, and harder, and scratched up the bank and hit a tree. The tree screamed. The car twisted up into the air and spun round, engine roaring, wheels spinning, tires cooling, and came down to earth and I was flung out through the windscreen and landed in the road, splayed, unmoving, dead.
I lay there.
Any time soon I would come round the corner and see me in the road and swerve and crash.
Samantha Memi lives in London where she bakes cakes and eats them. Her stories have been published in magazines and can be read at http://samanthamemi.weebly.com.
