This is the story of my street's paperboy and how he met his demise. This is the story of how I lost my best friend on that fateful day in July.
He rode his route every morning, chains chatter as the rubber wheels rub the warming pavement of the road. The whoosh of passing cars nothing but white noise in the ears of a six year old boy.
The summer was hot and boring, spending hours upon hours inside of a house, air conditioning on at full blast, television on, nothing to do but only half enjoying it after the first two weeks.
In the first week of July, on Tuesday, a nice woman that lived a few doors down from me walked outside onto their front porch that morning. Ice clinked in her glass of who knows what as she walked out onto her front lawn, waving to my friend, a toothy smile on her face as she waved a broad and practiced wave. My friend threw her newspaper onto her freshly cut lawn and waved back as he rode past.
A car came down the street, speeding slightly, speeding up slightly. The car swerved a little, the driver distracted by cell phone, breakfast, coffee or anything else. My friend put his hand down as he looked back behind him at the woman waving. He turned his head around and looked back down at his papers when it happened. The car hit the front tire of the bike, sending my friend's body off the seat of the bicycle, his hands still clutching the handle bars as his head cracked against the shining windshield. The frozen look on the driver's face as they realized what they had done. The driver swerved all over the street, crashing the car into a mail-box as my friend's head bled, brown in bunches, but red all over the car, accenting the car's color. My friend's eyes were closed tight, breath forcing itself out of his bloodied nose, his broken teeth lying on the dashboard, or almost at least, with his forehead resting on the steering wheel.
Everyone on the street heard the crash and was slowly and cautiously exiting their houses to see what was happening. See what carnage was produced. Someone screamed looking down at the car, someone fainted. Wives were held tightly in their husbands arms, children left inside the house, peering outside of the windows, hoping to see something deeply, but knowing that they shouldn't. I knew what had happened as soon as the crash rumbled the streets of our neighborhood.
The roar of an ambulance soon arrived and everyone retreated to their houses. My parents came in the front door, my mother with held back tears escaping her eyes, and my father looking sympathetic sat me down, had a talk, told me what had happened and all I could think is that after that, after this, I could only hope for it to happen to me one day.
Any feedback at all on this would be greaty appreciated.
It's a short story alright. I'm guessing this is somewhat autobiographical.
It actually isn't at all. I just mis-heard someone talking about a story of the death of a paperboy once, so I sat down and wrote this.
The best part is the first sentence, with the abstract change in tense. I'm not sure if that was an accident or not, but it was really enticing, formally, and is an excellent jumping point. There are a few other good sentences later in the story - the rhythm of 'speeding slightly, speeding up slightly' and part of the description of the hair with the blood - that convey a sensibility, rather than mere facts; but the majority of it is so dry, so careful in its descriptiveness that, by the time one reaches the end, its failed to achieve any real emotional resonance.