The Voice Returns

I’m a bit on overload this month clearing and sorting while the rain continues to pummel down. At least it’s no longer snow and ice. Bear with me please. In the meantime, the long ago promise of another story.

Part 2

Maddie was agitated and frustrated. What the heck was Public Relations and how was she supposed to be of help to this firm? The Temp service had sent her over to work for an undetermined amount of time and after a week, she was still a fish out of water. She didn’t know what she was doing and it was becoming more obvious the two women who owned and ran the company didn’t know what they were doing either. Thank goodness it was Friday!

Maddie was in a hurry to get out of the parking lot and onto Riverside Drive towards home after another mind numbing day. She and her husband had free tickets to the Pasadena Ice House Comedy Club. Maddie could really use a laugh after the day she’d had and pulled out a little too fast cutting off another car that seemed to be in as big a hurry as she. She waved behind her apologetically. That curve was hard to see around. Just after pulling out, she was first in line for the stop light with the angry man just behind her. She could almost hear him swear at her as the light finally turned green. Maddie put her foot on the accelerator and started to move forward when she heard it loud and clear. PUT YOUR FOOT ON THE BRAKE! But the light was green she thought. Again it came louder this time. PUT YOUR FOOT ON THE BRAKE NOW! So Maddie did.

Looking into her rear-view mirror, she fully expected Mr. Angry and Impatient to drive right over the top of her car. It was in those milliseconds that a flash of white passed in front of her and she heard the most horrendous sound. Looking over at the lane to the right of her and just a half car length ahead she saw the very large woman in her small Ford Mustang flop over sideways like a rag doll and come back up. The white delivery truck had struck her door with full force. No brakes on his vehicle had been applied. His big truck had pushed the Mustang all the way out of her lane. Maddie knew she had to be dead.

When things stopped for a few seconds and the lane was quiet and clear, Maddie drove across the intersection and pulled up to the curb on the other side. Mr. Angry continued on as did as much of the traffic as possible until the police arrived. Maddie waited till they came to talk to her. She was going to be late getting home but she was alive. Why?

When the police came to get her statement, they asked if the truck driver had gone through a yellow light. “Absolutely not” Maddie stated! Our light was green. Maddie couldn’t explain to the policeman that they’d had a green lights for seconds already and why she had not gone. Maddie made it very clear that the truck driver had gone through a clearly red light on his side and was going so fast he was a blur to her.

Big white truck

small Ford Mustang. No competition.

It became clear to Maddie that if the truck had hit her, she was eight feet closer and would most likely not have survived. If she had not pulled out in front of Mr. Angry and Impatient, he would have been first in line at the light. He may have gone quickly as the light turned green.

They would not tell her the other woman’s condition but Maddie was hopeful. Drinks at the Ice House once they got there that night did little to assuage her anguish. Why did she hear the Voice and not the woman in the car next to her? She just couldn’t make sense of it.

The next week, Maddie ask the Temp service to transfer her somewhere else.   She needed life to make sense.

Does life make sense to you?

From my heart to yours,

Marlene Herself