Charles realized that there was nothing that he could do to take the pain away and hurting Michelle, the woman he loved, was not going to reverse what had been done. He slowed the car down and eventually he stopped. He ordered Michelle to get out of the car.
"Charles, where am I going to get out at? There is nothing here but
mountains. Where am I going to go?"
"Get out." Charles yelled. "Get the fuck out!"
"Where am I supposed to go?" Michelle cried. "How do I get home?"
"I'm sure you will think of yourself and do what is best for you. Now
get out!"
Michelle, still shaken and afraid, slowly got out of the car and closed
the door. Charles sat for a moment and thought as he listened to Easy.
As the song played, he shed more tears. His crying became heavier as
his loss hit him like a ten-ton weight. He locked the door and rolled the
window down.
"Michelle," Charles said sobbing as she looked into the window.
"Know that I loved you true. For the first time, I loved true and this is
what love did to me."
Charles rolled the window up without allowing Michelle to say a word.
She knocked at the window, but Charles ignored her knock. He turned
the music up louder so that her knocking on the window couldn't be
heard. Suddenly, Charles stepped on the gas leaving Michelle standing
in the middle of the street. He reached a high rate of speed in a matter of
seconds. Around the turns he sped as though he was in the cockpit of a
racecar. He emerged from around a sharp turn to an oncoming car.
With tears and pain in his eyes and heart, Charles didn't offer any of the
shared-road to the swerving vehicle. He wiped his eyes and notice that
the road straightened for nearly a half mile. He increased his speed as
visions of his loss revisited him like an unwanted nightmare. As he
thought, pain took momentary control of his mind. He gripped the
steering wheel tighter as he approached the end of the straightaway. He
began talking to the road, yelling at it to bring it on. As he approached
the end of the road, the song that brought him pain also brought him
back to reality. Upon regaining his senses he realized that his death was
at hand if he continued on.
He slammed on the breaks, hoping he would
stop before flying off of the cliff. As the breaks locked, the car swerved
left and right while Charles attempted to gain control of the car. His
efforts seemed to be in vain as the vehicle slammed into the hillside then
fishtailed into the center of the road before rolling blindly into the center
of it. Charles saw his life flash before him as the mangled vehicle slowly
neared the cliffs edge. He pulled the emergency brake, hoping that it was
still functional. To his surprise the vehicle stopped rolling. With the
song still playing and his eyes and heart still full of tears and pain,
Charles knew that he had gone too far. He got out of the vehicle and
walked away from it. The vision of the mangled vehicle forced reality to
pay an immediate visit. Charles sat on the open road and listened to his
heart cry. He listened to the many I love you's that Michelle had spoken
to him and wondered how many were true and how many were
convenient.
How many were just for the moment or because of obligation
because he told her that he loved her? He also wondered if this is what
Allen meant when he spoke so admirably about love. He wondered if this
is what he meant when he said that he wanted love to dwell in his life
forever. Charles new that he needed someone to talk to. Who better
than Allen he thought, would be willing to listen and understand his
pain. Charles went back to the wreck to search for his cellular phone.
Thought it was 3am, he knew that Allen was always willing to listen. He
dialed the number and after a few rings, a sleeping Allen answered the
phone.
"Jones," Charles said softly, "I need to talk to you. No it can't wait. I
need you to come and pick me up. I'll explain when you get here. If you
must know, Michelle and I had a fight. Jones," Charles said as he began
to cry, she had an abortion. She killed my baby, Jones. I'm on PCH at
Pacific Palisades. I don't know where she is, I put her out of the car.
OK, I'll be waiting."