It was the dip that did it, it always was. The dip in the road just beyond the Mitchells’ place, the one all the locals knew to watch out for, the one that all but disappeared when the setting sun fell just so and the road before and after stretched out in a smooth, level line.
Some visitor in a hurry – a hurry to leave, or a hurry to get to their next stop, who could tell. Well, maybe the visitor could, once they recovered. The dip was deep and steep, and with a dog-legged kick at the bottom that cars disliked, even at low speed. Someone flying along like their pants were on fire, well, they didn’t make the turn did they? They skidded off into the undergrowth and the icy waters of the creek.
The council had put up some of those concrete blocks a few years back, to try and at least keep the damage to the road. That was the one time, the one accident, where someone died. Now Jake from the towing company just came by and hauled the car out the next day, then called Penelope, the local hedge witch, to check and purify the crash zone.
Sometimes the driver had passengers, mostly not, and they mostly didn’t need any time in the hospital down at Maytown. This time though, it was a fancy car, the kind that rich people were driven around in, and the driver was in the kind of uniform that said it was his job, and that meant there were passengers. Three of them. All children and dressed poorer than Amanda Silco’s kids. She didn’t earn much at the chain restaurant in town, and too much of what she did earn was spent on booze and cigarettes. Her kids were dressed in whatever someone could sneak them that wasn’t good enough for their ma to sell. Even they would have turned their noses up at the rags those fancy car kids wore.
They weren’t in a good way, none of them. Even the driver. But it wouldn’t do to send for the ambulance to take them to the town. Townspeople talk, and it just seemed right not to talk about these four. So they were bundled up and made as comfortable as possible at Mrs Barnaby’s house, while Jake pulled the wrecked car around to the very back of his place, and Penelope brewed soothing, healing creams and potions in Mrs Barnaby’s kitchen.
Old Doctor Simms came out of retirement to check on them and tutted over their sleeping forms. “Minor injuries from the crash, no real reason they should still be unconscious. I think they’re running from a trouble that found them before they ran. Keep them together and keep a watch on them. Won’t do for them to wake up not knowing their situation.”
The DNA of Stories 