Chica Dreams

I don’t remember much about that earlier time. Only that I screamed for her to slam on the brakes. Then we were tumbling through air and flashes of road and metal and inhuman screeches flew by me.

Then I crawled from the car on to the gravel and could see a blonde frail thing in the back, lying against metal, unmoving. Mom moved and said something, but I ignored her and looked around instead. People were along the road watching, some were running and screaming. Someone was moving me from one place to another and my youngest brother Robert still laid at the back of the car.

I moved in that direction and someone grabbed me and there was a fight. He said I scratched him in the eye. Another picked me up from behind and slammed me down on a stretcher, strapped my hands to my sides. Then they covered me up so I couldn’t see anything.

Then the horse ranch and Mom, Ernie and Robert were somewhere else. And though I didn’t understand the logic adults used in separating me from my brothers, I went about doing kid things I wasn’t supposed to do: jumping fences, swimming by myself, going into forbidden horse stalls and attempting to ignore the world at large. 

Robert and I were lucky. He didn’t have a scratch on him. I had a piece of glass from the windshield imbedded in my cheek, which they removed and sewed up. “Don’t get the stitches wet,” the doctor said.

The ambulance driver came in and talked to me while I lay on the table. I apologized for scratching his friend, but he didn’t know what I was talking about. Flaming red hair, eyebrows and blue eyes, I fell in love while he stroked my braids and told me everything would be okay.

I got the stitches wet. I went swimming and couldn’t resist going under and into a world void of human chaos. The water was mine and I didn’t care what a doctor said. Then later I spent time in the mirror removing black, brittle pieces from my cheek.

Aunt Betty said Mom had a broken neck, but didn’t die. Ernie had something wrong with his arm. Robert was fine, but they sent him to one of my uncles.

My aunt’s dog was a St. Bernard. Huge with saggy jowls and afraid of everything. They also had a small terrier that the larger dog was terrified of. The terrier knew it and constantly used its power, cowering the larger dog into the porch corner until it whimpered and lay down.

I could only ride when someone was with me. The horses were not meant for children, but Uncle Hank said I could ride one of the mares, as long as I had safety equipment on and my cousins Fran or Mandy were with me.

The stalls were off limits. Children weren’t allowed there either. Dangerous stuff there. The horses didn’t like kids and Nathan said I was a kid.

We only rode once. Over the rolling hills that made up most of my aunt’s land. I thought I would be brilliant and show how well I could ride, believing I had been born on horseback from my short experience in Idaho. Where do children come up with such notions?

I rode away from Mandy and thought I could make the horse jump a small stream cutting through the hills. It didn’t work. Somehow, I was tumbling through air again and this time landed hard on my back with no breath. Then Mandy was beside me and hauling me to my feet, red-faced and screaming, “What the hell were you thinking? You could have been killed.”

We walked back with the horses behind us.

What do you say about a kid like that? That she was so obnoxious and oblivious to the rules of the world or to the consideration of others? What can one say, except that she was a kid with a fearsome imagination and the idea that she could do anything?