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paved slope and onto 6th Avenue. His 4Runner bounced as it hit the road and teetered drunkenly to
the right for a moment, then accelerated and straightened up. Deborah hit the brakes and we spun
through half a turn; the white van slid ahead of us, bounced down the slope, and closed the gap with
the 4Runner. After half a second, Debs straightened us out of our slide and followed them down onto
the street.
The side road here was narrow, with a row of houses on the right and a high yellow-cement
embankment on the left with I-95 on top. We ran along for several blocks, picking up speed. A tiny old
couple holding hands paused on the sidewalk to watch our strange parade rocket past. It may have
been my imagination, but they seemed to flutter in the wind from Oscar s car and the van going by.
We closed the gap just a little, and the white van closed on the 4Runner, too. But Oscar picked up the
pace; he ran a stop sign, leaving us to veer around a pickup truck that was spinning in a circle in its
attempt to avoid the 4Runner and the van. The truck wobbled through a clumsy doughnut turn and
slammed into a fire hydrant. But Debs just clamped her jaw tight and squealed around the truck and
through the intersection, ignoring the horns and the fountain of water from the ruptured hydrant, and
closing the gap again in the next block.
Several blocks ahead of Oscar I could see the red light of a major cross street. Even from this far I
could see a steady stream of traffic moving through the intersection. Of course nobody lives forever,
but this was really not the way I would choose to die if given a vote. Watching TV with Rita suddenly
seemed a lot more attractive. I tried to think of a polite but very convincing way to persuade Deborah
to stop and smell the roses for a moment, but just when I needed it the most my powerful brain seemed
to shut down, and before I could get it going again Oscar was approaching the traffic light.
Quite possibly Oscar had been to church this week, because the light turned green as he rocketed
through the intersection. The white van followed close behind, braking hard to avoid a small blue car
trying to beat the light, and then it was our turn, with the light fully green now. We swerved around the
van and almost made it through but this was Miami, after all, and a cement truck ran the red light
behind the blue car, right in front of us. I swallowed hard as Deborah stood on the brake pedal and
spun around the truck. We thumped hard against the curb, running the two left wheels up onto the
sidewalk for just a moment before bouncing down onto the road again. Very nice, I said as Deborah
accelerated once again. And quite possibly, she might have taken the time to thank me for my
compliment, if only the white van had not chosen that moment to take advantage of our slow-down to
drop back beside our car and swerve into us. The rear end of our car slewed around to the left, but
Deborah fought it back around again.
The van popped us again, harder, right behind my door, and as I lurched away from the blow the door
sprung open. Our car swerved and Deborah braked perhaps not the best strategy, since the van
accelerated at the same moment and this time clipped my door so hard that it came loose and bounced
away, hitting the van a solid smack near the rear wheel before spinning off like a deformed wheel,
spitting sparks.
I saw the van wobble slightly, and heard the slack rattling sound of a blown tire. Then the wall of white
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slammed into us one more time. Our car bucked violently, lurched to the left, hopped the curb and
burst through a chain-link fence separating the side road from the ramp leading down off I-95. We
twirled around as if the tires were made of butter. Deborah fought the wheel with her teeth showing,
and we very nearly made it across the off-ramp. But of course, I had not been to church this week, and
as our two front wheels hit the curb on the far side of the off-ramp, a large red SUV banged into our
rear fender. We spun up onto the grassy area of the freeway intersection that surrounded a large pond.
I had only a moment to notice that the cropped grass seemed to be switching places with the night sky.
Then the car bounced hard and the passenger air bag exploded into my face. It felt like I had been in a
pillow fight with Mike Tyson; I was still stunned as the car flipped onto its roof, hit the pond, and
began to fill with water.
CHAPTER 20
I AM NOT SHY ABOUT ADMITTING MY MODEST TALENTS. For example, I am happy to
admit that I am better than average at clever remarks, and I also have a flair for getting people to like
me. But to be perfectly fair to myself, I am ever-ready to confess my shortcomings, too, and a quick
round of soul-searching forced me to admit that I had never been any good at all at breathing water. As
I hung there from the seat belt, dazed and watching the water pour in and swirl around my head, this
began to seem like a very large character flaw.
The last look I had at Deborah before the water closed over her head was not encouraging, either. She
was hanging from her seat belt unmoving, with her eyes closed and her mouth open, just the opposite
of her usual state, which was probably not a good sign. And then the water flooded up around my
eyes, and I could see nothing at all.
I also like to think that I react well to the occasional unexpected emergency, so I m quite sure my
sudden stunned apathy was the result of being rattled around and then smacked with an air bag. In any
case, I hung there upside down in the water for what seemed like quite a long time, and I am ashamed
to admit that for the most part, I simply mourned my own passing. Dear Departed Dexter, so much
potential, so many dark fellow travelers still to dissect, and now so tragically cut short in his prime.
Alas, Dark Passenger, I knew him well. And the poor boy was finally just about to get married, too.
How more than sad I pictured Rita in white, weeping at the altar, two small children wailing at her
feet. Sweet little Astor, her hair done up in a bouffant bubble, a pale green bridesmaid dress now
soaked with tears. And quiet Cody in his tiny tuxedo, staring at the back of the church and waiting,
thinking of our last fishing trip and wondering when he would ever get to push the knife in again and
twist it so slowly, watching the bright red blood burble out onto the blade and smiling, and then
Slow down, Dexter. Where did that thought come from? Rhetorical question, of course, and I did not
need the low rumble of amusement from my old interior friend to give me the answer. But with his
prompting I put together a few scattered pieces into half a puzzle and realized that Cody
Isn t it odd what we think about when we re dying? The car had settled onto its flattened roof, moving
with no more than a gentle rocking now and completely filled with water so thick and mucky that I
could not have seen a flare gun firing from the end of my nose. And yet I could see Cody perfectly
clearly, more clearly now than the last time we had been in the same room together; and standing
behind this sharp image of his small form towered a gigantic dark shadow, a black shape with no
features that somehow seemed to be laughing.
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