This morning about ten-thirty I buckled my five-year-old and two-year-0ld into their car seats and started off to Melissa’s house via a fairly busy north-south surface route. As I approached an intersection I saw a brown car pull partway out from the right, stop, pull a little farther, stop again. It caught my eye and as I drew closer I saw there was a young woman, barefoot, her hair unkempt, kneeling on the hood of the car. I couldn’t make out what she was doing but she looked like she was shouting at the driver.
Rather than drive across the car’s path, I hit my brakes. What the — ? My hand reached into my bag and fumbled for my cell phone, but didn’t find it before the car pulled out in front of me, tires squealing, turning left across me, the woman still clinging to the hood of the car, turning her head this way and that as if it see where he was driving. My windows were open. I didn’t even think about it. I shouted out the window at the woman, "Hey! Are you okay?"
The car screeched to a stop, facing the opposite way. The woman came down off the hood, or maybe she fell when the car stopped, and opened the passenger door. She looked up at me for an instant; I repeated my question; she nodded and got in. Then the driver’s side door opened, and the man who was driving put a foot out and turned towards me and began to yell abusive words at me, started to get out of the car. I whipped my head around and put the pedal to the floor. Behind me in the rear view mirror I saw the car making a three-point turn, and I realized he was going to follow me. I had no idea what he planned to do if he caught up with me. I didn’t want to find out. My two kids were in the back seat. I’m eight months pregnant.
I sped down the street — no one was in front of me really — and turned right at the next intersection, taking me into a residential neighborhood. Vaguely I remembered reading somewhere that, if someone’s tailing you, you should make a series of quick successive right-hand turns. I never really thought about it, but now that I’ve done it, it makes a lot of sense. For one thing, a couple of consecutive right turns rules out the possibility that it’s only a coincidence that the same car is following you. And that’s what happened — fast. Two right turns and in the rear view mirrow the car was still behind me, tires squealing around the corner. It was hard to turn the wheel as fast as I wanted, because even with the seat as far back as it goes and the wheel tilted up, the bottom of the wheel digs into my pregnant belly.
I slowed just enough to make a third right turn without losing control of the car, blowing through a stop sign and stomping the accelerator all the way down to the floor, passing houses and trees, and hoping that no pedestrians stepped into my path. (That’s another good reason to make right turns. If you’re going to careen illegally through an intersection, it’s the move least likely to cross another’s path.) The car was still behind me, and could see me, when I made the fourth turn, back onto the busy street I started on and heading the same direction. I thought there was a chance that the guy was far enough behind me that I could make another turn while I was still out of sight, and at that moment a left turn opened up.
There were people in that intersection, which had a coffee shop or something like that on the corner, but they were all on their way out of it and I thought I had a clear path. I leaned on the steering wheel and shot through that intersection. Didn’t hit anyone. Bystanders on the sidewalk turned and shouted angrily at me. I wish I could go back and apologize. Couldn’t, just then. I didn’t know if he’d seen me or not. I had a few more turns to make.
I blew through three or four more stop signs, this time making random turns, glancing fearfully up at the rearview mirror, but he didn’t appear again. I made my way to another neighborhood, finally slowing down for the stop signs, and eventually I was sure I had lost him.
I drove the rest of the way to Melissa’s house in a near stupor. When I pulled into her driveway and reached for the ignition, I was surprised to find the radio was on. I didn’t remember the sound of the radio. I was unable to calm down for the rest of the day. Kept wondering if it was possible that the guy got my license plate number and could track me down, find my house. I know it’s not likely but the fact that it’s not entirely impossible kept nagging at me.
It’s no wonder, really, that people don’t get involved when they see a bad situation unfolding in front of them. I assume that what I stumbled upon was some kind of domestic-violence incident. The way the driver of the car started and stopped it in jerks. The blank look she gave me, nodding I’m okay, as she got into the car. When I saw her there on the roof of a car with its tires squealing as it rounded a turn, all I saw was She’s in trouble. I didn’t really stop to think, Somebody in that car is causing her a lot of trouble, and he could cause me trouble too. If I had, maybe I wouldn’t have shouted. Who knows if it did more harm than good, even to her situation, whatever it was?
Anyway, it’s over, we survived, my beat-up ’93 Oldsmobile cornered better than his beat-up whenever whatever, and no, officer, I didn’t get the licence plate number, I was too busy getting myself and my kids the hell out of there. Just wanted to let you know in case something else happens later, so you know if there’s a pattern. But I’m still shaken, I will be for a few days at least, and I don’t know if I’ll stop the next time something happens in front of me like that.
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