8 March 2012

Impounded

My eyes are creased. I'm trying to focus but my vision is blury. Mainly because I can't keep my eyes open. It's like I'm looking through my eyelid. Cherish on the cake, the moon is hidden, it's full night outside. My left hand is massaging my temple. I try helplessly to stay awake. I shouldn't have drank. I drank too much and I'm too tired. My mind is not controlling my body. My body is hardly controlling itself. This feels like a long way home.
I put my hand back on the wheel. Even holding it at 10/10 I still feel as the car is driving itself. My forehead is heavy. I struggle to hold it up. A curve comes up, I'm going too fast and fail to stay on my lane. My car skimmes past the Renault but miraculously we don't hit each other. I breath heavily thanking God as we agnostic ironically sometimes do. "Good, now slow down, be very careful and you will be home safe in no time" I tell myself.
That's when I heard a very loud vacuum noise over my head. I look up and see a helicopter hoovering above me. "Oh crap, the pigs are out of the barn and I smell like marmalade to them" I sneer. No point in trying to avoid them. I've watched enough of these American road rage show to know that trying to escape means I'd end up in jail or dead. Moreover, compare to French cops, Americans cowboy drive like schoolboys. Let's be honest, I don't even have the strength to think that much. I stop the car and get out of it to stand 3 meters away. The helicopter is getting down. I'm thinking they'll just park it on the four lanes motorway until I see four large metal cables unrolling and grabbing my car like a cougar on a 22 years old Australian surfer. "Oh no no no leave my car, you bunch of $%&"%!" I start to freak out.
They're gonna arrest me and take my license. If they take my car this means I can't drive home and worst I can't drive to work in the morning. That seems like a good news but then I could loose my job. The film unravels in my head: car's being  impounded + loose license = can't go to work =  loose job = can't pay rent = get kicked out of flat  = homeless & jobless. That's not the scenario I was hoping for. I'm fully awake and thinking fast now. The cable are so strong the doors are actually being crushed. My very young looking car now looks much older. "Be careful" I shout. No way they can hear me over the helicopter's noise. That's ridiculous. I'm not sure it can actually be driven now that they've turned it into a Smart. The helicopter is flying away pulling my car behind. This is the surely the last time I'll see it.
That's when it hits me. The car is gone, sad but I can deal with it. I've got my license with me, no papers are in it and the number plate is unreadable. How would they know who I am? If I can keep my license, I can rent a car until I find a new one. I can go to work, I won't loose my job. This is brilliant! I'm standing in the middle of the road, amazed that no police car has come to pick me up and drive me to their lovely BnB. I walk backwards toward the hard shoulder keeping my eyes on the road. Then turn around and run home.