You Can’t Make That!

Kris was a good driver, so how exactly did this happen?

Kris was trying to make a left turn as the GPS instructed when he struck a lifted 1974 Jeep. We were on the way to visit his grandmother, who lived about an hour away from our hometown. We were only 15 or so minutes away when Kris redirected the GPS, changing the destination from the town his grandma resided in, to her actual address, to make things a little easier. Kris had made a playlist of songs he liked for us to listen to on the way there. I grabbed my phone from the cup holder to add one of the songs to my own playlist. I looked up, and saw a big blue Jeep coming our way. I didn’t think anything of it until Kris slowed and began to turn the wheel.

“You can’t make that!” I screamed, pointing at the Jeep, but it was too late. The Jeep had perfectly aligned with Kris’s blind spot. We slammed into the Jeep, which went rolling into the ditch.

Our car skidded to a halt, throwing us forward. I closed my eyes as tightly as I could as we crashed into the Jeep. Once our car stopped, I opened my eyes, and looked at Kris. Both of our mouths were on the floor. I carefully set my cup back in the cup holder. I couldn’t remember if it had been thrown from the cup holder or my hands. I looked at myself. I had no injuries, and the windshield was in perfect condition, so I figured this wasn’t a bad wreck.

As I stepped out, I first swung around to examine the damage on Kris’s car. I had been hit twice in parking lots, and my first thought was about insurance. The car was definitely totaled, which I knew would be a pain to deal with.

But then I heard something: screaming. I couldn’t really fathom the idea of the wreck being anything too serious. That would just be crazy. I figured someone was screaming just at the shock of seeing such a thing. That would make much more sense.

But when I saw the mangled Jeep, lying in the grass next to the road, crushed and twisted up into a heap of metal, I knew that this probably wasn’t just a fender bender.

The screaming was not that of a horrified onlooker, but of the driver’s young son.

Paramedics arrived almost instantly after Kris called 911. They jumped into action, giving the driver CPR as his blood painted the pavement. The man’s brains were dripping out of his ears. There wasn’t a lot they could do.

Kris was a CNA, and stood near the man’s body, smoking and covering his mouth. I stayed away, not wanting to see, unbelieving that this was real, and clutching a guardrail. I called my parents, letting them know what happened, letting them know that they needed to get here, that I thought something bad had happened, but I wasn’t sure yet.

Before I knew it, I was in a hospital getting X-rays and tests done to ensure I wasn’t injured. I was in perfect condition except some lacerations from the car’s airbags and a bruise from the seatbelt. My parents were holding my hands and preparing me for the questioning I would soon be experiencing. My parents looked at me, reminding me that nothing was my fault, or Kris’s, that this was all just an accident.

Being questioned by the police made me feel like a criminal. I felt horrible, and even though I wasn’t driving, I felt like some kind of murderer. I can’t even describe how it feels to see someone die on the road, especially when you were in the car that killed them.

At around midnight, I was finally cleared to go home. I visited Kris before I left, and told him I loved him, it would be okay, and that I had to leave. Kris was still waiting on a few test results.

My parents drove me home, and it felt like things were over, but I knew that in reality, things were just beginning. Court, insurance dealings, not to mention, dealing with the trauma of the crash itself. Dealing with the guilt of what happened.

I couldn’t stop thinking of what might’ve happened. What could’ve been if the Jeep wasn’t in Kris’s blind spot, or if I told him to watch out sooner, or if the passengers in the Jeep wore seatbelts, or if Kris turned a second sooner, and the Jeep collided with me instead of the front of Kris’s car.

I texted nearly everyone I knew.

“Wear your seatbelt,” I said simply. “And drive safe. Please.”

I am extremely passionate about safe driving. So many accidents worse than the one I was involved in happen every day due to drunk drivers, distracted drivers, and more. And that breaks my heart. I never want anyone else to go through what I went through, or what anyone else involved in that crash went through. If I could convince one person to wear their seatbelt, or not text and drive, or not drink and drive, I will be fulfilled in life.