One-Eighty (Westover Prep 1)

“What the fuck are you doing?” Dalton roars.

My eyes begin to roll as I move the steering wheel to the left to get us back between the lines, but I must not be doing it fast enough for Dalton because he grabs the wheel and pushes hard to the left. Things might have been okay if we weren’t coming up too fast on a blind curve. Both of my feet press the brake as I pray that there isn’t anyone on the other side of the curve, but my prayers aren’t heard.

Lights blind me as I struggle against Dalton’s hold on the steering wheel.

By some miracle, we avoid the other car, but the fishtailing is too much to compensate for. When the front passenger wheel hits the gravel again, the car has had enough. Even knowing that we’re going to wreck, I somehow manage to wonder why the trip down a ravine is so bumpy. Having driven in Colorado since I got my permit, I always pictured it more like a flying experience. Thinking the car would leave the roadway and soar until I met death at the bottom with a Thelma and Louise type crash and explosion.

Instead, I’m jolted back and forth as the car tumbles. I’m weightless, then jarred to the side, over and over. Dalton is going to be pissed about his car, but when I look over to the passenger seat, it’s empty. Nothing but leather and the flash of lights fill the seat that once held the angry boy as the car topples.

The sounds of scraping metal and snapping of tree branches fade away until nothing can be heard but an eerie hissing and the sporadic tumble of smaller rocks as they slide past the wreckage.

“Da-Dalton,” I manage, but his name comes out as a whisper.

Wetness fills my eyes, but my shoulder screams in pain when I try to wipe it away. It feels like glass is clogging my throat when I try to yell out for Dalton again.

“H-help!” My scream is more like a soft plea, and as much as I want to stay here until help arrives, it hits me that help may never show. If the car we swerved past kept going, we wouldn’t be missed until tomorrow.

With all the strength I have and favoring the injured left side of my body, I manage to get my seat belt off. My phone is still in my back pocket, but when I pull it free and hit the home button, I realize I have no service. I don’t know how far down the ravine we are, but I know I won’t have a chance of getting help if I can’t get back to the road.

“Dalton,” I call again as I climb from the very top of the car.

Sliding safely from the T-tops makes my stomach turn. Just knowing that Dalton exited the car the same way while the car was rolling down the hill is enough to make me vomit. I’m undiscerning of where I get sick, having only enough energy to turn my head to the side to lose the contents of my stomach.

Tears sting my eyes, joining the wetness already there as I try to get a better footing on the rocks. I’m able to climb to safety from the T-tops, but that, combined with Dalton refusing to put on his seat belt may be what kills him.

I repeat his name as I slip and slide up the rocks. The only way I know I’m heading toward the road in the pitch black is the pull of gravity at my feet. The sharp incline is hell on my calves and nearly impossible with only one working arm. I don’t spot Dalton on the way up. My phone flashlight is bright but still only manages to give me about five or six feet of visibility.

I pause when I hear what I think is a whimper, but even after staying still for long moments, I don’t hear it again.

“Dalton, can you hear me? Make a noise,” I yell when I finally manage to get to the top.

Shivers hit me with the force of a train when I point my phone down the ravine and realize that the car is so far down, I can’t even see it from my vantage point.

“Are you okay?”

I spin around at the masculine voice, but it isn’t Dalton standing behind me but an older man with a look of abject fear in his eyes.

“Thank God, you’re okay,” he says as he walks closer.

“M-my fr-friend.” I point down the ravine as my teeth begin to chatter.

“Come on,” the man says with his hands out. “I have a first aid kit in my car. I called an ambulance as soon as I saw you go over.”

“We have to help Dalton,” I tell him as I dig my feet into the gravel on the side of the road, preventing him from pulling me toward his car.