Faster Disaster

Story Sent in by Brendan:

Sheila and I had already met up for one date. During that date, she had mentioned her recent purchase of a new Toyota and of how proud she was of it. I'm into cars, so I expressed an interest in seeing it sometime.

My chance came soon enough. For our second date, she offered to pick me up in her car and take me out for a spin. I climbed in and off we went.

She drove around the block, then took off down some other local roads. It seemed to handle well. Then, I noticed that she was speeding, and increasingly so.

"You can slow it down," I said, "This is a windy road."

She said, "Speed limit's 85 here."

I said, "It's state route 85. Speed limit's 30."

"Nuh uh," she said, and pointed to a sign that said "85" on it. She sped up.

"Really, it's route 85. Speed limit's 30. Slow down, please."

She took a turn at 55 and kept going. Her tires squealed. "Speed limit's 85," she said.

"Stop the car," I said.

"Speed limit's 85," she repeated, as if she didn't hear me at all.

"Stop the car! Stop it!" I yelled.

She didn't reply and sped up to close to 70 on a straightaway. I did the one remaining thing I could think of. She had talked about how much she loved her new car, and so I hit my door repeatedly with my closed fist. Bang, bang, bang, over and over.

She screamed, "What are you doing? Cut it out!" and slowed the car down. I didn't stop banging, she yelled for me to stop, and hit my shoulder repeatedly. I didn't quit smashing on the door until she pulled over and stopped the car. I jumped out of it, without even closing the door behind me.

She reached over, slammed my door shut, and peeled off, leaving me there, over a mile away from my house. I walked back, dreading the idea that she was going to turn around and fly back down the road in my direction. She didn't come back, and when she didn't contact me again after that, I didn't mourn the loss.