Chapter
24
Nick trudged along the road, squinting
to see through the darkness of the night.
He wiped a mixture of sweat and rain from his forehead as he walked
along, searching for any sign of human life.
Cars, buildings, lights, anything.
Unfortunately, it seemed they were stuck in the middle of nowhere.
I thought this kind of thing only
happened in movies, Nick thought with a sigh.
It seemed he was stuck in some kind of nightmare. But it was no nightmare; this was real life.
And suddenly, his situation became a
million times worse, as he stumbled over something unknown in the road, a
pothole, a branch, maybe. Nick wasn’t
sure. All he knew was that suddenly, he
tripped, his ankle twisting sharply, and fell forward, landing hard on his
hands and knees, the rough pavement of the road slicing into his skin.
“Shit!” Nick yelled in pain and
frustration, as he pulled himself into a sitting position, gently rubbing his
ankle, which he feared he had sprained.
Upon trying to stand up, the ankle gave out, and Nick found himself
crumbling to the ground once again.
“Damnit,” he moaned, seething in pain.
“Now what am I gonna do?”
There was no way he could walk any
farther to look for help now, but he couldn’t just sit there on the side of the
road either. He needed to get to some
shelter, and the closest place was back to the car, to Angela.
Trying his best to ignore his pain,
Nick managed to get to his feet and limp/hop along, putting as little weight on
his bad ankle as possible. His knees
ached from the fall now as well, making walking even more painful, and his
palms ached as well. They were torn and
bleeding, but Nick didn’t care about them then.
He was more concerned about getting back to the car at that point. Hopefully, things would look better in the
morning.
***
It took Nick a lot longer to make it
back to the car than it had taken him to get to the spot where he fell, but
finally, he made it back.
He headed this time to the backseat,
instead of the driver’s seat in front, aching to prop his throbbing ankle up on
the seat.
He found that Angela was still awake
and waiting for him when he got there.
And of course, she noticed his limp right away.
“Nicky, what happened?” she asked in
wide-eyed concern.
“I fell,” he said simply. “My ankle’s killing me. I’m afraid I might have sprained it.”
“Oh no,” she moaned. “You just rest. Maybe tomorrow I can go out. My leg doesn’t hurt that bad.”
“No, Ang. There’s no way I’m letting you go. I’ll go again tomorrow. Hopefully, I just twisted it, and after I
rest it a bit, it’ll be better,” Nick said.
“I hope so,” Angela said.
“Me too,” said Nick. “Our lives could depend on it.”
***
