what Daddy is going to say,â Jannie remarked brightly.
âOoh,â I said, and doubled up again.
â
You
âre hurt?â the other woman said, and laughed shortly. âWhat about
me
?â She rubbed her forehead and brought her hand down and looked at it hopefully for blood. âYou insured?â she asked.
âOh, shut up,â I said.
â
My
little boy got hurt,â she said. âHeâs still in the car, hurt too bad to move.â
â
What
?
â Hastily, I made my way past her, thinking that she must surely be stunned or shocked, and got over to their car, where the man was leaning in through the front door, arguing. It was so slippery that I had to hold on to the fenders of the cars to keep on my feet.
âCome on
out
,â the man was saying. âNo oneâs going to hurt you.â Finally he reached in and pulled out a small boy about six years old. âYou all right?â he asked the boy.
âSure,â the little boy said.
âHe is
not
all right,â the woman said, pushing past me to grab the little boy. âHe is
not
all right,â she insisted, her voice rising, âheâs covered with blood.â
âGood lord,â I said helplessly.
âWhere you hurt?â The woman began to run her hands frantically along the little boy, feeling the outside of his snowsuit. âYou hurt in the head, like me?â
âNo,â the little boy said, âI feel fine.â He smiled at me, and I smiled back nervously.
âThereâs blood on his
hand
,â the woman announced loudly. âLook, blood all over his hand.â She held up his hand and the man and I leaned forward and saw a small scratch and a little blood. The man wiped the blood off with his handkerchief and looked deeply at the scratch. âYou hadnât ought to do that,â the woman told him. âLeave it for them to see.â
âI did it before, anyway,â the little boy said. âI did it over to Grandmaâs house, on the door.â
âItâs awful,â the woman said hastily. She put her hand to her head. âI feel faint,â she said.
âI should think so,â I told her sweetly, âtraveling at that rate of speed. Weâre supposed to call the state troopers,â I said to the man. âWe canât move either of these cars, and no one can get past us along this road, and anyway an accident has got to be reported. Will you call them,â I said, âor shall I?â
He looked at his wife for a minute, and then said, âIâll do it.â
I watched with irritation as he looked again at his wife, and then moved off toward the nearest house. âMom,â Laurie called, âcan we get out
now
?â
âJust be patient,â I said. âSing or something.â
Jannie struck up halfheartedly with âThe Old Chisholm Trail,â and the woman said, âAre you insured?â
I opened my mouth and then shut it again, reminding myself of the explicit instructions on my insurance papers, instructions about not discussing an accident with any but properly constituted authorities. I turned instead to look at the damage to my car. âJuniorâs hurt bad,â the woman said as I walked away. The road was covered with bright fragments of chromium grillwork and broken glass, my fenders were crumpled unrecognizably, the front license plate leaned drunkenly sideways, bent almost double. âOh, brother,â I said, thinking of my husband peacefully asleep at home. The other car gave a momentary impression of deep embarrassment, as though it were hoping to tiptoe away when no one was looking; it leaned backward, somehow, and it was not until I looked at it clearly now that I saw that what I had assumed from a brief glance earlier was wholesale destruction was actually the carâs natural condition; the lopsided body and buckled doors were rusty, the back window had
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