Late that night, the woman takes a breath and lets it all out in a long plume. She watches it go, melt away into the air.
Just then a car pulls to the curb.
***
The driver leans over and rolls down the window.
Read too: The Dodo – Short Story by Ben Loory (The Jakarta Post, April 23, 2018)
Are you the ambulance driver? A voice says.
The woman doesn’t answer. She lies there, unmoving.
The door opens and the driver gets out.
***
The driver walks over and stands by the woman.
The woman blinks—it’s the boy’s mother.
You, she says. I thought you were dead.
Shh, don’t talk, the mother says.
***
The mother opens the rear door and helps the woman in. The woman lies down across the backseat. The mother takes a blanket and drapes it over her.
Then she stands back and swings the door shut.
***
The mother climbs in front and starts up the car.
I’m so sorry, the woman says from the back.
I know, the mother says. I hated you for a while. But I just couldn’t leave you like that.
***
She puts the car in gear and it slowly moves off. As they go, they start to pick up speed.
Ahead, an old man is crossing the road.
And they move right through him like the breeze. ***
Ben Loory is an American author of Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day (Penguin Random House, 2011) as well as Tales of Falling and Flying (Penguin Random House, 2017). He is currently working on his next story collection.
