CW 25: The Messenger

I wrote this today as part of my commitment to the Clarion West Write-a-thon. A dedication means that person sponsored it by donating to CW, and then provided me a writing prompt that sparked the piece. If you would like something written especially for you, please consider sponsoring me.

Here’s all the work of the 41 days. You’ll also find these pieces cross-posted at Sterling Editing as incentive for writers to practice their editing and story-building skills.

Enjoy.

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The Messenger

For Camille Terhune. Thank you for your support of me and Clarion West.

The messenger wore rockstar sunglasses and jeans cut off at the knees, and drove her bike like an F-16. She came bombing through traffic on the centerline and cut to the curb lane for a right turn; a guy stepped out between two parked cars with his hand up for a taxi, and she just leaned under the arm whphht right past him as if she hadn’t even noticed he was there. The guy practically peed himself; the messenger took the corner without a backward look.

“Holy shit,” Harry said, “did you see that?” They were at an outside table because it was his turn to pick, and he liked being on the street where he could sometimes catch a glimpse of people living kamikaze lives. Gutsy lives. Harry liked to see that.

Marina speared a forkful of Cobb salad and said, with the smallest edge in her voice, “That girl on the bike? Yeah, she should be more careful.”

Outside-Harry said, “Uh huh.” Inside-Harry was doing the flaily-arm hop on the sidewalk, Did you see what she just did, sweet mary mother of god! But most people wouldn’t understand. It wasn’t the leaning, although that was fairly cool. It was the corner in crosswalk traffic on a fixie with no fucking brakes. And not just any fixie: a custom SE Ripper 700c fixed gear freestyle god machine. Inside-Harry wanted to find this girl and marry her.

He turned to the girl he would doubtless be marrying instead. A nice girl. Good safe job in accounts payable. Always ordered Cobb salad because who could mess up a boiled egg? Had already convinced him to put his bike away because it was more fun to find things they could do together.

She was holding her fork halfway to her mouth, looking at him. The edge that had been in her voice was still in her eyes.

“So how’s life today?” he said, and put on his listening face.

#

Two weeks later, he came out of Starbuck’s with his Americano and a grande soy-milk half-caf latte for his boss, and the messenger was across the street, settling her bag across her back as she headed toward her bike locked to a rail.

Two teenage kids stopped to eyeball the bike. One took a pair of boltcutters out of his back pocket.

The messenger yelled, “Hey!”, actually she roared like a girl-shaped lion and ran flat out with her palms braced and slammed into one of the kids at speed, bammo right into his chest. He went back, and he almost went down. Both kids looked startled and suddenly very young; then they turned and ran.

Holy shit, Harry thought, did I just see that? Inside-Harry gave him a shove. Dude, there she is! Step up!

“Excuse me!” Harry called, and reflexively raised his hand to get her attention. A guy cutting around him on the sidewalk bumped his arm. Harry’s arm jerked, and latte spattered the guy like soy-milk half-caf rain.

“What’re you doing?” said the guy. “Watch where the fuck you’re going!”

“Hey, I didn’t–” Harry said, and the guy put a finger up in Harry’s face and bared his teeth and said, “What?”

Harry stepped back. “Nothing. Sorry.” And when he looked again, the messenger was heading uptown in a taxi slipstream. No hands. Great bike, Harry thought. Great rider. Gutsy. And unaccountably found himself wanting maybe, he wasn’t sure, but maybe wanting to cry.

#

The emo fit passed pretty quickly, but in the days that followed he found himself more alert to every bike on the street, and more restless the rest of the time. It was a big city. He would not see her again. And it was confusing to want it so much and also be glad it would never happen because then he’d have to… what? There was a phrase for it that he couldn’t remember.

But he remembered something else. He remembered what it was like to ride. The wonder and the terror of it, the bumper grazes and the random opening of car doors, the adrenaline joy of precision at speed, taking the corners, taking the risk, no hands, and it all came back so fast, so fast, so fast and Outside-Harry thought Marina doesn’t want me to and Inside-Harry thought Fuck her! Because I have to, I have to–

And there it was; the phrase he was looking for. Get back on the bike.