Gehenna Dawn: Portal Wars I by Jay Allan

Author:Jay Allan [Allan, Jay]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: System 7 Publishing
Published: 2013-12-19T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

From the Journal of Jake Taylor:

Do you ever wonder about the odd assortment of things you remember? Most days of your life vanish into the inaccessible depths of the mind, but a few seemingly random events remain in the forefront. Years later, decades later…you still remember them like they happened yesterday.

One day when I was young…seven, eight, I don’t recall that part exactly…we were driving into Concord. It was sometime around my birthday, and we were heading for one of the restaurants in town. It was always a treat to eat out someplace. It wasn’t often we had the extra money for things like that.

I was in the back of the truck, probably fighting with my brother. Suddenly, my father pulled over to the side of the road. There was an accident ahead of us. A motorcycle had been swiped by a tractor, and it wiped out hard.

My father told us to stay in the car, and then he got out and went to the back of the truck. He always kept a blanket and a first aid kit in the storage locker, and he got them out and ran over. I could see the rider through the window of the truck. He was lying on his back, and the street around him had puddles of blood on it. I wondered for a second if he was dead, but then I saw him move.

It was the first time I’d seen blood like that. Not a few drops from a cut, but pools of it. I knew immediately he was badly hurt, and I couldn’t move my eyes away. I watched my father cover him with the blanket, even as I heard the approaching sirens of the sheriff and the rescue squad.

When the medics arrived, my father walked back to the car, and we continued toward town. I remember wondering how we would get our blanket back. I don’t recall what we did in Concord that day, or what restaurant we went to. But I remember the image of that man lying in the street, covered by our old gray blanket…feeling bad for him and worrying about how we’d get the blanket back.

I think about that day often, even now. I wonder if that man lived or not. I feel sadness, thinking about his suffering, about the fact that he might have died. I always imagine that he got up that day, just like any other. Maybe he was excited, as I was when we left the house. It could have been a special occasion. He could have been going to meet friends. Instead he ended up hurt and bleeding…and maybe dying…on the cold pavement.

I can’t explain the reaction I had…that I still have…the melancholy, the sadness I feel for that man. Even now, after ten years of war and thousands of casualties…after all the suffering and death…I still remember the biker lying on that back road in New Hampshire.

Empathy. Such an odd emotion. Sometimes it is predictable. Clearly, the suffering of a friend or a loved one triggers it more profoundly than that of a stranger.

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