From: seaverw@columbia.dsu.edu (W. A. Seaver)
Newsgroups: alt.prose
Subject: Seatbelt
Date: 25 Aug 92 17:21:53 GMT
Organization: Dakota State University

Um... I dunno; have at it:
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                           Seatbelt

    Eddie stuck out his thumb and the cars did not slow.
    No one stops for a bloody hitcher anymore, he thought. They're 
too bloody preoccupied in their own bloody paranoia to care.
    It had been four and a half hours since his last ride, and the 
afternoon heat was peaking. Eddie was getting angry. The muscles in 
his shoulders burned with the weight of his backpack, and his feet 
stung with the odd pain that only large, oozing blisters produce. 
But these pains mattered little when compared with the irrititation 
Eddie felt toward the drivers. Fifteen years ago, he would have had 
no problem hailing a lift. Drivers were eager to lend a hand to a 
guy stuck without wheels.
    But today? Fear of death intervened. Fear of the lone 
psychokiller stalking the 2-lane in search of lone young women to 
rob and rape and kill--not necessarily in that order. What struck 
Eddie as odd was the fact that most of the drivers passing him by 
were neither lone nor female. And this road was a well-traveled 4- 
lane; hardly desolate.
    Indoctrination. The country was rampant with it. The blind, 
unquestioning adherence to presupposed "facts" made Eddie sick. None 
of these drivers knew Eddie, yet because he was on foot he was 
automatically dangerous--or there was at least the possibility he 
was dangerous, so best to play it safe and drive on past. Most folks 
didn't bother to so much as make eye contact. Some waved glibly or 
gestured in a silent communication of "Gosh, I'd love to offer a 
lift, but I've been indoctrinated to fear and loathe you on the 
assumption you're a mass murderer. Sorry." A few had the nerve to 
beep their horns. "Get a horse!" that said.
    Ah, who needed 'em?
    His two feet did, that's who. The odd blister pain had in the 
last half-mile become a combination of broken glass, rusty needles, 
and glowing coals. The sensation was particularly awful in his right 
foot. Before long, he'd have to stop altogether and sit until a ride 
stopped. How long might that take? At this pace, he'd spend the 
night on that spot--and probably most of the next day. No, he had to 
keep moving as long as he could, make the best distance possible 
before last light.
    A quarter mile later, he was forced to put down his pack and sit 
in the gravel by the guardrail. His feet had given out. Every step 
felt like he was walking in size-10 packs of razor blades. The parts 
that didn't hurt, itched. He wanted to pull his hiking boots off his 
swollen feet, but doing that would probably inflict further damage.
    Bloody hell.
    Eddie propped his elbow on his leg and gazed at the weeds in the 
opposite ditch while his thumb hung motionless and unnoticed by the 
passing cars.
    Soon, Eddie put his thumb down altogether and took to 
contemplating his right boot. He wondered if he could think the pain 
out of his foot by looking at it.
    Eddie was so intent on his throbbing foot, and its psychosomatic 
aspects, that he almost didn't notice that a car had stopped. A 
light-blue Ford Tempo had rolled to a stop thirty feet away; wisps 
of road dust sent up by the tires twisted slowly in the heat-soaked 
air. It's backup lights came on and it backtracked to within a few 
feet of him. Eddie leapt to his feet so eagerly that he swung his 
pack over his shoulder too quickly and almost knocked himself over.
    The side windows were tinted darkly enough that Eddie couldn't 
see inside them. He placed his hand on the door catch, and at that 
same moment the door popped outward at it was opened from the other 
side. His heart jumped for a second. It was the same sensation he 
got whenever he picked up an empty can he thought was full, giving 
him a split-second superhuman feeling. It was the sensation that the 
universe had perhaps momentarily lost its concentration and 
overlapped itself. In other words, the sensation of "this shouldn't 
statistically be happening, but it is."
    The door opened wider, and a slender man in his late 20s or 
early 30s leaned over and asked, "Been out here long?" The driver 
had medium-length straight dark hair, and wore a neatly-pressed 
white shirt with thin blue stripes. Eddie took the man for a 
conservative Republican. Although he normally wasn't one to 
presuppose, the feeling Eddie got toward this guy leaned strongly to 
the right.
    "Hours," he told the man.
    "Where you headed?" the man then asked, and Eddie suddenly 
forgot where it was he was going to. He had put his full attention 
toward getting a ride, and hadn't recently thought about where he 
wanted a ride to. The name of the place momentarily slipped his 
mind. He made up a destination, instead, and related that to the 
driver. A momentary frown of thought crossed the man's face. 
"Haven't heard of it. At any rate, I can take you down the road a 
few miles."
    "A block's as good as a mile to a cripple."
    The back seat was fairly well taken up by a couple suitcases and 
several suit bags. The floor of the front passenger seat, however, 
looked roomy enough to adequately accomodate both Eddie's legs and 
his packpack. He leaned in to place the pack in the floor, trying 
not to entangle it in the dangling straps of the automatic seat 
belt. He had seen these on some of the newer cars: shoulder belts 
fixed in grooves along the top of the doorframe; close the door, and 
the seatbelt glides back along its track, fitting the passenger in a 
snug yet comfortable grip. He hated them. He had never actually 
experienced them firsthand, but he was sure he hated them. They 
eroded his sense of freedom a little further. Safety first, like it or
not.
    Eddie got in and closed the door. Here it came, silently and 
obediently following the car's computer's bidding. The shoulder belt 
drew in and embraced Eddie in a snug yet comfortable grip. Then the 
grip went beyond snug to uncomfortable, then became downright 
painful. As the belt moved tighter, his breathing became  
difficult, and it felt as though a thousand pounds were pressing 
against his chest. Then a thousand sharp pains erupted as his ribs 
shattered and tore through his internal organs. His thin scream was 
dim and short, dying out midway as the last air was pressed from his 
lungs. Then there was only old phlem and the blood now oozing 
through the puncture wounds made by his ribs. This he reflexively 
tried to cough out, but without air, the situation only worsened. 
Eddie never got the chance to master this new and unique method of 
coughing.
    Larry (though his business cards read "Lawrence"), patiently 
waited for the hitcher to stop thrashing. When he had--and Larry had 
made quite sure by waiting an extra several minutes--Larry reached 
over with his spotless hankerchief and wiped a thin trickle of blood 
from the corner of the hitcher's mouth. He closed the eyes. Now the 
body would appear to other motorists as merely sleeping. A small 
lake lay a few miles away, surrounded by trees and lush fauna. Larry 
knew it well; it was his favorite burial site. It wasn't far out of 
his way. He could attend to his business there and still make it 
home to catch the 6:00 news. (That was the drawback to hitchers: 
they were rarely noticed missing, and therefore almost never 
mentioned by the anchor).
    A hot metallic smell rose from the back seat. Larry casually 
wondered if the winch needed oiling again as he continued down the 
road, one eye to the shoulder.

(C) 1992 W.A. Seaver
Newsgroups: alt.prose