The night I saw it happen, I was coming home from the hospital after I had felt under the weather. I was going down Interstate 3 to get home when I saw a car go flying down the lane next to me. I watched as he drove through the median and into the oncoming lane, his tires almost burning from the ferocity of the swerve.
I heard a pop, then a large bang. It was hard to see, so I did an emergency swerve into the median as well, but stopped in it and faced my car towards the accident. There I saw the corpse of a woman skidding along the asphalt. I thought I was seeing things, so I left my car and walked over to the body.
I vomited when I saw it: her face was gone, smeared along the pavement, and her stomach was torn wide open. I fell backwards, then remembered the other car. I got up and hesitantly trudged to the accident scene. Traffic on both lanes had stopped, and people were getting out. A brave few, and a highway patrol officer, had followed me as we saw the car that was hit ignite in flame.
I heard 2 screams, an older, gruffer voice, and a younger, more feminine one. I ran toward the vehicle and saw that a father and a young daughter, who had to be no more than 5, trapped in the flames. The father was grabbing at a piece of metal stabbed into his chest. He reached toward his daughter, trying to free her from the burning wreckage, but all she did was scream.
From a distance, I saw the mangled corpse of a son was in the back seat. I was crying, trying to think that what was happening wasn’t real, but I knew that it was. The highway patrol officer pulled me back as I took two more steps toward the car.
“I’m not losing another soul on this highway tonight!” The officer said as he yanked me away from the wreck.
The 3 other people who came with me were going back to their cars, no doubt trying to forget what they’ve seen. I couldn’t. That’s why when I heard the word “daddy” being screamed in a bloodcurdling fashion and the screams finally ending, I screamed myself. I cried more, and vomited more, and finally collapsed.
I came to the next day in the hospital. The highway patrol officer was sitting next to my bed, talking to the doctor treating me. I had finally gathered the strength to ask what happened. The officer hesitated, then told me the grim events of the previous night. He said something interesting too. Apparently no evidence of a driver in the car that claimed those lives was found. They were looking for the identity of the driver, but found instead that the car wasn’t even registered.
The day after I was released from the hospital and had been driven home by the officer, whose name was apparently Ben Hawkins. He told me that if I needed anything, to call him. He left his number and the prescription for my cold on my coffee table. I was surprised that he was so friendly.
What surprised me even more was that he died in a car accident the next day.
And so did 20 other people the same month.
I didnt understand it. Frankly, I still don’t. 20 people dying the same way in one month. I believe that it may be a serial killer. Maybe a cult of psychopaths who get their kicks sacrificing people in car accidents. But I know one thing.
I’ll never put my a*s in a car as long as I live.