AtomicCafe1
03-06-2009, 02:12 AM
Comments and suggestions are greatly appreciated! Thanks for reading!
It Doesn’t Matter if it’s Red
Arnold Pettigrew was now whapping his steering wheel in fury.
A minute and a half ago, when it had begun, Arnold just idly sat and watched in consternation from his black Chevy Trailblazer. There was nothing he could do, so he considered what exactly could bring about such a strange scene. He went through all the options: the domino effect was the thing that was prolonging the pandemic, that much he knew for sure—one initial person had gone, and then all the others behind promptly followed suit. But he belabored on who exactly was that first person. A portly man with an immediate need of a chocolate donut? A wild youth wanting to demonstrate his indestructibility? A blind person?—hell, queerer things have happened.
But Arnold was a man of logic, and he knew something extremely reasonable was behind it all.
His conclusion: the light on Highway 55 turned red and the cars kept on going simply because one person had mistaken the color of the light. That was it. The sunlight had merely aligned itself at the precise angle to give off the illusion that the light hadn’t yet turned red, but still retained its green hue, and by the time proper adjustments of sight could be made, it was too late, for the “moment of no return” had already been surpassed. It was that easy. And then the person behind figured that he was at liberty to repeat the task, and it was this contagious thought process that continued the current chaos.
But now that it had been a minute and a half since Arnold Pettigrew and all of his fellow drivers on County Road 9 were granted the right to “go,” he was getting extremely aggravated—because he couldn’t “go.” Each time a car rushed by on 55, just feet away from his first spot in line on westbound 9, he got sick to his stomach with anger.
And now he was whapping his steering wheel in fury.
Two cars behind and to the left of him, Suzie Culkins in her red Dodge Grand Caravan was reacting quite differently. Suzie was waiting to turn left from 9 onto northbound 55 to go pick up her five-year-old daughter at the local daycare, and this sight in front of her was making her ill. There she was a minute and a half ago, waiting to press on the accelerator, like always, once the left turn arrow turned green, but all of a sudden a torrent of cars running a red light prevented her. It all made her feel uneasy and nervous, because her routine—going when the light was green—she just couldn’t do. Her mind, as a result, was racing. What in the world was this all about? Was this the beginning of the Apocalypse? Were people going to start savagely giving in to all of their wants with absolutely no regard to the needs of others? Wait, no, that already happens. But was all of the world’s order and structure going to dissolve? Oh, oh, oh! Suzie Culkins’s mind was in a fragile mode, and she was hurriedly counting her blessings.
Mickey Greene, however, didn’t need to count his blessings. Traveling on northbound 55, this was going to be the fifth time today that he had gone through the particular intersection of Highway 55 and County Road 9 in his white, boxed van. Mickey was an electrician, and his small, family-owned business drew its customers from all around the surrounding area: from Hartville, the little town of five hundred located fifteen miles north, all the way to Ramsey, about twenty miles east. For his fifth visit to this intersection, however, he turned the corner and saw the street light and noticed something strange: the cars in front of him were all running a red light. He thought back to remember if the lights had been malfunctioning earlier in the day, but nope—each time that he had passed through today, everything was quite normal: the lazy swinging of the street lights each time a car barreled under it; the red “Do Not Walk” notification signaling an upcoming change in light; images of blurred faces in the cars whisking by—not one atypical thing. He thought back to remember if anything like this in the past had happened, but nope—every time he had found himself at this intersection as work hours wrapped up, the scene was normal as can be: the roads filled up and the workers all scuttled home, traveling from freeway to freeway on the link that was Highway 55 and the local ones finding their way into their neighborhoods on that which was County Road 9. Sure, he had seen a car or two do it every now and then, but never had he remembered a time when so many cars at once had defiantly ignored a red light—although he guessed that it could be possible that he had seen something like this before and had just forgotten. Was his memory already failing him?
So Mickey Greene, going down northbound 55, approached the intersection with the reproachful red light and considered: what was there to do? He couldn’t stop—no, all the other cars in the Highway 55 pool were still going. And he was running late, anyways! So does this mean I can go to? He must have decided so, for he proceeded through when the time came to do so. And as he snuck through the intersection, he glanced to his right and met the eyes of a man who was waiting in the County Road 9 lane to go straight.
And those eyes belonged to Jim Bennenger.
Jim Bennenger had been living in the general area ever since he was a young lad, and never—not once—had he witnessed such a preposterous and insane scene, anywhere. He had known this intersection from the time of its birth, which was a very, very long time ago; he even recalls the dirt roads that used to scale the exact same place. In fact, back in the day, he and his brothers used to walk the very roads to buy vegetables at the farmer’s market. And to think that such a horrible scene like this was tainting his past memories, it irked him very much indeed. “Where in God’s name is Frank’s son when we need him? Isn’t this what they pay the police for?” Jim reasoned while he waited to go east on 9. Right after he said this, somebody in a white, boxed van running the red light on 55—a criminal who should be locked up! he would say—caught Jim’s eye. This angered him, and he flailed his elderly arms in an ironically lunatic-like fashion and shrieked: “Lunatic! Goddamn lunatic, running a goddamn red light!”
Coincidentally, the very second Jim Bennenger said this, he—and also Arnold Pettigrew and Suzie Culkins waiting on the other side of 9—saw, traveling on northbound 55, a sign of hope: a car was slowing down. “Finally a man with some goddamn sense,” Jim mumbled.
And it was. The car belonged to one mild-mannered John Wilkins who, from the point of preschool and beyond, had been holding doors open for strangers and insisting—with all the appropriate degree of amiability—that the unknown person take the pleasure of entering wherever they happened to be first. John was chocked full of exuberance, charm and etiquette, and that was part of the reason people enjoyed and respected him so much. He vowed to remain this way, forever.
So when John Wilkins saw the red light in front of him as he rolled down Highway 55, he kept his promise of gratitude to those who had been waiting their turn on County Road 9. He slowed down.
But to anyone watching the scene play out, the car of John Wilkins, after steadily decreasing its speed, suddenly sped up and rifled through the intersection. And to those who were able to catch a glance at the man in this car as it streaked through the red light—Jim Bennenger was able to, and he yelled “coward!” when he saw him—, a snapshot of a man with a bright red face was seen, and evidence of mental turmoil was plastered all over this man’s body. He was shaking and little pellets of sweat were dripping down his brow.
For John Wilkins, as he began to slow down, was unexpectedly thrusted into a moral dilemma. The natural thing to do was to stop, yes, but what about the people behind him? They were expecting to go, no? So he would be letting them down if he stopped! And then he began to wonder—very quickly of course—that something like this wouldn’t happen without a purpose. They must be testing the lights, yes, that’s what must be happening. Or maybe they’ve switched red to mean go, and green to mean stop. Yes, yes, that is for sure what happened—“I just missed the announcement,” he said to himself. And before the car of John Wilkins came to a complete stop, the man inside of it looked at all the other cars on 55, shooting through the intersection, and then looked in his rearview mirror and then thought he saw an angry face in the car behind him and then squeaked, “Oh, gee!” and then stepped on the gas pedal and ran the red light.
Thus, the pandemonium continued.
But naturally, it wouldn’t have lasted too long, for the County Road 9’s green light—the one that the people on Highway 55 ignored—eventually turned red, and those on 55 got back their green light and, this time lawfully, continued to drive without any interruptions.
So in this interim, this seven more minutes of waiting, Arnold Pettigrew whapped his steering wheel even harder, Suzie Culkins counted her blessings even quicker, and Jim Bennenger wailed even louder for Frank’s son, the cop.
Nancy Witherington, the lady directly in front of Suzie Culkins on the east side of 9, had been at the scene since square one, had seen that unknown person who ran the red light first, and had waited the endless amount of time since first arriving at the stoplight. She, like everyone else, was very concerned as to whether or not the whole incident would repeat itself again. Everywhere her eyes moved they moved with the overtone of worry. She looked at the gas station to the left of her for condolence, and a man in a maroon fleece jacket was tentatively filling up his battered, gray Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck. She noticed the man spill some of the gasoline onto his blue jeans as he put the nozzle back in the pump, and angrily mouth a swearword when he became aware of it. She turned back towards the head-scratching scene at the intersection and reassured herself, “Oh, everything is going to be just fine and dandy!” And after gazing at the man will the gasoline-soaked pants some more, she added, “Oh, it for certain won’t happen again, I say, it just can’t!”
But for everyone else piled up on County Road 9—which at this point in time, was quite a few—almost nobody shared Nancy’s optimism. Ray DeLopa, behind Jim Bennenger on the west side of 9, for instance, had already called his wife at home to say that he would be late for dinner. Cars on both sides of 9, too, were becoming impatient and starting to aggressively turn right onto Highway 55. They had lost all hope.
And then came the moment, the moment to see whether or not an end to all the madness would come. The people waiting on 9 had already suffered their fair share of travails: they had waited through a red light, then a green light, then another red light, and now they were about to see if another green light would be squandered.
The green light of 55 finally turned to yellow. Tension filled the air. All eyes turned towards the incomers on 55, seeing what their next move would be, seeing if they would run the red light like their predecessors had. Suzie Culkins held her breath. Jim Bennenger waited with his eyes wide open. Arnold Pettigrew prepared himself to lurch through the intersection the exact moment his light turned green, regardless of the obstacles in the way. And Ray DeLopa, and everyone else, paused and watched.
The first incomer, a blue Toyota Corrolla, looked primed to rocket through the soon-to-be red light.
Was it another donut eater?
Was it another rebellious kid?
Was it another blind person?
Would it be the sun again?
But then, all in one quick motion, the Corrolla skidded to a halt, and all the other cars on both sides of Highway 55 conformed and stopped as well.
Afterwards, Arnold Pettigrew and all of the others, recovering from their disbelief, quietly slinked through the intersection, completely riveted that this time they could actually follow through with their right to “go.” They rushed to wherever their destinations were and barreled out of their cars, sprinting to the nearest person—a family member, a friend, a neighbor, a stranger—and told them of the recent occurrence that they had just witnessed.
But everyone laughed at them and thought it was some grandiose, make-believe story—“Quit lying,” Ray DeLopa’s wife had snickered.
Nobody believed them.
And after awhile, Arnold Pettigrew, Suzie Culkins, Mickey Greene, Jim Bennenger, John Wilkins, Nancy Witherington, and everybody else—they all began to doubt it themselves.
It never really happened, they said. It must have been one of those dreams—you know, that just seem so darn real?
Yes, it must have just been one of those.
It Doesn’t Matter if it’s Red
Arnold Pettigrew was now whapping his steering wheel in fury.
A minute and a half ago, when it had begun, Arnold just idly sat and watched in consternation from his black Chevy Trailblazer. There was nothing he could do, so he considered what exactly could bring about such a strange scene. He went through all the options: the domino effect was the thing that was prolonging the pandemic, that much he knew for sure—one initial person had gone, and then all the others behind promptly followed suit. But he belabored on who exactly was that first person. A portly man with an immediate need of a chocolate donut? A wild youth wanting to demonstrate his indestructibility? A blind person?—hell, queerer things have happened.
But Arnold was a man of logic, and he knew something extremely reasonable was behind it all.
His conclusion: the light on Highway 55 turned red and the cars kept on going simply because one person had mistaken the color of the light. That was it. The sunlight had merely aligned itself at the precise angle to give off the illusion that the light hadn’t yet turned red, but still retained its green hue, and by the time proper adjustments of sight could be made, it was too late, for the “moment of no return” had already been surpassed. It was that easy. And then the person behind figured that he was at liberty to repeat the task, and it was this contagious thought process that continued the current chaos.
But now that it had been a minute and a half since Arnold Pettigrew and all of his fellow drivers on County Road 9 were granted the right to “go,” he was getting extremely aggravated—because he couldn’t “go.” Each time a car rushed by on 55, just feet away from his first spot in line on westbound 9, he got sick to his stomach with anger.
And now he was whapping his steering wheel in fury.
Two cars behind and to the left of him, Suzie Culkins in her red Dodge Grand Caravan was reacting quite differently. Suzie was waiting to turn left from 9 onto northbound 55 to go pick up her five-year-old daughter at the local daycare, and this sight in front of her was making her ill. There she was a minute and a half ago, waiting to press on the accelerator, like always, once the left turn arrow turned green, but all of a sudden a torrent of cars running a red light prevented her. It all made her feel uneasy and nervous, because her routine—going when the light was green—she just couldn’t do. Her mind, as a result, was racing. What in the world was this all about? Was this the beginning of the Apocalypse? Were people going to start savagely giving in to all of their wants with absolutely no regard to the needs of others? Wait, no, that already happens. But was all of the world’s order and structure going to dissolve? Oh, oh, oh! Suzie Culkins’s mind was in a fragile mode, and she was hurriedly counting her blessings.
Mickey Greene, however, didn’t need to count his blessings. Traveling on northbound 55, this was going to be the fifth time today that he had gone through the particular intersection of Highway 55 and County Road 9 in his white, boxed van. Mickey was an electrician, and his small, family-owned business drew its customers from all around the surrounding area: from Hartville, the little town of five hundred located fifteen miles north, all the way to Ramsey, about twenty miles east. For his fifth visit to this intersection, however, he turned the corner and saw the street light and noticed something strange: the cars in front of him were all running a red light. He thought back to remember if the lights had been malfunctioning earlier in the day, but nope—each time that he had passed through today, everything was quite normal: the lazy swinging of the street lights each time a car barreled under it; the red “Do Not Walk” notification signaling an upcoming change in light; images of blurred faces in the cars whisking by—not one atypical thing. He thought back to remember if anything like this in the past had happened, but nope—every time he had found himself at this intersection as work hours wrapped up, the scene was normal as can be: the roads filled up and the workers all scuttled home, traveling from freeway to freeway on the link that was Highway 55 and the local ones finding their way into their neighborhoods on that which was County Road 9. Sure, he had seen a car or two do it every now and then, but never had he remembered a time when so many cars at once had defiantly ignored a red light—although he guessed that it could be possible that he had seen something like this before and had just forgotten. Was his memory already failing him?
So Mickey Greene, going down northbound 55, approached the intersection with the reproachful red light and considered: what was there to do? He couldn’t stop—no, all the other cars in the Highway 55 pool were still going. And he was running late, anyways! So does this mean I can go to? He must have decided so, for he proceeded through when the time came to do so. And as he snuck through the intersection, he glanced to his right and met the eyes of a man who was waiting in the County Road 9 lane to go straight.
And those eyes belonged to Jim Bennenger.
Jim Bennenger had been living in the general area ever since he was a young lad, and never—not once—had he witnessed such a preposterous and insane scene, anywhere. He had known this intersection from the time of its birth, which was a very, very long time ago; he even recalls the dirt roads that used to scale the exact same place. In fact, back in the day, he and his brothers used to walk the very roads to buy vegetables at the farmer’s market. And to think that such a horrible scene like this was tainting his past memories, it irked him very much indeed. “Where in God’s name is Frank’s son when we need him? Isn’t this what they pay the police for?” Jim reasoned while he waited to go east on 9. Right after he said this, somebody in a white, boxed van running the red light on 55—a criminal who should be locked up! he would say—caught Jim’s eye. This angered him, and he flailed his elderly arms in an ironically lunatic-like fashion and shrieked: “Lunatic! Goddamn lunatic, running a goddamn red light!”
Coincidentally, the very second Jim Bennenger said this, he—and also Arnold Pettigrew and Suzie Culkins waiting on the other side of 9—saw, traveling on northbound 55, a sign of hope: a car was slowing down. “Finally a man with some goddamn sense,” Jim mumbled.
And it was. The car belonged to one mild-mannered John Wilkins who, from the point of preschool and beyond, had been holding doors open for strangers and insisting—with all the appropriate degree of amiability—that the unknown person take the pleasure of entering wherever they happened to be first. John was chocked full of exuberance, charm and etiquette, and that was part of the reason people enjoyed and respected him so much. He vowed to remain this way, forever.
So when John Wilkins saw the red light in front of him as he rolled down Highway 55, he kept his promise of gratitude to those who had been waiting their turn on County Road 9. He slowed down.
But to anyone watching the scene play out, the car of John Wilkins, after steadily decreasing its speed, suddenly sped up and rifled through the intersection. And to those who were able to catch a glance at the man in this car as it streaked through the red light—Jim Bennenger was able to, and he yelled “coward!” when he saw him—, a snapshot of a man with a bright red face was seen, and evidence of mental turmoil was plastered all over this man’s body. He was shaking and little pellets of sweat were dripping down his brow.
For John Wilkins, as he began to slow down, was unexpectedly thrusted into a moral dilemma. The natural thing to do was to stop, yes, but what about the people behind him? They were expecting to go, no? So he would be letting them down if he stopped! And then he began to wonder—very quickly of course—that something like this wouldn’t happen without a purpose. They must be testing the lights, yes, that’s what must be happening. Or maybe they’ve switched red to mean go, and green to mean stop. Yes, yes, that is for sure what happened—“I just missed the announcement,” he said to himself. And before the car of John Wilkins came to a complete stop, the man inside of it looked at all the other cars on 55, shooting through the intersection, and then looked in his rearview mirror and then thought he saw an angry face in the car behind him and then squeaked, “Oh, gee!” and then stepped on the gas pedal and ran the red light.
Thus, the pandemonium continued.
But naturally, it wouldn’t have lasted too long, for the County Road 9’s green light—the one that the people on Highway 55 ignored—eventually turned red, and those on 55 got back their green light and, this time lawfully, continued to drive without any interruptions.
So in this interim, this seven more minutes of waiting, Arnold Pettigrew whapped his steering wheel even harder, Suzie Culkins counted her blessings even quicker, and Jim Bennenger wailed even louder for Frank’s son, the cop.
Nancy Witherington, the lady directly in front of Suzie Culkins on the east side of 9, had been at the scene since square one, had seen that unknown person who ran the red light first, and had waited the endless amount of time since first arriving at the stoplight. She, like everyone else, was very concerned as to whether or not the whole incident would repeat itself again. Everywhere her eyes moved they moved with the overtone of worry. She looked at the gas station to the left of her for condolence, and a man in a maroon fleece jacket was tentatively filling up his battered, gray Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck. She noticed the man spill some of the gasoline onto his blue jeans as he put the nozzle back in the pump, and angrily mouth a swearword when he became aware of it. She turned back towards the head-scratching scene at the intersection and reassured herself, “Oh, everything is going to be just fine and dandy!” And after gazing at the man will the gasoline-soaked pants some more, she added, “Oh, it for certain won’t happen again, I say, it just can’t!”
But for everyone else piled up on County Road 9—which at this point in time, was quite a few—almost nobody shared Nancy’s optimism. Ray DeLopa, behind Jim Bennenger on the west side of 9, for instance, had already called his wife at home to say that he would be late for dinner. Cars on both sides of 9, too, were becoming impatient and starting to aggressively turn right onto Highway 55. They had lost all hope.
And then came the moment, the moment to see whether or not an end to all the madness would come. The people waiting on 9 had already suffered their fair share of travails: they had waited through a red light, then a green light, then another red light, and now they were about to see if another green light would be squandered.
The green light of 55 finally turned to yellow. Tension filled the air. All eyes turned towards the incomers on 55, seeing what their next move would be, seeing if they would run the red light like their predecessors had. Suzie Culkins held her breath. Jim Bennenger waited with his eyes wide open. Arnold Pettigrew prepared himself to lurch through the intersection the exact moment his light turned green, regardless of the obstacles in the way. And Ray DeLopa, and everyone else, paused and watched.
The first incomer, a blue Toyota Corrolla, looked primed to rocket through the soon-to-be red light.
Was it another donut eater?
Was it another rebellious kid?
Was it another blind person?
Would it be the sun again?
But then, all in one quick motion, the Corrolla skidded to a halt, and all the other cars on both sides of Highway 55 conformed and stopped as well.
Afterwards, Arnold Pettigrew and all of the others, recovering from their disbelief, quietly slinked through the intersection, completely riveted that this time they could actually follow through with their right to “go.” They rushed to wherever their destinations were and barreled out of their cars, sprinting to the nearest person—a family member, a friend, a neighbor, a stranger—and told them of the recent occurrence that they had just witnessed.
But everyone laughed at them and thought it was some grandiose, make-believe story—“Quit lying,” Ray DeLopa’s wife had snickered.
Nobody believed them.
And after awhile, Arnold Pettigrew, Suzie Culkins, Mickey Greene, Jim Bennenger, John Wilkins, Nancy Witherington, and everybody else—they all began to doubt it themselves.
It never really happened, they said. It must have been one of those dreams—you know, that just seem so darn real?
Yes, it must have just been one of those.