Fiction

Heavy Traffic

by S. D. Liddiard

Carling Avenue is a major thoroughfare. It stretches from Kanata, a high-tech hopeful of a bedroom community several kilometres west of Ottawa, to Bronson Avenue, near the heart of the National Capital. From the city of Nepean to Centretown, it is six lanes wide, split by a grassy median. Parking is not permitted. That would impede the flow of traffic. Traffic gushes like a river down Carling Avenue. The speed limit is 60 kilometres per hour, but only the inexperienced and the elderly go less than 70. Eighty is not uncommon. The truly impatient routinely hit 100 between widely spaced stoplights. Even during rush hour, traffic, though heavy, moves smartly.

At 4:00 P.M. one Thursday, Monica Dumont made a quick stop at her accountant's home office on Carling. She had some receipts to drop off and needed to confirm her suspicion that manicures were not deductible, despite being a business necessity for a real estate broker. Monica's busy schedule took her right past the accountant's office on this day. Though she was running late, she refused to put this visit off any longer. It would only take a minute, as it had a dozen times before.

She almost passed the house by, as a long, high barricade hid the driveway from view. A wall of freshly painted plywood snaked across the lawn and the sidewalk, all the way to the asphalt. Monica tossed it a frown as she made a wide turn into the drive. The accountant told her the gas company was investigating a leak in the line to his house. Good thing hardly anyone walks by here, thought Monica, because there's no way to get by without stepping into the street.

She remarked on the gas company's lack of consideration and dismissed the matter from her mind. In less than five minutes she was behind the wheel and ready to hit the road again. Not until she had backed her car to the end of the driveway did she realize that the oncoming cars were screened from her view. There was no way she could pull into the rush hour traffic. As she waited long minutes for a break in the flow, her neck began developing a painful kink. Each time she was on the point of plunging into a gap, it vanished. It was impossible to judge the size of an opening until it had passed.

She thought of trying to edge into the flow by easing slowly out of the driveway. That strategy would work in a lot of places, especially during the afternoon stop-and-go. Some kind soul would stay stopped for the extra five seconds it took to let her in. Not on Carling Avenue, though. The traffic was still moving at 70 kilometres per hour. At that speed, the kindest soul in the world could stomp the brake pedal through the floor, but would still slam into her trunk. Without plenty of warning that a break was coming up, she was stranded.

Deeply frustrated, Monica eased her head around to face forward and tried to relax. With the fingertips of both hands, she massaged the stiff muscles at the nape of her neck. Sighing, she reached for the cellular phone to warn her next client she would be late. As she did so, she heard a soft tap-tap-tap from the direction of her left rear fender. She turned to see the deeply lined face of an elderly gentleman leaning forward to peer at her from the edge of the sidewalk. Even at this distance she found the brilliance of his blue eyes startling. His long, straight nose was accentuated by a neatly trimmed white mustache. A smart tweed trilby topped his tidy mane of silver hair.

He flashed a twinkling smile, tipped the trilby at her, then held up the palm of his hand like a crossing guard. An angel of mercy, thought Monica gratefully, was about to deliver her from her torment. With his open palm still halting her, he looked over the fence at the oncoming stream of cars. After about ten seconds, he looked Monica in the eye again, curled three fingers into his palm so that just the index was still raised, then glanced back at the traffic. As she watched expectantly, he pivoted gracefully, turned the palm of his hand toward the street and flapped his fingers imperatively three times.

Monica did not hesitate. Immensely relieved to be on her way, she flattened the gas pedal and cranked the wheel hard to squeal the car blindly into the curb lane. She neither heard nor saw the transport truck that crumpled her car like a discarded tissue.