Short Story - Sig Alert

Sig-Alert

Wilbur Jones woke up with a scowl on his face. He always woke up with a scowl. I mean what kind of life did he have?__no spouse, no children, no siblings, his father long gone, his mother gone even longer. Fact is, outside of a meager bank account, he had no nothing. What did he have? A meaningless life is what he had. Wilbur rose every morning and went to a meaningless job at a mega insurance company where he saw the same meaningless faces at the office, one day after another where he crunched the same meaningless numbers all day long except for a lousy ten minute break in midmorning, a half hour lunch, and a ten minute break in mid-afternoon. Wilbur Jones took the same drive to work each day passing the same Starbucks, the same Safeway grocery store, the same Office Depot, and all the while listening to the same news radio station in the car where he heard the same meaningless reports every day, news, weather, sports. He even experienced the same traffic slow-downs and tie-ups in the same spots. The only differences were the radio reports of sig-alerts. Sig-alert, short for significant alert, accidents significant enough for drivers be advised to take alternative routes. Wilbur Jones liked sig-alerts.Significant, meant something, meant something big, big and important with the kind of details that stuck in one’s mind. He liked hearing the reporter say that state highway troopers and first responders were either en route or on the scene.

He would turn up the volume on the radio and then visualize them. He could see them in his mind’s eye; someone losing control of their car, maybe a tire that blew out when the driver was speeding well over the limit then other cars getting involved, crash, bang. People driving by bearing witness to the spectacle and calling 911 to report the emergency. Wilbur’s heart raced when he heard his favorites—rollover accidents—these were most definitely sig-alerts. “Good one,” he’d whisper.

People in such accidents put the brakes on the meaninglessness of their daily lives and their significant accidents caused drivers racing on the highways to “slow to a crawl.” He pictured the crawlers staring at the injured and seeing them as a person, not some meaningless corporate drone. Surely they sent them good wishes, maybe even whispered a short prayer for them. And if the victim wound up in the hospital perhaps their acquaintances sent them a get well card.

Wilbur rose from bed, shaved the same whiskers on his chin, buttered the same toast at the table, ate the same bowl of oatmeal, drank the same decaf, made the same peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and climbed into the same fifteen-year-old Japanese four cylinder car always parked in the same parking space of the apartment complex. He turned on the radio. “It’s a good day,” said the traffic reporter. “No accidents as of this hour, let’s keep our fingers crossed.” Wilbur Jones shook his head in disappointment and hoped for something. He passed the Starbucks, passed the Safeway and Office Depot, took the same north bound Wilmington highway onramp and hit the gas until he reached the speed limit. He passed the same oleander shrubs planted along the median strip and drove along the same embankment that he passed every day. He looked down the slope onto the southbound traffic, thought for a moment then rolled down his window, reached for the radio and turned it up to full volume while he simultaneously stomped on the accelerator. He merged onto the shoulder or the road and quickly reached 80-plus miles an hour. He yanked the steering wheel to the side while hitting the brakes. The car went into a screaming skid onto the gravel off the shoulder, and over the embankment. The car rolled side to hood to side to undercarriage, over and over.

“Yeeehaw!” He yelled through deafening sounds of smashing metal and plastic and glass. Wilbur Jones’s world went round and round like the combination of a roller coaster and a kaleidoscope. He started a second yeehaw but his voice got muffled when the airbag exploded open pinning him to the seat. The car made three full turns before it came to a stop at the bottom of the embankment on its hood and surrounded by beautiful clouds of dust. Tires squealed as vehicles veered away avoiding his car that had come to a stop on the highway lane. It looked like a colossal dead bug, legs in the air.

Someone appeared in seconds. “Hold on mister,” yelled a woman over Wilbur Jones’s blaring radio. “We’re gonna get you out. Are you seriously hurt?”

Wilbur tried to say, “I can’t talk with the airbag against my mouth.” But the pressure of the bag muffled his words into something like. “Hei cnn tk wi th arbg ss agns m mth.”

“I’m an EMT on my way to work and saw you roll. I need to know if you’re seriously hurt. Can you tell me?”

“Hei cnn tk wi th arbg ss agns m mth.”

She put her ear as close to his mouth only as his mangled car door allowed. “I can’t understand you, please try again.” But all that Wilbur Jones could do was repeat the same gibberish.

She shook her head. “I’m just not getting it what with the airbag is against your mouth.”

The woman reached into her pocket, pulled out a knife, opened the blade, then stabbed the airbag releasing the air. “Can you tell if you’re injured?”

“I don’t feel much,” Wilbur said relieved to be rid of the intense pressure against his chest and face. “Blood’s running to my head and that doesn’t feel too good.”

“Don’t move,” she said jogging off. “I’ll get my kit and see if I can get you out.”

Don’t move? he thought. I couldn’t move if I had to.

Sirens wailed in the distance. Soon state patrol cruisers and emergency vehicles pulled up amber and red lights spinning. The EMTs got him out of the car, put him on a stretcher, and onto a gurney. Wilbur Jones heard his car radio. “This just in, there’s a sig-alert a mile past the Wilmington onramp on northbound highway 124. It’s a rollover with injuries involved. State troopers and first responders are on the scene. Traffic’s tied-up for miles, use an alternate route if you’re in the area.”

“What day of the week is it?” asked an EMT as he wheeled Wilbur to the ambulance.

“It’s a not so meaningless Wednesday,” he said turning his head to see cars inching past, drivers and passengers gawking. A woman driver, concern spread across her face made the sign of the cross while whispering something. Wow, she must praying for me. He lifted a hand only as high as the gurney strap allowed and gave her a thumbs-up. His gesture turned her expression from concern to relief.

And for the first time in a long, long time, Wilbur Jones smiled.