Jane Elliot waited patiently at the crosswalk. She was the nanny for a wealthy family who lived near, but not within, the city. The girl in her care, both young and a single child, held her hand firmly, so as to not lose hold of the sole source of her emotional and physical care. Jane distractedly smiled down at her. Jane had just, on the previous night, been caught with the girl’s father by his wife. The wife was angry, the husband wavering on his own future, and Jane was torn. Jane was only eighteen and should have had a long life stretched before her, full of opportunities, and she saw many of them from her vantage point on the corner. The family she worked for was rich, and most of their friends were rich. Some of these friends, having been informed of her transgressions by the child’s mother, were eager to hire her for services outside of legal professions, and Jane had not hesitated to put them into consideration. Jane had been pleasantly surprised to discover how much fun and profit she could draw by using her youth and vivaciousness to toy with men, and lacking either scruples or oversight, was eager to exploit this knowledge. She was considering several of these offers when the light turned green and she, with the childs hand in hers, stepped off the curb and into her destiny.
A large blue van, driven by an elderly man who knew nothing of Jane and was unconnected with her in any way aside from trying to drive past her at this intersection at this particular time, began to drive past her, heading in the same direction but blocking slightly Jane’s view to her left of what had been oncoming traffic. Had the driver of the van been turning to his right, he would have waited a moment for Jane and the girl to have crossed the street sufficiently for him to turn. As it was, he himself was attentive enough only to watch the stoplight switch to green and begin to pull forward through the intersection when a man driving a delivery truck nodded off and drove through the light, crosswise to the van and hitting it with such force that it flew sideways, into Jane and the girl, who themselves were thrown like rag dolls down the street. The driver of the delivery truck, here nameless, would spend a substantial amount of time in the hospital before being jailed. The driver of the van, a Raymond Phillips, would spend the rest of his day in the hospital before being discharged with orders for several days of bedrest to heal his strains and bruises for he was lucky enough to have no broken bones or other serious injury. He would spend his bedrest trying to teach his dog to play fetch and wondering if he would ever again see a nurse he found to be mesmerizing even if she was of a plain appearance. Neither of these things would ever come to pass.
Jane and the girl were fatally injured when they flew against the side of a small diner specializing in Welsh cuisine. Standing near the entryway trying to beg from the exiting patrons some meager coin or biscuit for her breakfast, waited Helen White, a homeless young woman who was in every regard not dependent on wealth Jane’s superior. She was possessed of brown, wavy hair that hung just past her shoulders, a face that as radiant of warmth as it was pleasing to view, her skin and clothes, despite her situation in life, were spotless, and although her form was masked by bulky clothing overly warm for the season, she was not unduly heavy but held a shape that most would desire of her or envy. Helen, predisposed to help others whenever the opportunity arose, moved with great haste to where the two had landed and with care to not touch their now soiled and bloodied clothing, bent over the little girl. “Adele,” was the feebly-voiced reply, followed by several shuddered breaths as the girl looked up at what she mistakenly believed was her savior. The girl reached up and tried to take Helen’s hand. Helen gazed down at Adele for a moment before relenting and taking the girls hand. The clasp lasted no more than fifteen seconds before Helen was pushed aside by others who had been passing by and had been witness to the accident. Helen turned away and tried to move down the street when a firm hand clasped her shoulder.
“She’s done something. The little girl is clean. There will be questions if she’s not fine,” said the woman holding her shoulder. That woman was Sarya Foster. Sarya was tall, slightly overweight, and had dyed blonde hair artificially curled well past the point of ludicrousness. Sarya was overweight, but possessed no great width across her shoulders, giving her the appearance of being much heavier than she actually was and which combined with her blockish countenance to create an intimidating presence. Helen was intimidated by her look and grasp, as was Steve, her hitherto silent companion.
Steve Dallas, the man to whom Sarya spoke, was a non-descript man. Any person who knew him would recognize him, but he was singularly indistinguishable. Any two people, if asked to describe him, would be unable to agree on what his most significant feature was and if compelled to describe him, even a person who had a perfect recollection for faces would become befuddled with ambiguities. Steve indistinguishably moved from Sarya’s side to that of Adele, upon whom several passersby were performing CPR. Several others were trying CPR on Jane, and a number of people in the small crowd gathered around this portion of the accident scene were querying each other as to if any emergency services had been called. A number of approaching sirens answered that question each time it was asked, but none of this bore any importance to Steve whose task had been to ensure the little girl was fine. He did this by taking her hand gently in his until she sputtered back to life. The two people performing CPR, a young man and woman, both congratulated each other on what appeared to be the successful conclusion of their joint efforts and, distracted by the energy of the moment, fell madly into a mutual love that would be perceived as unrequired and would be pushed aside to haunt them for the remainder of their many, unshared days.
Goe, trying new things some of the time.
