Traffic Light: A Short Story

A clipped prose crime story about a woman dealing with a brutal carjacking. Written toward the end of my undergraduate years, it was an attempt to play with telegraph-style language.

The car was stopped. The light was red. It had held that color for a good thirty seconds so far. Miriam leaned back in her seat, looked out the front window at the snow. She always hit this light.

She ran her fingers along the steering wheel, fidgeting. The heater didn't work. She was cold. She turned on the radio: Christian rantings in Spanish. The equipment only did AM.

Something was tapping on the driver's side window. Miriam turned her head, squinted. There was frost on the glass. Through it, she could see the shadow of an object. It took only a second or so to figure out. She inhaled sharply, then froze up. Her breathing stopped.

She saw something else move behind the frost. Bigger. A muffled voice: "Roll down the window."

Miriam was still frozen. She turned her head, stiffly; slowly looked towards the passenger side window and the frost that covered it. She had her hands on the wheel, her foot on the break. She lifted it. The car creaked, rolled.

"Hey!" the voice shouted. "@!$%#ing stop!"

Her foot put weight on the break again. The car stopped.

"Good. Now roll down the window." A pause. "Or I pop you in the @!$%#ing head."

Her hands were shaking. Miriam reached over, grabbed at the door handle, pulled. Locked. She pushed the electric lock button and jumped at the snap. She sat quietly for a moment. Then: "Are you going to kill me?"

"I will, you don't roll down the @!$%#ing window, lady."

Miriam coughed. She touched the window button. A deep breath, and she pressed.

The window slid down, sticking after an inch of movement, and then there was a man looking in at her. His face was stubbled, his eyes warped behind thick lenses. A baseball cap covered the top of his head. A Padres fan. He said, "That's better. See, lady, this ain't hard."

Miriam nodded. "What--" She swallowed. "What do you want from me?"

"You're thinking rape?" he said.

She shook her head, fast.

"Yeah," he said, "yeah, that's what you're thinking. Rape. That I'm maybe gonna force you outta the car and @!$%# you." Held the gun up in front of her face.

Miriam dry heaved, shook her head again.

The man laughed: a short burst of forced air. "Look, lady, I just want the car."

Miriam stared at him. His eyes moved away from hers. She said, "Okay. Okay, if that's what you want." She pulled at the door handle.

"No," he said. "Not here. I'm coming around to the other side. You try to move, I'll shoot you."

The open front of the gun stayed pointed at her as the man straightened from his leaned posture and walked around the front of the car to the passenger side. He tapped at the window.

Miriam reached over, popped the lock.

The man opened the door, holding the gun aimed at Miriam's head. He got in, adjusted himself in the seat, pulled on the seat belt, and pushed the gun into her side. "Drive," he said.

"Where?"

"That way," he said, pointing with his open hand through the light in the direction Miriam had been going. "A couple blocks."

"Where are you taking me?"

He shook his head. "@!$%#ing drive." And he dug the gun in harder.

They drove quietly. The man turned on the radio once, turned it off almost immediately: dios again and again, mixed with other rapid fire Spanish Mariam didn't understand.

After ten minutes: "That way," he said, pointing to the left.

They were heading out of the city now, along a highway lined with trees. The snow was still falling: Miriam drove slow. "Where are we going?" she asked again.

"Out of town," he said.

"Are you going to kill me?"

The man shrugged. "Depends."

Miriam's voice was small: "On what?"

He gave that grin again, the one that showed just a hint of teeth. "You're thinking I'm gonna say on whether you put out? You think this is about rape?"

Miriam nodded.

The man poked at her leg with the gun. "Yeah, it might just be," he said. "Wasn't planning it but you keep bringing it up."
Miriam shook her head: quick and fierce.

"Haven't decided yet," he said.

They drove.

There weren't many cars on the road: the snow made driving avoidable. Miriam was sweating. The heater was dead. The man stared straight ahead. Occasionally, he'd hum something, a couple of notes.

Miriam shuddered.

Twenty minutes more: "Pull over here."

Miriam slowed, looked around. The snow was dense but there were trees, more of them now, and in front of them, fifty yards, a marker for a service road.

She turned the car in. The man held the gun on her.

"Here," he said.

Miriam stopped the car. The road was dirt, the trees tight on the sides. Snow was piled up a foot deep on the shoulders.

"Get out," the man said.

Miriam undid the seatbelt half-way and stopped, the buckle held in her hand. She didn't look at him, nervously played with the belt.

"No," she said.

The man gouged her. She flinched. Blood stained her blouse on the side.

"Get out," he said again.

"Why are you doing this?"

That smile again. "I don't figure I'm gonna tell you."

"Why?"

He nudged at the blood. "Get out of the car."

She gripped the seat belt like it would somehow keep her inside. The small voice: "You're going to kill me."

A cut-off nod.

Miriam started to cry. The man pulled the gun off her, held it back a foot. He stared. He blinked. He said, "Nothing personal."

She turned on him, eyes red. "Why?!" she screamed.

He pulled back. "He said--"

"Who?!" again screaming.

The man shrugged. "Bill."

Miriam stopped crying. She stared, deadpan.

"Your husband," he said.

Quiet.

Miriam pulled on the belt. The strap ran long. She said, "The divorce."

The man nodded.

Miriam hit him: full on, the buckle digging a hole out of his cheek. He fumbled the gun. She hit him again. He dropped it. She said, "Why?"

He looked up: a punch darkened face. "For the money," he said.

She hit him, the buckle wrap coming undone. "How much?" she was screaming. Again and again: "How much?"

"Five-" He coughed. "Hundred."

The buckle was slick now, the same color as his vanishing cheekbones. Miriam didn't stop. She kept swinging, raising her fist over her head and bringing it down.