I thought this Thanksgiving would pass in peace like many others untill my roommate had an car accident right on Thanksgiving day. Luckily nobody was badly hurt, well, at least not phsically.
It happened on the way to the STL airport, where she would’ve picked up her mom. Things would’ve been much simplier if I hadn’t invited her over to my boyfriend’s house, which was an-hour drive from the airport. Even with a GPS , she was still not confident enough to navigate herself through the darkness all the way to airport. So, my boyfriend offered to drive guide her. ( We thought we could do some shopping afterward before we realized that almost no place would be open on Thanksgiving night@_@).
It happended at a sharp turn, five-minute drive till we could’ve reached the airport. I didn’t feel it that sharp a turn in my boyfriend’s car, as he knew there would be a difficult turn ahead, so he had slowed down long before the turn and at the same time remained on that single lane as inner as possible. Right after we made the turn, I turned around to see if my roommate has caught up yet. Just at that very moment, I saw a little silver car hit right into the blocking bukets of sand, the bukets bursted with sand splasing ,reflecting the headlights, like fireworks.
My boyfriend pulled over. I kept asking if this was his fault, as by that time it still didn’t occur to me it was my roommate, and I just didn’t want us to get into any trouble other than pulling over and offering some help. It was not untill we rushed to that car and I saw blood streaming down from my roommate’s nose did I realize what had happened and literarily shouted out:” oh, My God!”
The front of her car was completely bumped up, blown air bags streching, and the honking still on, as if it was trying to cry off the pain, making it annoying, even disturbing, for us to talk to each other for comfort and solutions.
Luckily, one of us was experinced and calm enough. My boy friend called the police, cleaned up the road and kept gusturing other passing cars wondeirng what was going on to keep driving, since it has all been taken care of, while the three of us waited in his car. My roommate hit her nose a bit, and another friend riding with her bumped the corner of her eye. Panic and upset took them more than the phisical pain, as on top of the accident in front of her, she had to make numerous phone calls to make sure that her mom, who came to America for the first time, would be taken good care of.
The police came about 15 minutes later, with intimidating police lights flashing, making it almost impossible to see the officers. Plus they weren’t speaking as nicely as we had expected, which was understadable, as it was holiday and the police are not usually called in to attend a joyable party….
Since my boyfriend and I weren’t directly involved with the accident, the police officer, who was a really cute lady by the way , shouted us back to our car. I was debating the whole time whether I could step outside the car and watch while the towing truck doing its job, since I was realy curious about how it would work, but still a little intimidated, fearing even a tiny disobey would get me into the trouble, as I assume I should take police orders literaly.
After like a century, my roommate’s car was towed and the police officer gave her two tickets, one for careless driving, another one for not carrying the proof of insurance in her car. My boy friend thought the police officer giving out the ticket for careless driving was only because the police didn’t want to take the effort to do full investigations over accidents, otherwise it would take much longer and much more resources.
I hate to say this, but I still think I witnessed this car accident, when I don’t know how to drive or own a car. I’ve always thought my dad’s driving at normal speeds in any situation annoying. After this accident, I’m more than willingly to train myself to be a driver like my dad. Yes, he had me miss something otherwise I shouldn’t have if he had driven faster, but he hadn’t hit anything in his entire driving life and he’s still alive as a driver.
