Description: An old man who is preparing to take his life is unwittingly pulled into a dangerous situation and forced to take action.
Rating: PG for some mild adult language and violence

***

The orange glow of Tucker’s cigarette butt traced a lazy, tumbling path through the night sky as it fell nonchalant toward the rushing river below that waited to extinguish it. Tucker’s feet, covered with the tattered remains of what might have once been someone else’s favorite sneakers, scuffled on the deck of the bridge. He could see the dark brown skin of his left big toe through a hole in his shoe and sock. He shook his head. The tattered shoes served as one last reminder that he had played the game and lost miserably. Tucker was getting old, crippled and tired. He was ready to retire for good.

Tiny snowflakes fell silent around him, covering the dirt and shame of the inner city. The rubbish that usually would have rustled in the small breeze was silent under its frozen blanket. Traffic was minimal at this hour, especially here on the bridge, which made this the optimal place for Tucker to take his time, check his resolve, then plunge into the river below.

A sharp breeze whistled through the supporting beams of the bridge, almost as a signal that it was time. Tucker reached up and scratched at his graying beard, then placed one foot on the lower guard rail in front of him and began to climb. Almost immediately he was interrupted by headlights coming around the bend. Tucker took a deep, frosty breath, relaxed his grip, and waited.

A Jeep Cherokee sped around the corner, its engine racing. The driver was speeding and reckless, careening from one side of the icy road to the other, sliding and overcorrecting. Once the vehicle’s path was almost straightened, it was barreling toward the bridge. Again his back tires began to slide, and the driver cranked the wheel hard to the left, sending the vehicle toward the guardrail opposite Tucker, sliding sideways.

Another set of lights appeared on the road behind the Jeep. The car that belonged to them was driving fast, but not as recklessly as the Jeep. Although it slid at times, the driver never seemed to lose control.

Tucker looked back at the Jeep, and was shocked to see that it was now rocketing in his direction, completely out of control. Tucker, with one foot still on the guard rail, hugged the support beam tightly in anticipation of being struck. The Jeep swerved again, the tires gaining some kind of grip on the icy road, and its path was corrected enough to avoid Tucker. As it passed, his eyes met those of the passenger, a pretty young woman who was frantic. In a split second Tucker caught a glimpse of her face, tear stained and twisted in a horrified and helpless scream. The lights from the bridge illuminated her pale face until it was a ghostly white.

The Jeep slammed into the guardrail four feet from where Tucker stood, shaking his grip from the support beam and knocking him to the ground. The Jeep spun around and slammed into the rail again from the other side, then continued to turn until the front bumper again made contact with the rail and the back tire came to rest on the curb.

The echoes of the crash, like a sledgehammer striking sheet metal accentuated by the tinkling sound of shattering glass, rang in Tucker’s ears. For a moment nothing moved, until Tucker heard another engine revving. The car that followed the Jeep had stopped at the entrance of the bridge and sat with its headlights staring toward the wreckage on the bridge in front of it. Slowly, it started to move forward.

The occupants seemed oddly interested with what had just happened as it approached Tucker, who was still sitting in an awkward position on the curb. As the car passed, Tucker saw three young men, all white, all with shaved heads. The two passengers scowled at Tucker, who could only stare back silently in response. Their attention, however, was soon refocused on the Jeep. They continued forward until they were parallel with the broken, leaking vehicle, but only stopped for a moment.

The passenger in the back seat opened the door and emerged from the car with a gun. He raised the gun to the driver’s window and aimed, but then stopped. Quickly he got back into the car. The driver gunned his engine and the car sped into the darkness on the other side of the bridge.

***

Several moments passed. Tucker sat on the frozen curb in silence, occasionally glancing toward the Jeep, but not moving. Two cars passed by, each slowing down to look at Tucker, then at the Jeep, but never stopping. Maybe they would call the police. Maybe not.

Tucker listened to the snow falling onto the ground. It sounded to him like soft static. White noise, in the truest sense of the word. Then, from the vehicle came another sound that Tucker hadn’t expected, and it chilled him more than the ice and snow ever could. Somewhere inside the battered Jeep, a child began to scream.

Everything inside of Tucker was on full alert, any previous shred of apathy vanishing in an instant. He pulled himself up using the guardrail and bent down to fetch his cane. The child’s screams were long and loud, like a warbling siren, and they grew more pained every second. Hobbling along the slippery curb, it took Tucker less than a minute to reach the driver’s side of the vehicle.
The driver’s door was locked, but the window was shattered. “Hello?” Tucker asked. The driver’s head had fallen limp onto the steering wheel. It was a young black man, and he was unconscious, or worse. He looked across at the woman in the passenger seat. “Ma’am?” he called. “Ma’am, you hear me?” There was no answer.

Tucker brushed the broken glass out of the way, then put his hand through the window and released the latch from the inside. He pulled on the door, which tried to open, but it seemed to be wedged on something. A deep gash in the metal near the front of the door was jammed into the fender.

The child noticed Tucker and cried out to him, more frantic than before. He could see her strapped into her car seat, and wrapped in a large pink coat that seemed to swallow her tiny body. The white fluffy fur around the edge of her hood almost matched her snow white skin. Her eyes, sparkling and wet with tears, stared at Tucker through the shattered window, and she screamed again.

“It’s gonna be ok, li’l girl,” Tucker tried to assure her. “I’m gonna getcha outta there. Jes’ hold on.”

The little girl’s cries continued, and she stretched her arms toward him. The door still wouldn’t budge, so he reached his arm through the window again and this time unlocked the rear passenger door. When he lifted the door’s handle, he was able to open it with minimal effort.

The little girl, who couldn’t have been more than two years old, was squirming frantically in her seat, tears streaming down her cheek. Tucker climbed into the back seat carefully, trying to avoid broken glass.

“Shh, now. See? I told you I was comin’ to get you.” He patted the girl’s hands while fumbling with the straps and buckle that held her tight into her seat. He lifted the harness over her head and pulled her into his lap. She clutched at his coat and bawled into his shoulder, occasionally lifting her head and looking at the front seat. Tucker patted and stroked her back until the crying subsided.

“Ok sweetie, we’d better take a look at your momma.” He moved to set her back into her seat, and she started to cry again. “Now, don’t start cryin’, I’m jes gonna set you down for a minute and look at your momma.” His eyes comforted her, but she still whimpered when he let her go.

Tucker leaned forward to survey the two in the front. The driver appeared to be dead. His head was twisted around in a way that indicated that his neck had been broken. He wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. Tucker couldn’t help but notice that the hat he was wearing had been painted with a local gang symbol.

The woman was in bad shape. Her face was lacerated in several places, and Tucker noticed that she probably had glass in her wounds. Tucker sat still for a moment and watched her chest rise and fall in shallow broken gasps under her seatbelt. He sighed in relief. At least she was alive.

“Ma’am?” he asked. He shook the woman’s shoulder lightly with his hand. “Ma’am, can you hear me?” There was no response.
“Ma’am, I’m gonna have to haul you out the back, here.” There was still no movement or acknowledgment, so Tucker leaned over the seat and unfastened the woman’s seatbelt. Taking the woman’s left arm, Tucker began to pull her gently toward the stick shift, between the seats. Her head rocked, and Tucker, with no free hands, steadied it with his cheek.

“Now you stay right here, ok?” he said to the little girl. “I’ll be right back after I get your momma out, allright?” The little girl nodded, and kept her eyes on Tucker and her mother.

It was a struggle, but Tucker eventually managed to get the woman out of the car. Her body was limp, and Tucker had no choice but to carry her like a bride over a threshold. Once he had adjusted himself to her weight, he called out to the little girl.
“C’mon, now, we gotta go,” he huffed. “Take ahold of my arm and climb down, ok?” The little girl did as she was instructed, and climbed down Tucker to the street below.

“Now, mind you don’t slip on the ice.” The little girl toddled precariously on the street. “Grab hold of my pant leg and hold on tight, ok?”

They walked for several blocks this way, the woman’s arms dangling beside her, the little girl slipping on the ice but holding onto Tucker’s leg and Tucker huffing the freezing night air trying not to collapse. Their feet crunched on the snow packed streets, and they trailed tiny plumes of vapor behind them.

After a while, a red taxi rolled up beside them. The driver rolled down his window.

“Hey man, you need a ride or somethin’?” the driver asked.

Tucker sighed heavily under the weight of the woman. “I’ve gotta get this’n to the hospital.” He turned toward the driver’s window.
The cabbie saw the woman’s face, bloody and bruised. His eyes widened and he quickly stopped the car and opened the door behind him.

Tucker looked at the girl. “Go ahead, honey, get in.” She crawled onto the seat and slid to the opposite side. Tucker leaned against the vehicle to steady himself as he maneuvered the woman onto the back seat, then climbed in behind her. The driver spoke into his radio for a while, then they rode to the hospital in silence. They were met at the emergency entrance by several people who helped them out of the car.

***

The woman had opened her eyes for a moment after arriving at the hospital. A nurse described what was happening as best she could. Her eyes rolled toward Tucker, and the nurse explained who he was. The woman’s eyes filled with tears, and her lips formed the words “Thank you.”

Someone lifted the little girl up onto the bed to sit next to her mother. The little girl grabbed at Tucker’s coat, pulled him close to her, and planted a tiny kiss high on his cheek.

“You’re big and strong,” the little girl said, and for the first time, she smiled.

***

“What about the daddy?” Tucker asked. A police officer had come to the hospital waiting room to report that the mother and little girl would be ok.

“He was no daddy,” the officer began. “From what we can tell, the mother and child were traveling alone.”

“Alone?” Tucker asked.

“We got a call from a 7-11 about an hour ago,” he continued. “They had just filled up with gas. The attendant at the station called in to report a scuffle of some kind after she had paid, out by the pumps. When the vehicle pulled away, the attendant said the woman was in the passenger seat.”

Tucker rubbed his chin. “So they was carjacked?”

“That’s what it looks like. One of the squad cars radioed in that they found a gun on the floorboard on the driver’s side.”

Tucker remembered the look of horror in the eyes of the mother, just before the crash. He could imagine how frightened she must have felt, and how terrified the little girl must have been.

“In a way,” the officer continued, “it looks like the crash is the only thing that saved their lives. Carjackers rarely leave their victims alive, you know.”

“Yeah,” Tucker thought. “Yeah, I guess you prob’ly right.”

“And you too. If you hadn’t gotten them here when you did, there’s no telling what might have happened. The mom was in pretty bad shape, and that kid, well, it was really cold out there.”

Tucker considered that for a moment and just shook his head.

The officer put away his notepad and pen and began to stand. “We’re gonna need you to stick around for some questions and a statement,” he said. “Is that a problem?”

“No,” Tucker replied. “I don’t reckon so.”

The officer began to walk away, and Tucker thought of the bridge, his original plans for the evening, and how far away it all seemed.

He thought of the gratitude and the tears in the woman’s eyes when they wheeled her away. He placed a hand on his scruffy cheek where the little girl had kissed him. He wiggled his toes in his torn shoes and smiled. Without warning, and in the strangest way, Tucker had found meaning and purpose in his desperate life.

“Yessir, Officer,” Tucker said, “I ’spec I’ll be around jes as long as you need. I’m not goin’ nowhere tonight.”