C.J. Carmichael - Leaving Enchantment

“It’s a mess. Single-vehicle accident about ten miles past Manny Cordova’s place. Looks like the driver lost control and ran into a rock wall at speed.”

Nolan’s full-time reporter, Cooper Lorenzo, had been on call last weekend. Which meant this “mess,” as Miguel had put it, was all his. Sighing, Nolan closed the cardboard box over the still-hot pizza and went for his camera.

He loved most things about owning and managing the local newspaper, but late-night calls, especially for stories like this, were never fun. Still, people expected newspapers to cover these personal tragedies.

Fortunately they didn’t occur often in a town of five thousand people.

A minute later, sitting high in the seven-year-old Explorer he’d just bought off an old friend of his father’s, Nolan zipped out of his neighborhood, bypassing the commercial heart of Enchantment. Sometime between now and when he’d picked up his pizza it had begun to snow. The white flakes battered his windshield as he left town limits. Switchback Road cut into the sparsely populated Sangre de Cristo Mountains that bordered the northwest side of Enchantment. The narrow, twisting route was picturesque during daylight hours, but it had a checkered history. Every year the townspeople could count on at least one bad accident, most caused by excessive speed.

As a teenager, Nolan had done his share of wild driving. But shortly after he’d begun work full-time at the Bulletin, he’d reformed. He’d seen some grisly sights in the past ten years. He really didn’t want to experience another. He thought of his pizza cooling on his kitchen counter and the game on TV that was only half over.

Shit. What a life.

Nolan took a sharp corner slowly, his tires jostling on the poorly maintained pavement underneath the fresh snow. Ahead he spotted the flashing lights of emergency vehicles in the dark.

The left-hand side of the road was cordoned off. Without the luxury of wide, paved shoulders, police had done their best to leave a narrow corridor open. Two officers stood at either end of the wreck, directing the sporadic traffic.

Nolan pulled over to the far left, just as an ambulance took off from the scene, sirens blaring.

Once the coast was clear, Nolan inched left again, parking behind one of the police cars. He had a view of the accident now. The vehicle—some kind of SUV—had gone off the road and crashed into a rock outcrop.

He’d have to get a photo.

About to uncap his Nikon, Nolan froze. He could see the rear license plate of the mangled vehicle, illuminated by the headlights from one of the police cars. The numbers taunted him. He’d seen that particular pattern before.

And then it hit him.

This was his sister’s vehicle.

His stomach heaved. He dashed from his Explorer and ran for the cover of some scraggly pines. Next thing, he was bringing up that slice of pizza. It was a loud and nasty process and finally drew someone’s attention. One of the officers left the others gathering evidence and headed toward him.

A dusting of snow covered Miguel Eiden’s dark hair and the shoulders of his uniform. He shook his head unhappily. “I was hoping you wouldn’t hear that call, Nolan. I was going to phone you first chance I got.”

Nolan dug into the pockets of his jeans and found nothing. So he pulled out the tail of his shirt and used that to wipe his mouth, his chin, his hands.

“That’s my sister’s SUV.” He took a few steps toward the accident scene, but Miguel stopped him.

“I know, Nolan. I’m sorry. She wasn’t in the car, though. Just Steve. He’s on his way to the hospital now. You must have seen the ambulance.”

“What about Sammy? Are you sure she wasn’t in the back seat?”

“Yes. Both kiddie seats were empty, thank God for small mercies.”

Two car seats? Mary and Steve had just one kid. Nolan closed his eyes, opened them. He couldn’t think straight. Couldn’t believe this wasn’t a crazy dream. Mary and Steve had lived for years in their cozy A-frame about fifteen minutes from here. Steve must have driven this route thousands of times.

“What the hell happened?”

“Don’t know for sure. The road is a little icy from the snow, but the skid marks suggest Steve was driving too fast, as well. He went off the road at the beginning of that S-curve. Probably would have dived right down the mountain, except for that hunk of rock at the side of the road.”

“And you’re sure no one else was in the vehicle?”

“Yeah.” Miguel shook his head, scuffed the dirt with his boots. He looked like he wanted to say something, but in the end only shook his head again.

Nolan swallowed but couldn’t rid his mouth of the sour taste of bile. Was his brother-in-law going to be all right? The brief conversation he’d overheard on his scanner hadn’t sounded promising. “Was he hurt bad?”

When Miguel didn’t answer right away, Nolan compressed his lips and stared at the license plate still visible in the headlights’ beam. He felt his good friend pat his arm.

“You better phone your sister, man.”

Deliver this awful news? No. He wasn’t the right person for that job. He couldn’t… Nolan bowed his head, fighting his gut reaction to refuse. Miguel was right. Even though he and Mary hadn’t spoken for almost three years, it would be better for her to hear about this from him rather than the cops.

He nodded, then wiped his mouth again. “Maybe I should drive over rather than phone.” But what about Steve? “Or should I go straight to the hospital?” God, his brain wasn’t functioning.

“Go to the hospital,” his friend decided for him. “I’ll take you in the Explorer and you can call Mary on your cell phone. Hang on a second.”

Miguel jogged back to the accident scene to confer with his fellow officers. Meanwhile, Nolan opened the driver-side door. His mind went blank for a moment. He remembered the last time he’d seen Mary, at their mother’s funeral. She’d come close to hating him then, he knew. He didn’t want to talk to her now. Not with news like this.

But he had no choice. And he had to hurry. Pulling himself back to the present, he fished the keys from his jeans.

Miguel came up from behind and scooped them from his hands. “I’m driving, buddy.”

Nolan nodded in the direction of the wreck. “You’ve got work to do.”

“Officially I’m off duty as of fifteen minutes ago. Hank’s going to bring the squad car back to town when they’re finished here.”

“I’m fine,” Nolan protested, but Miguel slid behind the wheel.

“You don’t need to do this,” Nolan tried to argue again.

Miguel ignored him. He started the engine and waited. Nolan slapped a hand against the closed driver door and gave in. The second he’d slammed his door shut, Miguel had the vehicle in gear. Another cop waved them safely onto the road, and Miguel eased the speed up to the posted limit.

“Do you have your phone?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Nolan pulled it out of his jacket.

“Okay. You call Mary. Tell her after I drop you off at the hospital I’m picking up my own car and coming back to get her.”

AT THE ARROYO COUNTY HOSPITAL, a nurse ushered Nolan into a special little room and told him the doctor would talk to him shortly. Nolan glanced at a stack of magazines on a table in the corner. The glossy paper gleamed. They’d never been touched. He put a hand to his head and it came away damp. The snow, he remembered.

How was Steve doing? Nolan hung on to hope, despite Miguel’s grim expectations.

There’d been no answer when he’d tried calling Mary. She’d always been a deep sleeper, but he’d let the phone ring until the answering machine picked up, and then he’d called again. Still she hadn’t answered. Miguel was on his way to her house now. So Nolan wouldn’t be the one to tell her about the accident after all.