by Russell Judd
The ride home seems to take forever. Every bump on the road rattles through my body reminding me of the wound in my torso and the arse hole that inflicted it. Even the simple act of breathing sends pain shooting up to my brain.
I thank the taxi driver, and once inside I go about locking all the doors in the house. Peculiar as it sounds I know I can relax a bit easier knowing that no one can get in.
As soon as I sit down on the couch, a feeling of relief overcomes my senses and every muscle in my body loosens. My eyes feel heavy as I slump back into my chair, and begin to fall asleep.
Without warning a thunderous sound shatters through the room. The exhaust of a heavily modified vehicle erupts into our quiet street. The driver takes the engine all the way through to red line in first gear, a quick change, and he’s into second, third and then fourth.
Our street isn’t by no means short, it’s about 1.2km long and very wide, and so I can see why the little hoon wants to open up his car. By the time they decide to button off and slow down for the incoming intersection, they would easily be doing about 120km/hr. It angers me that someone would be so careless, and not think about the impending chaos that would be caused if a child, or a car reversing out of a drive way, was to suddenly appear before them. I hear the driver lift his foot off the accelerator, this is followed by the unique sound of the car heavily back firing. Unique, because you don’t really see cars that are modified to that extent driving round the streets here. As he does this, the engine begins to dump fuel into the exhaust which keeps the turbo spooling at the revs before the driver took his foot off the accelerator. This enables the driver to put his foot back down and the turbo is still going to be boosting, meaning the power is right there.
It’s a fucken quick car. In the past I’ve tried to get outside in time to get a licence plate or the make of the vehicle, but so far all I’ve managed to see are some tail lights in the distance. The old Holden wouldn’t be a match for that in a pursuit. In my current condition I struggle getting up off the couch to take a piss let alone run down the street chasing a hyped up Japanese rocket.
As I’m staring out the window my phone snaps into life. A text message from Maree, this will be interesting.
“Hey I dropped by the hospital to see you but you weren’t in a state for visitors, hope you’re doing well”
Maree…she’s been a good friend of mine for a long time now. She’s been with one of the guys at work for nearly as long, Detective Sergeant Dave Beaumont, he’s an alright bloke.
I think I’ll text her back later.
Days go by and I’m starting to feel a little better. You would think that cabin fever would start to set in, but I’m quite content sitting here in my little house protected from the outside world. However every breath reminds me of what happened and a sneeze feels like the knife is being driven back into my side again. Even the simple task of sitting up in bed is a painful ordeal.
In response to these annoying boy racers my somewhat vindictive mind has come up with a simple solution to putting a stop to them before they injure or kill an innocent bystander.
A set of road spikes would be quite handy at home but far too obvious when the investigating officers find the spikes in the tyres. A quick audit would reveal that they are missing a set and I don’t need the suspicion cast on me. Mind you that’s if the attending officer at the scene looks for it but I think it’s best to mitigate the risk.
Suddenly the thought of my father saying he’d always wanted to have a piece of 4x2 with six inch nails through one end so when the little bastards come flying down the street, out it slides. The potential for that to go tremendously wrong is great. I could only imagine the carnage that would be caused if it snapped and got launched through the air.
The concept sounds good, but how can I improve on that?
Chapter Nine