Short Story – Flat Tyre

I stared blankly at the road ahead as I drove. The lanes were narrow, but I knew them, knew every turn, every bend that was a little sharper than anticipated. It was a good job, because I wasn’t paying attention to the road at all.

That is, I wasn’t paying attention to the road until some idiot came speeding around the corner in the middle of the road, forcing both of us to slam our breaks on and me to swerve out of the way, into the verge. I felt the car hit something in the hedge, but I was more preoccupied in sending the dirtiest look I could his way as he squeezed his posh car past the beat up old car I had been driving since I turned seventeen.

I knew something was wrong, though, when I pulled away and the steering wheel was difficult to turn. The car crawled around the bend, because I wasn’t sure I could turn it at any greater speed. I struggled on until the road widened, and pulled the car into the entrance to a field, turning the car off and getting out, looking around it for damage. It was when I saw the flat tyre, where my front wheel had hit the verge, that I sighed. I had a spare in my boot, but I didn’t know how to change it. 

I grabbed my phone from my car, and scrolled through my contacts, trying to figure out who to call. My finger hovered over my Dad’s number, and tears welled up in my eyes. It was always him I called for things like this. He was the person who came to my rescue when I didn’t know how to fix something, or who to call. 

I hadn’t properly grieved him, I knew that. I had sat, dry-eyed, at his funeral, listening to countless people say that they were sorry. Sorry. They weren’t the drunk driver who had smashed into him. They weren’t who needed to apologise. Besides, I had managed to convince myself that he wasn’t really gone. He had just gone away for a little bit. This kind of thing didn't happen, not in my family where nothing ever happened. It was a bad dream that I needed to wake up from.

Standing next to my car, with a flat tyre, I cried. Not for the tyre, but for my Dad, who couldn’t come to my rescue anymore. I couldn’t call him up when I needed him, or pop round to have a cup of coffee and listen to him rave about his latest motor obsession. He would never wrap me up in his arms again when I was upset, never reassure me that everything was going to be alright.

I cried until a car drove past, reminding me of where I was, and that even though I was off the road, I wasn’t completely out the way of danger, and I was still stranded in the middle of a long lane with only a beginning and an end, and barely nothing in-between.

I sniffed, scrolling through my contacts again, and clicking on one, holding the phone up to my ear. 

“James? I’ve got a flat tyre, and I’m in the middle of nowhere, and I don’t know what to do.” It was all I could do not to start crying again as my Dad’s best friend reassured me through the phone. I could hear him leaving the house, and getting into the car through the phone as I explained where I was.

He pulled into the field entrance as much as he could, switching his hazard lights on and getting out. I ran to him, and he engulfed me in the kind of hug only a father could do. But it wasn’t my father. 

James didn’t seem to care that I was getting his shirt wet with tears. He hugged me, on the side of the road, as I finally realised that my Dad was gone. He wasn’t coming back. It was the kind of hug that I had been missing from my Dad, but it was what truly made me come to terms with the fact that he wasn’t here to hug me anymore.

When I finally pulled away, and reached my hands up to wipe the tears from my face, it didn’t escape my notice that James had tears in his eyes as well. James sniffed, and gave me a sad smile.

“Shall we get your tyre sorted, and get you back on the road?”

I nodded, and opened my boot, throwing things from the boot onto the back seat, so we could get to the spare wheel.

“You know,” James sniffed again, “I can’t believe you don’t know how to do this. Your Dad rebuild four different cars from scrap, and he never taught you how to change a wheel?”

“He did,” I smiled at the memory. Me being a grumpy teenager who just wanted to lounge about in the sunshine, forced to take a wheel off and put it back on because my Dad wanted me to learn. “I was never enthused about the idea of getting dirty, so I never really paid attention.”

“Well, you can get dirty this time. I’m not doing all the hard work. I pulled a muscle in my shoulder the other day. You’re changing this wheel.”

Somehow, James making me do the hard work made me feel better. My Dad was always doing something on some car or another, tightening this, or fiddling with that. Now, I was the one doing those things. Granted, I was just changing a wheel, not rebuilding an engine, and I did have to get James to help me loosen the bolts in the first place, but I was fixing a car. Kind of. 

James hugged me again when the wheel had been changed over, a side-hug that said ‘well done’. My Dad might not be here to help anymore, but I wasn’t alone in missing him. It was clear James missed him just as much. 

“You need to get that tyre replaced, you can’t drive on the spare forever.” James told me as I struggled to lift the wheel I had taken off into the boot.

“Where do I do that?”

“We’ll do it now, yeah? I’ll go ahead, you follow behind me so you know the way.” 

I smiled, more to myself. My Dad was always doing that if we needed to take two cars somewhere, and I didn’t know the way. Driving ahead, so I could follow him. 

“Okay. Thank you.” I hugged him again, but this time, I wasn’t sure if it was him comforting me, or me comforting him.

And done!

I know, I know. Another sad one.

I don't actually have anything to say down here today.

Anyway, that's all for now...

Bye!