Traffic Life : Passionate Tales and Exit Strategies
Edited by Stephan Wehner
An Anthology
 
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156 Goulais River reach. My car is on the grass, about thirty yards from the house. The sight of it, still jacked up, the fuzzy fucking dice dangling from the mirror, the chrome bumpers, the racing stripes, fills me with rage: violence fills my mind. Grimacing absurdly, full of a hazy sort of elation and adrenaline, I sprint over to a junk pile of old parts and grab a rusty tire iron, spin back, and begin attacking the car. I'm a madman: smashing it, swinging the metal hard, shuffling around the car, busting every window, driving big dents into the body, caving in the trunk. After two full rotations I tire, my effectiveness wanes, and I chuck the iron aside. I am covered in grime and sweat, I have cut my torso twice and there is a little trickle of blood on my chest. I take a half-dozen steps back, consider (if I am capable of really considering anything) and reassess. Suddenly, the rage wells up again and I charge the car. I plow into it like a linebacker snuffing a screen. I crash into the frame, the car refuses to budge, and I recoil with glass shards riddling my shoulder, momentarily sobered up. The sight of more blood underlines the reality that this machine has declared itself an enemy. Recovering my en- ergy I run over to the garage and grab an armload of greasy newspapers. Tearing and crumpling them up into strips and balls, I fill the driver's side floor up and jerk a lighter out of my pocket. It takes several stabs, but eventually a dull flame catches and soon the front of the car is burn- ing. Actually smoking. The paper is packed too tight, is too damp or something and the plastic on the seat just smol- ders weakly, emitting a huge volume of acrid, black smoke. I lean into the mess, trying to fan the flames, and get only mouthfuls of smoke and fumes, half asphyxiating myself, and forcing me to take a knee. Gasping for air with that watermelon hooch just barely staying down, I retreat, daunted. How the hell do people de- stroy cars without crashing them? All of a sudden a vision of dust flashes through me, and overtaken by another rush of pleasure and adrenaline I sprint to the house and grab a shotgun sitting behind a couch on the back porch. Stag- gering under the weight of anticipation, I reel out, loading a
  
Matt Hern 157 shell with three more in hand. I stop twenty yards away and glare down the barrel. Now the car looks pathetic and small, like a baby bunny. Cow- ering. I have fired guns before. And enjoyed it every time. But this is the first time I have used a shotgun, and I don't prepare for the kick. It really does feel like getting kicked, by a mule maybe. With my shoulder and neck throbbing, focusing my attention acutely, I contemplate the trajectory of my shot. It rips through the broken shards of the back window and imbeds somewhere in the dash with a sullen crash. The quiet after a gunshot is a beautiful thing. The boom echoes all through the trees and across the highway, and in its absence is a certain kind of real clarity. The car does nothing though. It absorbs the shell and stares back, dar- ing me to fire again. Why has no one come out of the house? They can't still be sleeping. I just attacked a car with a tire iron, tried to burn it, and then fired a shotgun, all in their front yard. And no one has come out to ask me what the hell I am doing? I am too excited. I will myself to cool down and think. This works on screen. This has to work. Maybe I need a grenade or an anti-aircraft thing or something. They prob- ably have an elephant gun in the house. But wait. The gas tank. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's it. It hits me like the slow dawning of an ecstasy rush. Thrilled, I take a few more steps back and move around to the side and find the place where you put gas in. Assuming the actual gas tank must be around there, maybe a little lower, I cock the gun again, and fire, this time readying for the kick. It's perfect. Just like a cheesy action movie. The slug disappears, almost in slow motion, and then in a welling ball there is a series of small, then large, then awesome explosions, and within forty seconds the car is totally en- gulfed in flame. There are deep yellow and orange flames, licking ten feet up, and a mountain of black smoke pouring upwards. I am stunned with my own genius and the beauty

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