THE CAR CRASH THAT NEVER HAPPENED

The car didn't crash.

Not the way everyone assumed, anyway.

I was meant to be in that car. My brother called around 4pm — "Come with us, we're going to town." I was already dressed. Slippers sitting by the door. Then at the last minute my mother said, "Stay back, help me pound yam."

I was annoyed. I hissed, even. I wanted to go so badly. The car pulled off without me. Three of my cousins, my brother, and his friend, all squeezed into that small red Toyota.

Thirty minutes later, the call came.

The car had somersaulted near the bridge. Front tyre burst. It hit the side of the road and flipped.

Silence everywhere.

My mother dropped the pestle. I couldn't breathe. We ran outside — people were already shouting, bikes racing towards the bridge.

When we got there, the car was upside down. Glass everywhere. But voices. I could hear voices.

They were all alive.

Bruised, bleeding, crying — but alive. My brother had a cut on his forehead. My cousin was holding her leg. But they were breathing. They were alive.

A man standing there said, "If this car had one more person inside, somebody for no come out alive. The weight for don too much."

I just stood there. My slippers. My mother's yam. That small "stay back."

Sometimes I still think about it. What if I had entered that car? What if my mother hadn't called me back? What if I hadn't hissed and stayed?

It was a car crash, yes. But for me, it was the car crash that saved me. It taught me that sometimes disappointment is protection. Sometimes when life says "stay back," it isn't punishment. It's preservation.

That red Toyota never moved again. But that day still moves inside me every time I hear a car horn too loud.

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