Split Second

SPLIT SECOND

My first time; a complete accident.  I was walking towards the corner of Reddingfield Rd. and Harbor Ave. The light had turned green right before I had gotten there. As I walked toward the intersection, I looked down at my phone and pressed play. The music began, or at least it tried, struggling to make sense. I looked at the phone curiously, when in that instant, everything seemed wrong. I looked up to a freeze-frame of my hometown. As if the world had seemingly slowed to a stop, everything around me seemed frozen. Cars moved forward painfully slow, like lions stalking their prey. I looked around, and despite the unnerving silence, I could see looks of horror slowly forming on the faces of the people around me.

Looking around, I found what had caused the fear in all those around me. A girl, around my age had aimlessly and accidentally walked out into the street. She was too busy texting to realize the light had changed. From what I could tell, the people shouted for her to stop, to turn around, to do something. She didn't hear them and continued forward, oblivious to the world.

So I did the only thing that felt natural to me. I ran. I urged every muscle in my body to move, every electrical impulse screaming go. It was like all the blood in my body had been replaced with adrenaline. You know how you only use thirty percent of your muscles?  I used everything. Like a bird of prey, I exploded into motion. With the world around me at a standstill, getting to the girl was easy. Within what seemed like milliseconds, I was there.

What was difficult was what came afterwards. The moment I touched her everything was set into motion. Like a gun, the sounds came in one giant burst: the music, the cars, the screams. They were all loud, all too real. My body slammed into the girl, sending us flying out of the intersection onto the other side of the road. I twisted my body mid-air to land on my back. Even still, the landing hurt. I looked up in time to see a truck fly right by where we had been. I put my head back and sighed. The girl, however, screamed.

The people around us rushed to help, expecting the worst. I had a few scratches but would be fine, and the girl walked away with nothing worse than a bruised ego.  She thanked me but was too shaken up to say much more. Truthfully so was I, but I wouldn't let anybody know it. Something had happened that couldn't be explained with a simple answer. I looked back at the street one last time. I had sprinted across a four lane street in a fraction of a second.

The newspaper had called it a miracle. Stating that adrenaline allowed me to sprint 20  yards in the blink of an eye. The community ate it up and treated me like a town hero. I liked the attention, but it set something off in my parents. They began to argue more and more often, and one day we just upped and moved. So much for town hero. Back to the unknown zero.

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                The second time was done on purpose. A year after the first incident, my parents and I moved to a little town in New Jersey. Why we decided to go there, I will never know. I transferred rather effortlessly and I can't say I was unhappy. The people were nice, the girls were pretty, and the classes were easy.  Yet for some reason I could never shake the memory of that day. I felt as if it had been burned into my memory.

                The day of the second occurrence was a polar opposite to that of the first. It was one of those days where you don't feel like doing much of anything. Rainy, cold, and cloudy, a combination I hated. The final bell rang and I walked to my locker taking the longer route. Trust me, I was in no rush to catch the buses. Taking my time, I slowly dialed in my combination, hearing each click as the old locker released each pin. By the time I had gotten my things, the buses were already pulling away.

"Walking home again AJ?"

I turned around to see who had been talking to me. My friend Mike was staring into his locker, looking for something that he probably lost two weeks ago. He was a big guy for being six months younger than me. Hell, he probably had a full head on me. He was all muscle too, a kid you'd be afraid to make angry if you didn't know him. He threw his hand through his hair and slammed his locker with a puff of air. Whatever he was looking for was gone. "Yeah," I replied with a laugh, "I figured since the weather was beautiful why not."

Mike ignored the sarcasm and went on, "Yeah, yeah, just don't get killed out there alright. I still have to convince you to join the football team."

"Not gonna happen Mike," I said dropping the sarcasm, "Asthma remember?" Since the first time I broke land-speed records, my parents told me to make sure that it never happened again. So asthma was my excuse out of gym, sports, and just about anything else physical. I hated it, but it was a necessary evil.

"Yeah, asthma. And I'm a pretty little Mexican," Mike said in annoyance. He didn't believe me for a second, but I didn't need that long anyway. I walked away with no response, I'd let him win this one. As I stepped out into the rain I decided that all I wanted to do was be in my room. I honestly didn't need more arguments with the parents.

And just like that, the feeling returned. I had never actually forced it before. But after 365 days of concealing a secret, you'd learn what set it off too. As my breathing and heart rate increased, the things around me once again slowed down. Once disconcerting, the alien feeling was now welcomed. It was peaceful. The raindrops floated in the sky, sending beams of multicolored light of in every direction. It was the very definition of breathtaking. But I couldn't stop and stare at water the entire day. I took a deep breath and ran home. I'd probably get there before Mike walked out the door.