I

 A Stranger Comes Calling

One

            Something is very wrong, eleven-year-old Jack Bucher thought as he absently climbed into the freezing backseat of the waiting car. This car feels like a cold tomb. Something terrible is about to happen.

            “I’m sorry I’m late, boys,” Mrs. Waters said from behind the wheel after the two bundled and snow-covered boys piled into the new1970 Ford LTD station wagon. “This blizzard is causing all kinds of accidents, and we were swamped down in the emergency room all evening. Did you win your basketball game?”

            “Naw,” Brian Waters muttered, while pulling off his wet toboggan hat to reveal his shoulder-length sandy hair. “I missed the game winning basket, but I swear that butthead fouled me.”

            “Don’t swear, Brian,” Mrs. Waters scolded above the blast of the defroster fan. “How did you do, Jack?”

Jack didn’t respond. This is wrong, all wrong. I know I’ve lived this same night before, this same terrible snow storm. But I can’t remember what happens.

Mrs. Waters turned to peer into the dark backseat. “Jack? Are you all right?”

“Huh?” Jack glanced up with frightened blue eyes. Melting snow from his curly blond hair trickled down his flush face. It went unnoticed.

“Are you okay?” Mrs. Waters repeated with concern. “You seem preoccupied.”

“Don’t worry about him, Mom,” Brian said. “He was acting squirrelly all day at school, too.”

“It’s just a game, Jack. You’ll get’em next time,” Mrs. Waters said. “Cheer up. The radio said we’re supposed to get another six-to-ten inches tonight. They’ve already declared a snow day for all southeastern Michigan schools tomorrow.”

“Yeah!” Brian shouted enthusiastically while stomping his feet.

Jack didn’t hear her.

Mrs. Waters put the snow-covered station wagon into gear and carefully got underway. The wiper blades were doing double-time, but they did little to keep the icy windshield clear of the heavily falling snow. Even the engine-warmed car hood remained blanketed with over an inch of wind-swept snow and ice. She slowly turned the car around in the dark and empty Salem Middle School parking lot. Powerful winds slammed into the car as if with evil intent, making it shudder.

Jack slid across the freezing vinyl backseat and scraped the icy frost from the rear passenger window with his boxer-glove ski mitten. The swirling dense storm had swallowed the world beyond as if they were snow blind in their own starless universe. The night sky was pitch-black. The parking lot lights battled valiantly to provide small globes of illumination. They failed miserably against the nearly horizontal snowfall.

Jack sought desperately to understand his overpowering feelings of déjà vu. This has all happened before, he thought. Why can’t I remember what happens? Come on, think!

“Oh, I have to stop at the store to pick up some milk and bread for dinner,” Mrs. Waters said. She turned right onto the slick and snow-covered Sheldon Road. The light rear end of the station wagon fishtailed as she slowly accelerated into the late rush-hour traffic.

A terrible fear pounded in Jack’s heart. Its power was almost like some internal force screaming for him to get out of the car.

“No!” Jack nearly shouted. “We can’t go to the store. I mean, ah, I have to get home.”

“I’ll just be a minute, Jack,” Mrs. Waters laughed. “You boys can wait in the car. I’ll leave it running with the heater on.”

“But my mom told me not to be late tonight,” Jack said with determined urgency. “We’re having a special dinner . . . or something.”

“Relax, Jack,” Mrs. Waters said, starting to sound a little peeved. “I called your mother before leaving the hospital, and told her we’d be a little late.”

Jack gazed fearfully out the fogging windows with increasing frustration. He could barely make out the faint shadows of the Methodist Church coming up on their right. Their subdivision was the next right after the church.

We have to go straight home. Something terrible is going to happen if we go to the store, Jack thought, and then blurted out, “I have to pee!”

“What’s the matter with you, Jack?” Mrs. Waters asked with irritation. “Kroger’s is only another couple blocks. You can use their bathroom if you have to go that bad. I’m not going out again tonight.”

Jack sagged with defeat as they slowly passed the obscure house lights of their subdivision. He anxiously peered through the icy windshield in fear of some horrifying evil that awaited them just ahead. The dense snowfall swirling through their weak headlights was hypnotizing. Visibility was nonexistent. If not for the constant flashing of the red taillights ahead of them, Jack didn’t see how Mrs. Waters followed the snow-covered road.

A dim glow brightened the car interior. Jack absently glanced to the right knowing whatever happened would happen soon. He could just make out Family Drugs beneath its struggling parking lot lights. The car began to slip and slide as they came to the main intersection at Sheldon and Ann Arbor Road. It wasn’t until the car slid to a complete stop that he spotted the red eye of the intersection stop light through the heavy snowfall. It seemed to glare back at Jack with wicked intentions. Snow-blanketed cars slowly began to pass in front of them through the intersection like ghosts floating across a static-filled black-and-white TV screen.

Blinding lights from an approaching car flooded the rear of the station wagon. A car horn suddenly blared angrily directly behind them. Jack whirled around. Two-and-a-half tons of steel were sliding uncontrollably toward their rear end at a high rate of speed.

 “Oh, my God!” Mrs. Waters screamed.

Knowing a collision was inevitable, Jack threw himself to the protective floor between the front and back seats. He felt a tremendous jolt. His ears were assaulted by the crunch of crumpling metal and shattering glass as he was hurled backward into his seat. Fear-spiked adrenaline coursed through his body as he felt their car moving forward again. He sat up and peered through the frosty windshield with wide, terrified eyes. Brian was whimpering in panic and pain from somewhere on the floor in front. Their car was being pushed out into the deadly intersection.

Mrs. Waters let out another earsplitting scream. Jack whirled in her direction. He was briefly blinded by another set of brilliant headlights. But the lights were high enough for him to see they were set above the scarred snow blade of a county salt truck. The deadly sharp wedge was just yards away as the huge dump truck bore down on the driver’s side of their car. His ears were blasted by a powerful truck horn before Jack screamed and dove to the protective floor again. 

The force and sound of the collision, of Death’s coming, was horrifying. Metal screeched against metal. Blinding light filled his horrified sight. The car began to roll over. He was hurled about like a weightless toy, but felt no pain. Above it all were the panicked screams of Brian and his mother. He suddenly felt a savage blow to his head. There was a cold blast of air. Wet snowflakes fell on his upturned face.

You should have listened to me, Jack, said a deep male voice in Jack’s head. It wasn’t his.

He knew no more.