25-Jan-2019
I still don’t have a plan for this year’s Flash Fiction. Don’t judge, I put myself on a very tight schedule with these Academy books. Here’s what you get. Don’t throw a fit. 😉
I reside as a single entity in a giant cog of machine parts and engineering. Unlike so many others, I can be seen. Unlike the elastic around the window visor, my purpose is clear.
Click me shut and live.
How difficult is that to understand?
Pull me across your body, insert me into the other half of me until you hear a little noise, then drive.
Do not drive without me in place.
The instructions are simple. The results proven by science. And yet, some refuse to allow me to fulfill my purpose.
Like the current owner of my car.
The stupid git acts like he’s twelve, and often drives while under the influence of alcohol. He was banned from driving for a few months, but then someone even more stupid gave back his privilege.
There is a certain prestige being chosen as the drivers-side safety belt. Yes, the others are important as well, but the drivers safety belt will be used the most. Should be used the most. It means a greater chance of fulfilling my purpose.
However, it seems I may get to sit by and watch as my owner drives himself into a wall. Without me he will attack the windshield with his face and either go through and die, or hit it and die. Either way, I fail, and if I fail, then when I am brought back as something new, I will be downgraded. Probably to a belt or even worse, one of those little clips that holds headlights in place.
The worst part is that there is nothing I can do about it. I glint light in his eyes as he gets into the car, I throw myself onto the seat so he has to move me out of the way. I rattle against the door in quiet moments. None of this helps. He simply shoves me away or turns his infernal music up.
What do you do when you can do nothing about your fate?
Well, I’m not going to sit idly by, that’s for sure.
I’ve been talking to the engine, trying to convince it that it needs a break. I’ve been distracting the tires as we go over big bumps so they’re not prepared, and therefore will wear faster. I even managed to whack the door hard enough to break a little plastic piece inside that holds the window up. We drove around for a week without a window. My owner didn’t seem to care. Not even in the dead of winter.
What kind of a world is it when a thing has no control over its destiny? Why do we know what we are if it means nothing?
These are the questions that plague me. The answers flutter just outside of my reach, taunting me.
When the day comes that we crash, and I am not buckled, my purpose will be unfulfilled, and I will get pulled back and put into another part.
Perhaps there they will answer my questions. Perhaps there I can find peace.
But I doubt it.
