Duel

By Bob

Sometimes the journey home gets more interesting once a rider leaves the bus.

On a hot Friday night, the last No. 12 from downtown was mostly full. A pretty lively crowd of the mostly sober, the less sober and the mostly drunk headed toward the burbs. It was talkative bunch. The booze and the beer and whatever else had put even the headphone-wearers into a gabby mood. Good times.

One rider departed at 53rd Avenue, a desolate stop on Barbur notable only for the strip club there, the Big Bang. After the bus moved on, the traveler crossed Barbur and headed up the hill on 53rd. Walking steadily, he dodged a couple of cars along the sharp curve at Pomona and continued up 53rd toward Capitol, several blocks away. The unlit street is paved here, and at nearly 1 a.m., only a few houses had lights on.

The traveler heard a vehicle coming up behind him, a rarity that time of night on 53rd. He was walking on the left side of the street, and as the SUV passed him, it slowed somewhat, and he could hear voices and music and smell cigarette smoke from the open windows. The SUV proceeded to the intersection with Capitol, crossed under the sole streetlight and continued up 53rd, which at that point turns to gravel.

The traveler was following some distance behind. He saw the SUV's brake lights come on and watched it stop at the next block, Buddington. The traveler's usual route kept him on 53rd until Buddington, where he would take a left, but something about the halted SUV set off inner alarms. So he took a left on Capitol and headed up the hill to 51st, where he would take a right and head toward Coronado.

The stretch of 51st between Capitol and Coronado, several blocks long, is also unpaved and dark -- no streetlights. It was quiet and the traveler could hear the scratchy sound of rocks beneath his feet with every step. He walked in the middle of the narrow road. As he neared the intersection of 51st and Buddington, he looked down the hill to his right, expecting to see the SUV at the bottom, where he had last seen it a few minutes before. But suddenly he was blinded by headlights. The SUV had climbed Buddington, apparently with its lights off, and was almost at the intersection with 51st.

Startled, the traveler increased his pace and moved to the left edge of 51st. The SUV accelerated toward him, spraying gravel as it gained speed. The traveler started to jog and made his way to the nearest lawn as the rocks splattered behind him. He climbed a small incline until he was about six feet into the home's lawn. The SUV kept coming and swerved to avoid a boulder that marked the edge of the property.

The traveler, fully alarmed, started to run toward Coronado and the nearest streetlight. He stayed off the road and ran through the lawns of several houses. The SUV followed, directly to his right. Its spinning tires sprayed gravel toward him. The traveler's heart was pounding and he was almost out of breath. As he sprinted, he looked over at the SUV, whose headlights were bobbing as it bounced over potholes in the rutted road.

The SUV's engine was roaring and the gravel was flying. Then, it abruptly came to a halt. The traveler kept running, cut behind a small fir tree and, staying on the lawns, headed up Coronado. He could hear the SUV's engine being gunned. Glancing behind him, he saw that it was stuck, maybe high-centered on something at the road's edge.

The exhausted traveler slowed to a walk and climbed the hill on Coronado. He still had a long stretch to go on the trip home, but the pursuit had ended. He was looking forward to a beer.