Mathilda, SuperWitch (Mathilda's Book of Shadows #1)(38)
In other words, Hill Road was narrow.
Way narrow.
Super narrow.
To a girl from Colorado where you could drive for an hour on the highway between Pueblo and Taos with two whole, big, wide lanes to yourself going eighty-five miles per hour and feeling like you were going sixty and maybe, just maybe, see one dusty pickup… well, to that girl, Hill Road was an eye opener.
These days, Hill Road, like many roads in England, was forced, against its will, to accommodate two lanes of traffic and parking and scary, aggressive English drivers who were scary, aggressive English drivers precisely because of the existence of roads like Hill.
With nothing for it, Hill Road, like many streets in England, protested against all of this and forced all travelers to play chicken in order to get through.
It was a hair-raising experience.
And it was about to get worse.
* * * * *
Down Hill Road we went (passed Junior’s, by the way), the maniac bumping into us again and again, swerving crazily behind us and clipping our fender one side and then the other while we were swerving crazily trying to avoid slamming into an oncoming or parked car.
Everyone was honking and tires were screeching and I counted three drivers who gave us the two-fingered, backhanded “V” (English for “Fuck Off”) and one of them was a blue-haired old lady who could barely see over the wheel of her Micra.
“Do you know how to use a gun?” Ash asked calmly as if we were on a Sunday drive.
Ack!
Guns?
Ack!
I was watching behind us and, at Ash’s question, my head whipped around so fast my neck cracked (and thus disappeared all benefits of the yoga I did that morning).
“No!” I answered (loudly).
We were making the right turn onto Marine Hill, a forty degree turn you should take at fifteen, twenty miles per hour (tops) and we had to be doing sixty (okay, maybe forty, but still!).
I screamed.
Yes, to my utter mortification, I girlie-Kim-Basinger-in-Batman screamed, high-pitched and shrill.
(What can I say? It was terrifying.)
We’d gone the five hundred feet on Marine Hill to Wellington Terrace and managed somewhere during the scream to lose the car behind us for a second.
Ash slammed on the brakes and then cut the wheel to the left, switched gears then reversed down Marine Parade.
Yes, he went backwards down Marine Parade.
Holy Mother Earth and all her flowered friends.
* * * * *
Let me explain about Marine Parade.
On a good day…
On Marine Parade…
When you are going forward…
And have plenty of time…
And there is no traffic…
And the sun is shining…
And you are in good health with all your faculties about you…
The angle of Marine Parade to Marine Hill and Wellington Terrace is The Angle of Death.
That junction was where perfect insurance records went to die.
Not to mention, Marine Parade was another “chicken road” but it just happened to have the added heart-attack-inducing sheer wall of granite that held up Marine Hill on one side of the road and on the other side you had a thirty foot drop onto an access road to the seafront terraced houses.
I didn’t scream this time. I was too terrified to move a muscle… even a throat muscle.
The car came after us, screeching tires to make the death angle and Ash drove backwards down one of the most crazy bits of road in a town full of crazy bits of road.
The whole time he was winding open the window (if you can believe).
Then out came the gun.
Ack!
Blam!
Blam!
Blam!
I don’t know if he hit anything because I closed my eyes. I felt like Brenda must have felt in Highlander when the Kurgan took her out for a spin.
We were screaming down Marine Parade and Ash cut the wheel at the end and we went careening left into the parking lot of the derelict Royal Pier Hotel.
Screech!
We stopped with a jolt.
Zoom! The car passed us.
Ash pulled the emergency brake and got out of the Micra (gracefully, which is surprising considering he’s over six foot and the Micra is called a Micra for a reason). He ran toward the Parade in that manly, loping SWAT jog as-seen-on-TV with the gun held behind his back.
* * * * *
Yes, this happened.
* * * * *
To me.
* * * * *
When he got back to the car he said, “I’m taking you home.”
I could think of nothing but…
“What about the Peking duck?”
He looked at me under his brows as he put the car in gear.
I started babbling, “I’m supposed to order the Peking duck. I’m supposed to get the table. In the alcove. At the back. Peking duck is important. I’ve been looking forward to Peking duck all day… no, all week. The girls are counting on me.”
We screeched away from the hotel.
“They’ll get over it.”
* * * * *
He took me to The Gables and the minute I got out of the car, the bag with the pots clutched in one hand, my sausages, lavender and carrots clutched in the other, he skidded out of the driveway without a backward glance… off in the Purple People Eater to track the bad guys.
Needless to say, this turn of events meant Junior Poon’s wine bar was out of the question.