Word Count: 300
I hit a leaf one evening on the drive home from work. It was a maple, bright red with blood and I picked it up carefully and brought it safely back to my apartment.
I tried to clean it, best as I could, and taped two toothpicks where the tire had bent over and flattened its main tip. For three days I fed it chicken soup and Saltine crackers and let it get plenty of sleep.
For a day or two I thought it was healing. I rubbed lotion in when it seemed brittle and dry. But the poor little leaf didn’t make it and I cried.
Cars are mechanical monsters that only work well when we drive them with care. The leaf came out of nowhere it seemed, out of the sky, not darting in front of my vision but landing right on the windshield and before I could stop, it blew under the car.
Still, I feel guilty. I should have been looking above me as well as around. We do what we’re used to without thinking, without being alert to the subtle changes that come unexpected when we only focus on that which we know.
I buried the leaf in the small garden in front of the brownstone. I said a quick prayer and even as I stood for the moment it took, its friends came to pay their respects.
They came in with the breezes, flying in through the sun. I listened and joined in their singing. They understood the life cycle of leaves and assured me I wasn’t to blame.
I’ve become a more cautious driver since then, and in all the years that have passed, I’ve seen the eyes of the homeless, the thinness of jackets, the fingerless gloves that I’d never noticed before.
