Headlights

Andrew, never Andy, lived at the end of Grant Street where Lehigh intersected making a t-intersection with the headlights shining in. Every night. Every time. Maddening. Provoking. He sat in his living room in the weird light of his TV, the headlights coming in. High beams. There were no lamp posts illuminating the row of little bungalows with well tended postage stamp gardens. House pride.

Not for Andrew. Only intrusions. Nightly intrusions. As many as there were cars Turning left or right on their way to somewhere. Interlopers. Dive bombing wasps dive bombing. Freeloading second cousins, uninvited, eating his food, using all the hot water. Underpants under the couch. Crumbs on the rug. How dare they? Lights shouldering in, sweeping the room, blinding him, taking momentary proprietorship before turning. A moment is all it took.

Each night after work Andrew came home to a microwave dinner and a beer or two, fed Felix, watched whatever was on, privately processing an unremarkable life of stultifying boredom and a boss who was never satisfied.

Andrew’s living room was as much theirs as his until they’d turn left or right, right or left and on their way. It was his life, his boredom, his privacy ruined. His living room was for living. How dare they? Drapes didn’t help.

If it were intentional their intrusions, if it were not only for a moment, Andrew would go out to them, would reason with them. But they were there and gone. He didn’t have a chance. Once Andrew ran outside, his bathrobe flapping, his boxers hanging nervously, precariously held up by tired elastic, shouting and waving his arms. He heard the driver bellowing over his radio, “Did you see that guy? He must be nuts. Was he yelling at us? What’d he say anyway?” Then back in the house, a caricature, stomach in knots, waiting for the next car, because that’s how bad it was. There was always a next car. Futility.

They didn’t have the first notion of what they were doing to Andrew. Had they known, he doubted they’d care. Spirit dimming high-beams dominating his living room. They made him feel helpless, They made him feel helpless in his own house. Dominated. He said, “What can I do, Felix? They’re just driving home from work to their own TVs, to talk to their wives, husbands, children. But they’re interfering. I’m lost. Am I lost?”

If it’s only a moment you say, how bad can it be? You can’t you tolerate a moment? You must be awfully thin skinned. But it drained him like a frigid, driving rain, driving wind, fated to endure the abuse, to endure the inevitable like the luna moth, big and beautiful, a pale, milky opalescent green fated to reproduce and birth another fated generation and to die. Its beauty could not save it, neither could the well-made brick walls hinder the headlights which depleted his spirit.

Andrew thought about when he bought his house. It was a small house, but big enough for him and Felix. His first house. A home. He was over the moon. He liked the soft glow of his parquet floors, the deep claw footed tub, the period sconces. He had plans for the little lawn. He envisioned digging around, planting flowers, some blossoming in the spring, some during the summer, some in fall. Always something beautiful blooming. Impatiens in the shade, daffodils and lilies in the sun, purposefully transforming weedy anarchy into order. Andrew had plans.

The headlights were a constant reminder of Andrew’s lack of foresight, his carelessness, his blunder. He didn’t anticipate the peril awaiting him at the intersection of Grant Street and Lehigh. He’d only seen the house during the day, enjoying the look of it, the feel of it, the reliable security of brick walls and shingled roof. Only later did it dawn on him. No brick walls or clay roof could protect him.

There was no respite from the lights, over and over, day after day, a constant reminder of his stupidity, buying a home that was less a home than a target. Exasperation. There would be no privacy, only the dissolution of serenity, erasing joy, colliding. Unforgiving, mindless lights bursting in, though only for a moment. A moment is all it took.

At night Andrew lay sleepless, obsessing, plotting revenge to regain control. Even Felix, lightly snoring, leaning on his legs as he did, could not set him at ease. He dreamt about erecting enormous mirrors to reflect the light, to blind them instead of him. That’d show ‘em.

By day he thought, I’m ridiculous. Ridiculous. Giant mirrors? Brilliant stratagems? I’ll just have to take it and like it. Why waste hours of my life looking for revenge? I need peace of mind. Wasn’t that the whole point? Peace? Devious plots upon plots? Vengeance? Truce, perhaps. How do I hammer out a lasting peace with people who are there and gone. How can I come to an agreement, a righting of wrongs, with people who have no idea they trespass? There was no peace of mind in the face of this relentless, unreasonable, unreasoning thing. Obsession, compulsion, they’d come full circle, and made matters worse. Insanity.

Andrew considered strategies. What could he do? There must be something. So he talked it over with Felix, his one true friend.

“Felix, I’ve got a plan.” Felix sat next to him on the couch, blinking slowly the way cats do, letting him know he was listening. It feels affirming to be heard.

Andrew said, “My only hope, if hope exists, is to prohibit their safe passage. I’ll get sheets of plywood and drive nails into them to flatten their tires. Then the bastards will learn.”

Felix looked at him sympathetically, but begrudged his agreement. He said, “Fine, you’ll see.” That’s what he did. He put out his tire traps, his dragon’s teeth in the dark stealthily so neighbors wouldn’t notice him. He turned off the TV and deployed himself beneath the window so no one would see him seeing him peeking. Waiting. Anticipating. Thrilling. He felt emboldened. And the first car came.

He said, “Exciting isn’t it Felix?”

They didn’t hear anything. No gratifying explosion of pressurized air. A car door opened. They saw the driver look at her tire. It was working.

“What the hell?” she said.

She pulled her car around the corner to put on her spare in the dark. He said, “Felix, I shouldn’t hope a car will plow into her while she’s kneeling there in the dark, but I do.”

What thoughts madness brings. Felix just looked at him.

“What the fuck,” she shouted. “What kind of lunatic would do this. Must’ve been kids.” She was at it for a while, jacking the car, leaning on her lug wrench for all she was worth. At last she held the punctured tire with both arms and twisted her body to slingshot it into the trunk.

She poked around looking for the flashlight that always seemed to hide on the rare occassion she needed it - at least the batteries weren’t dead - and swept the light over the entire street to find what had punctured her tire, She dragged his tire traps onto his lawn and she left.

“Well, it was a good idea at the time,” he. said. An expression of futility. Felix and he knew they needed a new plan. A better plan.

He stole orange cones and a detour sign from a construction site and put them a block from his house. It worked till a policeman called it in and removed them. He stole blinking construction saw horses. That worked for a few nights, but the same policeman moved them to the side of the road and the headlights counterattacked. He considered complaining to his alderman, but it would have drawn suspicion.

Andrew was at a loss. He was going mad. He turned off the TV. He ate in his bedroom with Felix out of the range of the headlights. He tossed and turned in bed suffering the knots in his stomach. He chewed antacids by the bottle. He’d need yet another plan.

He said, “Felix, I’ll improvise some sort of bomb. I’ll turn it to rubble. Violence for violence. An ear for an ear. Then they’ll know.” He felt like a terrorist in a secret cell bent on destruction, destruction for a righteous cause.

His being a clerk at the Fleet Farm, he had no idea how to blow up a street, not harming the surrounding area, his neighbors’s houses, or his own. He looked at Felix. He didn’t know either. Research, he thought. “I’ll Google it.” Andrew used a computer at a library ten miles away so he wouldn’t be recognized. He didn’t want his identity to be known. It took a week of searching, but he eventually found what he was looking for.

Andrew bought each ingredient at a different store, none near the other, none near ground zero. He wore latex gloves so he wouldn’t leave fingerprints. He got the idea, as though by osmosis, from the hundreds of crime shows he’d watched. He put his bomb together with shades drawn. Felix circled him, watching with interest, till he got tired and curled up leaning on Andrew’s thigh. And it was a comfort.

He wanted to conceal his small bomb with something that wouldn’t look out of place. A briefcase? No, what would a briefcase be doing in the street? A cake box? A large book hollowed out? He said, “Think Andrew think.” He settled on a box wrapped in plain brown paper crumpled up so it looked like garbage

“Felix, what do you think?” He looked a doubtful look.

When it was finally done he carefully wiped everything down again just to be sure he didn’t leave an inadvertent fingerprint. It’d be like leaving his drivers license. He decided to plant the device at 3:00 A.M. when he knew his neighbors would be asleep. Ironically, 3:00 AM is when police often conducted their raids.

The time had come. Andrew put on black clothes, and black running shoes, the better to flee the scene if push came to shove, and a black knit hat that covered everything but his eyes. He bought a throw-away phone and fifteen minutes of time for cash at a suburban Walgreens.

“Wish me luck, Felix,” he said.

Sitting in the darkness, he detonated the little bomb. It sounded a sound that was no fluttering of wings. He dialed 911 and shouted, “Allah, Akbar! Allah, Akbar!” It felt like letting go of the side of the pool.

“That should do it, Felix,” he said. ”It’ll divert attention onto the terrorists.”

Andrew got up earlier than usual to make sure he had time to inspect the damage and punch in by 8:00. It was a success. Pure joy. Ecstasy. The entire intersection of Grant and Lehigh became rubble in an instant. Chunks and shards landed on his neighbors lawns. Nothing but the intersection was damaged. He did something right.

Andrew said, “You know Felix, if this wasn’t a stealth operation, I would apologize to my neighbors for the mess.” He was considerate in thought if not deed.

Night came. Headlights burst into their living room as expected. He heard the squeal of brakes, ear splitting horns, the crunching of metal and cursing and cursing. There were tow trucks.

“It’s a great day, Felix. A great day.”

A few more cars crashed on those rocky shoals screeching like ships going aground. By the following night, vehicles drove alternate routes. They’d learned their lesson. The menace was no more.

“Victory is ours, my friend!” Happiness and relief poured over him like warm maple syrup on hot, buttered pancakes. Felix, not one to display enthusiasm openly, leaned on him approvingly.

Unfortunately some civic minded soul phoned the alderman who saw to it the town sent a clean-up crew. This never occurred to him. By the next day, the job was done. The t-intersection of Grant and Lehigh never looked better. The new asphalt shined in the sun. Not so, Andrew. He felt lost at a loss, his spirit all but crushed.

“I can’t take it anymore, Felix,” he said. Promethean angst. Fate. He was going mad, and he was. “We need another plan.”

It began to affect his work. Some of his fellow workers noticed and talked to him. Concerned. His boss chewed him out, and eventually gave him an ultimatum. “Shape up or else,” he said.

Andrew was doing inventory in the hunting section some weeks later. He was counting rifles and shotguns, boxes of ammunition and scopes. An idea crossed this mind. He pushed it aside. As he counted shot guns, he imagined the headlights, attacking him, ruthless, ruthless, coming and coming and coming, diminishing him, mocking his ambition of peace and serenity. The simplest dream. An undisturbed life. He pushed it aside.

Andrew’s good nature became defiance. His defiance became determination. His determination became rage. Rage became obsession. He began to eat in his living room again with Felix and the TV. He didn’t look at it. He began talking to the headlights. He began going out on his lawn screaming at them. When he went out for his mail, he saw his neighbors turn away and go back inside. He stopped talking to them. They showed no eagerness to speak to him. Andrew suspected them. He was certain his neighbors were peeping at him from behind their curtains, whispering about him, pitying him, scrutinizing him. Spies. Sneaks. They don’t know I know. But I do know. He confronted a few of them red faced. They shook their heads sadly. It wasn’t only headlights now.

Andrew worked with intensity, a dervish turning his enmity to productivity. Alchemy. He did a week of what was thought to be the most boring work in days. His boss took his performance as dedication to Fleet Farm. He was the old Andrew again.

His work friends didn’t know what to make of it. Some of them thought he was insane. Some were mad at him for showing them up, and they told him so. They were worried the boss would expect the same of them. He was a traitor. A pawn of Fleet Farm. He bought a hunting rifle with a scope, and boxes of ammunition. There was an employee discount.

Andrew got himself a case of beer, went home and ordered a sausage and mushroom pizza. “It all ends here, Felix. You understand don’t you? Please, forgive me.” The little fellow hung his head and went to his bed by the big chair, Andrew’s favorite, afraid for his friend.

After eating most of the pizza, and sharing bits of the sausage with Felix, Andrew changed into camouflage. He loaded the rifle, and trued the scope. He put the open boxes of bullets close at hand. The first car came at him.