I Drove Home
by Regina Lacey-Smith
I've always known the difference between good and bad. Helping others is good. Being rude is bad. I can only understand the way I feel when I do good or bad things. So when people do bad things, it makes me wonder how they feel afterwards. I realize everyone is so different.
I was driving home one day and about fifteen blocks from home this car in front of me slowed at a green light and held on their horn for what felt like forever. They swerved and kept going. Now me being cautious, I slowly drove up and saw a woman completely disheveled and bloody laying on the ground.
Her knee was popped out, and her foot was facing the wrong direction. I took a second to process what I was looking at.
I parked the car in the middle of the road.
When I walked up to the woman, I fought the urge to gag. I had never seen anyone's body so manipulated like that. I called 911 along with another man who got out of his car to help. I followed all the instructions of the 911 operator, but she was asking questions like "was she hit?" and "is the person who hit her anywhere around?"
I realized this woman was hit by a car and that person had driven away and left her there.
After the ambulance took her and we filed statements and things like that, I drove home. I drove in silence and sat in front of my house. I just sat there wondering and a little angry.
I didn't know if I was angrier at the person who hit her and left or the person who saw her looking half dead in the street and still drove past her after having the nerve to honk. I just knew I was angry.
I wondered in my anger. Wondering if that person even felt any remorse, if they'd ever got caught. I wondered if it was someone I knew.
That day changed my life. It showed that people can be in the right place at the right time and still do the wrong thing. I'm more aware now of my surroundings and try to help people when I can. I still think about that night, sometimes. I try not to.
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Regina Lacey-Smith is a first year Animal Poultry and Veterinary Science Major from Chicago, Illinois.