My Savior Unknown
I was eighteen when I had the strangest thing happen to me. I had just been to one of my friend’s graduation parties. There had been some booze involved, so I thought I was invincible at this point. I got in my car alone and fumbled for the keys since my eyesight wasn’t very good at the moment. A couple of my friends had tried to take the keys from me and said I was in no shape to drive. I ignored their warnings like the stupid jerk I was.I had only driven a few miles when something ran across the road in front of me. I slammed on the brakes and swerved into the left lane to miss it. Since my vision was still blurred, I hadn’t realized that on the left side of the road, there was a fifty foot drop off. My car seemed to be flying through the air. I felt like I was on the Dukes of Hazard and running from the sheriff. Excitement ran through my body and at that moment, I realized I was falling to my death below. Was it that thought or was it the alcohol, that made me puke in the passenger’s seat?
They say that when you are plummeting to your death, you see your life before your eyes. I found this completely true. I saw my friends around me at the party dancing to the loud music. Their faces when I headed for my car. Carrie Munick’s voice yelling at me, telling me that I was the biggest jerk she’d ever met. What had I said to her? I didn’t even remember. I was completely wasted. Everything went black after that.
My brain was still wandering everywhere. There was the nasty taste of alcohol and puke in my mouth. And to make matters worse, my whole body was erupting in pain and I felt warm liquid running down my sides. The smell of blood was unmistakable. Then I heard something rustling through the woods. Had someone seen me go flying off the road at 75 miles per hour? Or was it just a deer?
My blood ran cold or at least the blood that wasn’t spilling from my body. I tried to call for help, but I found myself to scared to think. Was I really going to die? I had probably ticked everyone off at the party. They wouldn’t care what happened to me. The sound of a snapping twig made me return to reality.
What was coming after me? Was it human or animal? Herbivore or Carnivore? Help or just something that couldn’t save my worthless life? I had never been so afraid in his life. What was really going to happen to me? What would my friends actually think of me after I was gone? Maybe I was just dreaming. I hoped, but in my heart I knew it was real.
The fiberglass of the car hood slammed down. I felt the car jerk a bit. Something had jumped on the car hood. Then the answer flooded my mind, it wasn’t human. Now I knew I was going to die. I was already in pain. Hopefully the creature about to rip me limp from limp would do so quickly.
Then I heard it sniffing the air. Was it a dog, wolf, or coyote? I couldn’t really tell. Not until I the bone-chilling howl, did I know it was a wolf. I felt the car lunge a little bit, and I knew it smelled my blood and was heading for the broken window in my door. I felt it tugging at the back of my shirt. I didn’t move. I didn’t care. I was better off dead. I was being dragged out of my car, and it didn’t stop there. It dragged me for what seemed like hours. My head hit something hard at one point and knocked me out.
I could see Carrie. She was yelling at me. “You are the biggest jerk I’ve ever met!” she yelled. She ran out of the room crying. I ran after her. “Leave me alone!” she yelled. “I never want to talk to you again!” Why didn’t she want to talk to me? “Stop! You’re drunk! You drunk jerk!”
I could smell leaves wet with dew, and I could hear the birds chirping excitedly. I could see a bright light shining through the lids of my eyes. How long had I been knocked out? Was everything a dream? Had I never left the party or had I never went? Something wasn’t right. I opened my eyes and could see trees everywhere. The light shining through my eyelids had been the sun.
I began to sit up, but my sides pained me greatly. I wasn’t dead? Why hadn’t the wolf ripped me apart? Why hadn’t its kin joined it and ate my insides and licked my bones clean?
Then I heard the soft padding of the wolf’s feet. So it waited until daylight to kill me? I saw it coming straight towards me. I jumped up forgetting the pain in my sides and grabbed a large branch that had fallen from a nearby tree. The wolf didn’t show in signs of fear or blood lust in its soft eyes. It had something in its mouth. Was that a rabbit?
It slowly crept toward me. I didn’t move at all. I kept staring back at its gaze. It halted around five feet from where I was standing and placed the rabbit on the ground. It nudged the rabbit towards me. It looked up at the branch I was holding then at the rabbit. Its gaze shifted again to something shining amongst the dirt. It was my lighter that had been in my pocket. Then I don’t know how, but I think I realized the wolf was trying to feed me. I didn’t really understand how it understood us humans and our needs.
I placed the branch down and picked up a few more twigs and fallen branches and placed them on top of the previous one. I glanced back at the wolf and it was watching my every move. I picked up the lighter and lit the end of the twig I had just picked up. I threw the twig into the pile I had just made and soon a fire was blazing. I picked up the rabbit and took out my pocket knife and started skinning the tiny creature. I chopped the rabbit into small chunks and started shoving them onto a stick. I held them over the fire and let them turn slightly brown. I began to eat some of the rabbit. I found I wasn’t all that hungry. I looked at the wolf and held out what was left of the cooked rabbit. It slowly walked towards me. It took the rabbit slowly and put it down in front of itself. The wolf slowly began to eat the rabbit.
“I think the car’s over here!” someone yelled in the distance.
“But there’s a fire coming from that direction!” Carrie’s voice rang through the trees. Was she looking for me? After all the stuff I had probably said to her?
I looked around. I stood up and tried to figure out where the voices were coming from. As soon as I did so, Carrie tripped through the undergrowth of the forest and into the small clearing I was in. I ran over and helped her up.
“I found him,” she yelled turning her head slightly to yell back at them. “I’m so glad you’re okay. When you left the party, we were all worried about you.”
“I’m sorry,” I replied. “I was a huge jerk to all of you, I’m sure. I don’t really remember that much. I know I had a little to drink, but I honestly didn’t think that much would effect me that-”
“Someone slipped something into your coke when you stopped drinking,” she said. “They confessed to it after you left.” She hugged me tightly. “How did you survive?”
“A wolf saved me,” I answered. “It’s right over -”
When I looked back the wolf was gone. “A wolf would have eaten you alive, and plus, they can’t wrap your shirt around you like bandages.”
I looked down startled. My shirt had been ripped off of me and rapped around my sides. The shirt was now red with dried blood. I looked back at where the wolf had stood in disbelief.