Golden Years

Of course! "Our only chance!" How could she have forgotten? Their only - their last - chance at a real independence! At dignity, and -

"All right, John. I’m going to try my best," Celia heard herself saying, almost automatically; and without really waiting to rest or hazarding a further thought, she started the wheelchair down the hill.

Surprisingly she discovered most of her strength had returned, and she experienced a fresh surge of confidence. She could do it, was her unuttered thought: and at first things did indeed go much easier than she’d imagined. Since at the top of the hill the grade was slight all she really had to do was steer. But the wheelchair gained momentum, and she found eventually that if she didn't pull back on the handles with all her strength both she and the wheelchair were in danger of catapulting uncontrollably forward.

Celia did try her best. Careful not to tip the chair over backwards she had at times nevertheless to dig her heels in so doggedly that they thrilled with pain. When her right leg began to wobble weakly again she refused to panic: she gritted her teeth and held on. If she gripped the wooden handles any harder, she felt surely they would have snapped right off.

Soon she was almost running, the wheelchair pulling her along. Occasionally it wanted to veer to the left, towards the road’s shoulder and the ditch, and it cost her practically every ounce of energy she had left to set it straight once more. Then about a quarter of the way down, the wheelchair hit a dip in the road, the handles bounced free of her hands, and she was left gasping for air and struggling desperately to maintain herself on her feet.

"John!" she shouted. But it was no use. The wheelchair had gone.

Celia was stunned. Almost as in a dream, she could hear the wheels as they ground and squealed down the hill, slowly at first, like some tired, wounded-sounding, animal. In profound shock, she could only think: this can not be happening! this can not be real! Initially, the blackness of the night and her own confusion prevented her from seeing a thing. Then, in almost the next instant it seemed, an astonished Celia watched as the wheelchair, less noisy now and with John obviously still in it, sailed smoothly, almost gracefully, through the first of the frosted cones of street light and then vanished into the night. For an instant John, sitting very upright and without uttering one sound, had been as cast in a strange and unreal silvery luminescence. Celia, still rooted in astonishment and alarm, could only blink wildly and stare as the nightmare unfolded. It seemed like only seconds later the same unthinkable scene was repeated, this time with greater speed. Nearer the bottom of the hill, still amazingly in the dead centre of the road, the wheelchair, with a much smaller but apparently composed John, slipped swiftly into and through the second cone of light and disappeared without a trace.

Again Celia rapidly blinked. Her heart, which moments before had despaired, now kindled with a small and fantastic hope. Since John had so incredibly survived the first two lights and was almost at the bottom, then perhaps...

But her hopes were short-lived. A moment later, from somewhere at the bottom of the hill, she heard a sudden scrape, as of steel grinding on cement, and a tiny, oddly muffled crash that filled her with terror. Then she heard nothing.