He stepped on the brakes hard, but knew as he did that it was a futile gesture. What was this idiot doing in the wrong lane? ‘Well’, he thought, ‘I don’t know the guy’s name, so Idiot will work for me’. He closed his eyes, wondering what death would be like.

He was only 30, so he hadn’t devoted a lot of time to thinking about the subject. He went to church every Sunday, but mostly because he felt it was better to be safe than sorry. He wasn’t sure if he really believed in the whole idea of some guy coming back from the dead in order to send everyone to Heaven. It seemed a bit far-fetched to him, in fact, but he thought that maybe if he pretended hard enough, he’d believe enough to count if the Christians were right, and if they weren’t… Well, he just hoped whatever came next wouldn’t be so bad.

He’d lived a good life, not in the sense that it had brought him a lot of happiness, but he’d been a good person, helping anyone in need to the fullest extent of his abilities. In fact, a lot of people said he was the most selfless person they’d ever met. He hoped those good deeds and his façade of being a man of God would be enough to ensure him a good eternity.

But, he thought, as the lights in the Idiot’s car blazed brighter and closer, how was he sure this was the end? Maybe he’d manage to survive the twisted wreckage and be fine. Or maybe he’d be injured and lose an arm or a leg. Could he function then? Could he do his menial, pathetic job without a limb? ‘Maybe’, he thought, ‘just maybe it would be better to die here than to walk away a broken man’.

Why had he taken that job, in the first place? He remembered now… he’d been young, and couldn’t afford college, so his dad had offered him a job working for him. It had gone well at first, and he was planning on going to school when he’d raised a little money. Then his dad had died, though, and he felt the need to support his mom and help cover the funeral, and the money he’d made disappeared almost overnight, and along with it his dreams of going to school again. It was a well paying job, though, and he and his mother needed money more than anything else, so he stayed there, eventually taking his father’s old job.

Even though he knew he should be there, he didn’t like it. He wondered if his father had felt the same way. He also wondered what his father had dreamed he would be when he was 16, 18, 21, 24. Did he think he would be doing what he did? His father had been a success, more than providing for his wife and children’s future, but when he was facing death, was he able to say he’d lived a good life?

How does one define a good life, or a worthwhile life? Is there such a thing? When you come down to it, he thought, when you leave the world, what do you take with you? All the things one has in life: money, health, friends, all worldly possessions, would stay here, in this world, as his body rots in the ground, and his soul, if there is such a thing, goes off someplace totally new. So, then, doesn’t everyone, beggar, worker, executive, and king, become equal at death? ‘No, that doesn’t seem right,’ he thought, ‘but can I honestly say that one person has lived a better life than anyone else? Well, certainly a philanthropist who spends his or her life giving to those in need has lived a better life than someone who spent their life stealing from those same people in need.’ He felt a little better, but still uneasy about his judgment.

The Idiot’s car looked like it was just about to touch his own, but now time seemed to have slowed even further, and even perhaps to have stopped. Would this be the end, then? The two cars would never touch, and he would just stay in this moment of time for all eternity? He still had a lot to think about, he realized, and this was a good chance to do that thinking.

His most pressing thought, and the one that he was sure would last him until the two cars collided, was whether or not he had lived the good or worthwhile life he would have hoped to live. Sure, he was helping his mom now, in her time of need, and he certainly always was finding causes to donate to. Whenever he saw one of those little jars on store counters, he’d deposit any change he could summon from the depths of his pockets. By anyone’s definition he had been a good, kind man, yet despite that he felt that his life hadn’t been good or worthwhile. He’d spent much of his life, the first 18 years, in school preparing for life. Then he’d gone to work for his father in order to prepare to go back to school. Then his father had died, and he’d been working ever since to support his mother. When, in that time, had he really lived for himself? What had he wanted for his life? What was the life he imagined having years ago?

Memories that had been long lost to him suddenly seemed to flow to the front of his mind. He saw his kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Grant, asking the class what they wanted to be when they grew up. He could see the kids around him again, and they were raising their hands and yelling out things like ‘firefighter’ and ‘astronaut’ and ‘rock star’ and ‘doctor’ and ‘nurse’ and ‘scientist’. He had been silent because he wasn’t sure, then, what he wanted. He’d never thought about it. He heard another voice, now, asking again what he wanted to do after school. He was in his guidance councilor’s room in high school, staring at the ceiling, wondering what was directly above him. He told her he didn’t know, he hadn’t thought about it. She had asked what he liked to do, or what made him happy. He had replied that he didn’t know. He finally was realizing that he still didn’t know. He didn’t know anything.

What had he enjoyed? He enjoyed girls, and, he supposed, he enjoyed boys. He’d kissed a boy once, but he’d kissed a lot more girls. He enjoyed the girls better, but he didn’t know what he wanted; he hadn’t thought about it. He had a girlfriend in high school, but they broke up after he graduated. She had asked him, where do you see us in five years? He told her he didn’t know; he hadn’t thought about it.

He’d never had sex with his girlfriend, although it was one thing he had thought about. He had thought about a lot of things. He’d thought of settling down with his girlfriend when he finished school and raising a couple of kids. He’d liked her a lot, but he didn’t know if he loved her, and he wasn’t willing to take any chances.

He liked movies, especially the ones in black and white. Old movies were often so simple. Guy meets girl, guy falls for girl, they end up together, the end. Maybe add something about war to the mix, but it was all the same in the end. He loved watching each movie a second time, because he knew what would happen in the end. He knew each step on the path to the end, and there were no uncertainties. Nothing would change from last time. There wasn’t any thought needed, and no decisions to be made.

He liked music. There was an order to it, the way every measure was divided, and everything was built off of the same notes and chords. Then, after he had heard a song enough times, he could sing along with it, although usually poorly. He didn’t need to make anything up himself, because the music was already there for him.

‘I have not lived’ he thought with a wisdom often dedicated to those looking death in the eyes. Every step of the way was a guided step, his hand held by forces seen or unseen. He saw. He saw his mother helping him up the ladder to the top of the slide, and he’d been too afraid to go down by himself, so she placed her arm in front of him, and he’d clung to it like a man on a boat in storm tossed waters clings to anything that will keep him from going over the side. He saw himself going to school. The bus had come, but he was too afraid to get on without either his mother or father there, so his father had driven him to the school and walked him into the classroom.

When he was in school, he’d never raised his hand to answer a question for fear he’d get it wrong. He never began a conversation with anyone, because he didn’t know them, and he didn’t feel comfortable talking to someone he’d never met. The friends he’d made had talked with him first, and, to his surprise, the right words to say always seemed to come to mind. He’d never participated in any activities outside of school because he felt he wasn’t good enough and he’d lived without those things for this long in his life, he didn’t need to try anything new. When he was looking at colleges, before he’d gone to work for his father, he had chosen the closest possible school.

‘It couldn’t be more than a few more seconds,’ he thought, as the front of the idiot’s car loomed inches from the front of his own. Soon he’d either be dead or saved by a miracle. For once, the idea of not having a choice was not comforting. The matter of life or death being up to fate or some invisible higher being seemed unjust to him. If he died, though, would there be any more choices? Because he couldn’t know what would come if he were to die, he began to think of what he would do were he to survive. If he was paralyzed, there would no longer be any choices, he’d simply lie in bed and wait for death. He was surprised to find that this lack of choice frightened him instead of making him happy. There was a time when he would have been happy to not have a single choice to make, but that was a few minutes ago. Now he longed for a chance to make a choice as to what would happen next. If he had the choice, he would chose the miracle, where he walked away with, at the most, a few scratches, or even a broken limb.

He began to think about what he might do if he survived. His mom seemed like she could live without him working to provide for her. He’d spent a lot of time not thinking about the future and not thinking about what he wanted, but now it was all he wanted to think about. He heard Mrs. Grant again asking that question: what did he want to be when he grew up? He’d always dreamed of starring in a movie. Someone else told him all the things he had to say and how to say them, and he just had to convince the audience that he was making the choice himself. It would be so difficult, though, to become an actor. After all, so many people try, and lots of people fail. He forced that thought from his mind. He’d let defeatist thoughts hold him back from doing so many things he wanted, and it was time to end that. Perhaps if he believed he could do anything, he would be able to at least accomplish much of what he really wanted instead of hiding from failure. He thought that maybe he could look for his old high school girlfriend. Maybe if she was still single, he could try to get back together with her, and answer all her questions. If not, there are always other girls; surely he could find someone.

So, he decided, tomorrow, he would try to find a small play to act in, probably keep his job for a while and save money. He would look up that girl from the past and call her, see how she had been doing these past few years, and ask if she wanted to see him again. If not, maybe he’d try to meet someone at work, or an actress when he got a part in a play. Before, the future had seemed a narrow path to him. Now, it opened wide, and there were so many possibilities, and the lights of the car in front of him seemed to be lights of hope instead of a portent of death. He turned to passenger’s seat and smiled at someone or something that was not there, then turned back to the road and the car as time returned to normal.