The bell rang. I walked out the door of Mr. Gilmore’s classroom. The halls filled with students cramming their way to the parking lots like sheep being herded into a field. That day I was going home alone, without my brother. My brother usually took about a half an hour to get to the car because he was always talking to friends, but not today. Pinocchio had lied to my parents about doing big assignments and turning them in, but he never did turn them in, so he was stuck riding the bus.

I sped to the car thinking “I need to get there fast, I can finally leave early”. I walked through the halls without talking to friends because I wanted to get to the car without delay. I was moving at a fast pace. I went out the front doors which are always crowded with people who take up all the space to get outside. It was extra crowded, since I got to the doors earlier than usual, which slowed down my exit even more. I went out to the front lot where the seniors parked because my “bright” big brother was a senior. I saw many people getting into their cars and leaving which sucked because it would take longer for me to get out of the school parking lot. I started to walk faster because my car was in the far back right corner and the line would soon stretch behind my car so I would have  to wait longer if I didn’t hurry. I got there in time to back out. I opened the rear door,  threw my backpack in and hopped in the front seat.

There weren’t too many cars around because I rushed to get to the car. I backed out of my spot and pulled into the line. I had come to a complete stop and sat there, still in the line. Out of nowhere my car jumps forward sending me towards the steering wheel. “What the hell was that?” I thought. I turned my head one hundred and eighty degrees straight out my back window to see someone in a brown Ford Taurus just driving off. Thinking about it now, my next actions weren’t the smartest, but luckily nothing bad happened. I put the car in reverse and accelerated down the parking lot, going as fast as a bat out of hell after them. I parked my car right next to the middle entry of the front lot and got out. I walked back to look at my bumper, surprisingly there was no damage. I guess that’s what you get when you drive a tank! I walked over to the other person’s car, which was still in the line to leave. On their back left bumper there was a deep dent that took up the corner of their car, went about half a foot in, scratched the paint and the bottom part of the tail light was cracked. Part of the red plastic laid on my back bumper. I laughed. All that damage to their car and none to mine. I walked up to the girls window and knocked on it.

She rolled it down and said,“Hey”.

The fact that she just hit me and tried to drive away was bad enough, saying “Hey” made it a thousand times worse because she acted like nothing happened. What if I was hurt or something was wrong?

I said,  “You realize you just hit me, right?” She responded, “Yeah, but there is no damage to your car.” She never got out to even look at her own car. In an annoyed tone I stated, “There is a big ass dent in the  back of your car and I’m going to need to swap insurance information with you.” She pulled out of the line and parked next to me. She got out and walked to my car. I said again “I need your insurance.” She responded saying “I don’t want to give you my insurance, I was just recently in an accident.” I was trying to be nice to her, but she was just making it worse and worse. I didn’t even know who she was. I asked “What is your name?” She answered, “Emily, What’s yours?” “Josh” I said. We talked for a little while to get more information and I told her that I was a sophomore. She asked “Why are you parked out here? You’re a sophomore, you can’t be in this lot.” I realized that rushing out of school really wasn’t worth the time because I had to deal with this. I said, “My brothers a senior, Tyler. He and I share a spot but he’s not coming home with me.” She talked about how she knew him and stuff, trying to get away from the point that she had hit me. I told her,“I’m going to need your insurance, you just hit me.” She walked over to her car giving in to my demand and grabbed her insurance and handed it to me. I got on my phone with my dad to find out what I should do. I explained that there was no damage to the car, but she was not very willing to cooperate and even tried to drive off.

He just said,“Call the police.” I got off the phone with my dad and said to Emily,

“My dad wants me to call the police.” After I said that she began to reason with me a bit more and we went to the office instead to talk to the school officer. He wasn’t there, so we had to wait until the next day to discuss it with him. We left after talking to the people in the office because we both just wanted to get out of there.

I thought to myself “to err is human; to forgive divine.”  I got in my car to go home. I drove home very carefully because I was “on edge”. Everything was ok and was settled after the accident. I realized that if I wouldn’t have rushed, I would have been able to leave school faster and not have to deal with being in a car accident. Now, when I leave school, I let most of the traffic clear before leaving so it doesn’t happen again. It has also taught me to take my time on school assignments because if I rush, it will just take me longer or impact my grade negatively by not doing a thorough job.