Clouded Rainbow Read Online Free PDF Page A

his eyes filled with his wife’s glowing face, the roar of his SUV’s gas-guzzling engine consumed his focus. It was followed by the sound of tires screeching. Roger flared up like a mother hearing a stranger abusing her child.
    “Whoa! What the hell are you doing?” he shouted at the culprit.
    The college-aged man had a look of embarrassment, as he realized that one of his customers had finally caught on to his joyriding. Roger helped Lois into the passenger’s side, and then made his disapproval known to the other man.
    “Come on. Where did you learn to drive? This is a fifty thousand dollar vehicle, not some beat-up wagon. And you just drive it around like you don’t give a shit!” he blasted.
    The valet driver gave no response. Roger stormed to the driver’s side, purposely giving no tip.
    It’s about time someone stood up to these punks , he thought.
    Lois could hear his scolding through the sound-deafening material of the SUV. She giggled, too tired to do anything, too tired even to click her seatbelt. All she wanted to do was bask. “Boys will be boys,” she mouthed under her breath.
    Roger grabbed the keys from the young man and entered the tranquility of his SUV. His nose received a hint of Lois’ natural scent, which stimulated his receptive olfactory nerve. He immediately calmed down and put himself right back into the placid mood he had felt as he walked out.
    “Let’s go home and I’ll make it all better,” Lois murmured.
    Her words massaged his auditory nerve and further pushed him into serenity. Roger glanced at his wife; her cleavage kneaded his optic nerve. His worries subsided.
    Roger pulled out and drove down the familiar downtown streets. Lois’ tipsiness heightened the mood and made him feel as if he were back in college driving home from an evening basketball game at the Bryce Jordan Center.
    Lois began to sing. “Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream—come on, Roger.”
     Roger laughed.
    “Come on, sing,” she playfully instructed.
    Roger gave in and joined in the melody. He was a horrible singer, but having an intoxicated audience allowed even the worst singer to shine. They sang in tandem, Lois a few beats ahead of Roger, “…gently down the stream. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, Life is but a dream…”
    Lois moved closer to Roger and slid her hand on his thigh. Her libido was raging. The fun and games continued as Roger commanded the road. Then, like flipping a light switch, buckets of rainwater attacked his vehicle. Roger immediately reached for the wipers, but the rubber was no match for the flood of water mixed with golf-ball sized hail. He looked up at the sky. While it was relatively clear when they had left, ominous clouds now filled it, stealing the moon away.
    Up head, Roger saw the Pleasant Place Bridge through the shield of water. He could make out the fact that four lanes existed, but the water made it nearly impossible to see where the other cars were.
    Just follow the yellow line , he kept telling himself, remembering the driving manual he had studied as a teenager.
    He couldn’t make out what the body of water was doing down below, but he knew it must have been raging.
    Lois continued the song in an attempt to keep up the light-hearted mood, but sweat covered Roger’s brow. He hated driving in blinding weather, and although his SUV gave him a sense of protection, all he could think about was that yellow line.
    Lois turned to look behind them, but as she did, she knocked the doggy bag from her lap onto the carpet.
    “Watch the rug!” Roger instinctively yelled as he moved his eyes over to the lasagna spill.
    As Roger removed his stare from the yellow line, he didn’t see what fate brought the loving couple. Because the moment he looked back at the rain-covered road, he saw an image that would forever change his and his wife’s life.
    The image was two blinding headlights, but they weren’t the headlights of a compact car, which would be the