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Nickol Payne

Mrs. Remmers

English Composition

22 Sept. 2017

The Jump

On a cold, blustery November morning ​in my quaint town of Elgin​, leaves skittered over

the grass beneath trees that recently blazed with autumn color and a gray mist filled the sky. The

cold bit through our coats as my classmates and I jostled up and down in the backseat of Lizzy’s

Ford Explorer. A naive 15- year-old, I believed nothing could harm me. Through one stupid

decision, ​my thoughts of adolescents ​all changed when I cheated death.

Lizzy, Cole, Heather, and I were all sophomores. Just towering about 5’1, Lizzy’s height

never stopped her from putting her foot to the floor while driving. Although short, her spunky

personality stretched far beyond her diminutive height. She could consume as much food as she

wanted, never having to worry about changing her size 0 physique. She loved makeup like her

own child, never failing to have a year's supply of makeup in her car’s center console. Heather, a

blonde-haired, blue-eyed marksman who lived to hunt and fish, was still jacked from the

weekend because she made an incredible shot and bagged the biggest deer any of us had ever

seen. Heather and I had been close friends since the age of three, so naturally, we always shared

a backseat. Cole, resembling a string-bean, sat in the passenger seat. Like most teenage boys,

Cole’s knowledge of cars reached levels greater than any girl could comprehend. Being sheltered

from the bitter cold inside the vehicle did not stop my thinking about how to avoid being out in

the harsh Nebraska climate any longer than what I had to be.
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“I just want to be curled up in my plush, white, snuggly blanket on my couch with my

space heater nearby to keep me warm and toasty all day long,” I thought as the sharpness of the

cold nipped its way through my clothing and pricked into my skin.

“Ugh! I hate how we have to park so far away from the school,” Heather groaned. “It

sucks walking in the cold.”

Annoyance crept deep into my chest. The trek from the parking lot to school, comparable

to the Trail of Tears, loomed before me, and I resolved I would not walk in the frigid weather

any longer than necessary.

As the Explorer turned west to pass on the north side of our rectangular school, I selfishly

requested, “Lizzy, would you just drop me off at the front door?”

“What? No! You can walk!” she snapped.

Slumping in annoyance and throwing my head back, I groaned from the depth of my

throat. Rolling my eyes, I noticed Heather’s expression which clearly expressed, “I want to take

the shortest route to the inside our warm school as badly as you do!” She reiterated my plea for

the SUV to come to a stop. “Lizzy, quit bein’ a lil’ bitch and stop the damn car! I’m cold as

shit!”

Swiveling her head around, Lizzy’s glare, like tasers, shot from her eyes at Heather. “No!

I’m not frickin’ stopping!”

Peering​ at each other, Heather and I rolled our eyes. Whining like babies in the backseat,

we squirmed in our seats, jerked back and forth, and pled for her to stop the car.
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Scheming how I could walk the shortest possible distance to school, a question popped

into my head. “Is jumping out of a moving car really as hard as it looks? It can’t be ​that​ hard,

right? If I jump straight up, I’ll land straight down, won’t I?”

With each passing second, the opportunity to escape the cold passed. I had to devise a

plan to avoid the cold walk to school quickly. “Heather, let’s just jump out of the car.”

Our eyes locked, and with a devilish grin she conspired, “Okay!”

I pulled the door handle up, threw open the back passenger door, and the crisp, fall wind

rushed into the car. “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU GUYS DOING?” Lizzy screamed. “SHUT

THE DOOR!”

Past the point of persuasion, nothing could stop us. “On the count of three, we’re

jumping. Okay?” I instructed Heather.

With a giggle, she consented, “Yep!”

“One...two...THREE!”

Thrusting myself off of the Explorer’s running board, I leapt into the icy air before

crashing down onto the road. As if in slow motion, my feet skidded out from under me, my legs

buckled beneath my body, and my backside scraped against the gravelly asphalt. In an attempt to

brace myself for impact, I thrust my right wrist downward. Gravel embedded itself in my flesh as

I prayed for something to stop my momentum. My tailbone smacked the ground, and I finally

skidded to a halt.

“God, I should’ve bought smaller pants.” I thought when I realized the bare skin on my

tailbone had been reduced to road rash.

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Watching the white Explorer speed off, the doors still gaping open from my leap of

adolescence, pain seeped through my body. Redhot heat radiated and pulsed through my

extremities. My wrist throbbed like a kettle drum. My hands’ palms oozed blood. My mind

flooded with questions. “What had I just done? What if my head had hit the pavement instead of

my wrist? Or what if someone was driving behind us and had run me over?” It suddenly

occurred to​ me, “I could’ve died.”

Wracked with pain and choking back tears, my words came out in short bursts,

“Ow, ow, ow.” Crying was NOT an option, especially since jumping was my brilliant

idea.

Hoisting myself up from the ground and brushing loose gravel from my black uniform

pants, I also tried to brush away my embarrassment. Turning around, Heather ​stood​ on the

opposite side of the road wiping bits of gravel off her puffy winter coat. “Oh, crap,” I thought, “I

completely forgot she jumped too.” Quiet and solemn, she didn’t appear to have any noticeable

physical injuries.

With eyes the size of teacup saucers, we silently strode towards the school building. Now

oblivious to the frigid temperature, the thoughts racing through our heads replayed what we had

just done. Speechless, we reached the school’s glass entrance doors. After pressing the call

button for the school secretary to unlock the door, Heather and I stared at the ground.

Breaking the silence, I said, “That was so stupid.”