By George Oliver
The car drove away when I approached it, even though my doing so was a natural continuation of my walking route – not an addition, not a diversion. When I was within touching distance of the car, its engine shifted from standby to active. The car was a red Honda Civic. It was a Monday.
I found the car’s knee-jerk reaction suspicious. It was reactive, not proactive. I can’t put my finger on why it was suspicious, because it’s difficult to detect guilt from the actions of a machine. I never saw its driver. It was a foggy morning. The car windows were translucent.
My thoughts then and now catapult to cinematic hyperbole. The timing of the car’s sudden movement was too precise. Was it an accessory to a drug deal? Was it connected to a bigger crime? Was it stolen?
Turning things round to the unknowable driver: was – are – they having an affair? Are they a hitman? A hitwoman? The afterlife of Monday morning’s events is reduced to this written thought exercise. This is my sole course of action. I have told no-one and reported nothing. Tying the car and its driver to the present tense is speculative.
It’s difficult to interpret guilt from the actions of a machine. My ability to retrospectively personify the car is limited.
The car was stationary, but its engine was chugging. On my approach, during the side street shortcut stretch of my journey from house to station to office, the car jerked into first and drove past me. The fog didn’t stop the morning light glinting on the Honda’s red paint job as the car passed me and faced the sun, which was shining through the trees. The car was winking at me.
But then, something else: its jerky movements while passing me resembled the shifty eye-contact avoidance of a defendant on trial. Or: the movements implied that the driver wasn’t – isn’t – a very good one.
This second possibility was undermined by the comparatively smooth driving as the car joined the main road and shifted into second, then third. The driver knew what they were doing. The poor driving wasn’t part of the plan. It seems that I, provider of a spanner in the works, had interrupted something.
For context, my condition on Monday morning was perfect. My components and functions were by the book. On Sunday night, I had an uninterrupted eight-hour sleep. On Monday morning, I woke up calm, recharged, ready. I filled my body with enough caffeine to get me through the day, not surpassing the threshold needed to become agitated or restless. I had a bite to eat. I played with my dog. I kissed Jane goodbye. I left.
The third party in this scenario – you – are not empowered. You don’t have a voice. Threats to my narratorial reliability cannot be posed; but in the event that they are desired, I’m laying my cards on the table. This was my truthful condition. This is who I was that morning. I was no superhero. It was the beginning of an ordinary day.
My condition on Monday mornings hasn’t always been perfect. It hasn’t been perfect on the other six days of the week either.
Three years ago, aged 32, I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. It was the kind of lightbulb moment of existential clarity we are led to believe only happens in films. I didn’t believe it could happen to me, and I couldn’t believe it had, when it did. But as the days and weeks rolled past, I felt better. So much better. It was only after the first year had gone by that I realised the implication of a consistent, uninterrupted stream of comfortable days, weeks, and months: I had improved. By the end of a second uninterrupted year, I had forgotten what discomfort felt like.
I met Jane six months after the diagnosis. Six later, we were married. Her intervention in an already-improving personal situation was colossal. I booked the appointment that would lead to the diagnosis when I was at my lowest, but my ship was no longer sinking. Jane turned my hull around and ensured I was on course.
My fixation on the possible justification for the car driving away doesn’t signal a return to bad habits. This isn’t a slip back into anxious tendencies.
Because it had always been that order: fixation – anxiety – discomfort – depression.
My fixation on that Monday morning isn’t an unhealthy one. It’s also not some sort of erudite philosophical enquiry. It’s a basic, everyday question: why did the car drive away?
Or: why did the man walk away? Did the man think he saw something? Did the man think something untoward was happening? Someone else could be asking these questions, somewhere. This someone could be the driver. Or it could be you, the voiceless. You, the unempowered.
The car might have already been planning to drive away, but the timing of my approach made it look as if its movement was a response to mine. Timing is everything.
Perhaps the driver was late to work. Perhaps they had pulled into the side street to text their boss this information, so they didn’t have to unsafely do so while driving. Perhaps there was a reason for this information: an argument with a romantic partner as they left the house. Or perhaps it was more innocuous: a new puppy making mealtime an ordeal, because the puppy would rather play. Perhaps there was nothing to be read in the car driving away, or in the man walking away. Perhaps there’s nothing between either set of lines. Perhaps time is being wasted.
Cars are constantly driving away. Wheels turn and friction between the road and tires creates forward motion. Cars move away – but they also move from and to. The little metal boxes glide along, determined by which of these commitments their drivers are bound by. The rest of us watch, excluded and jealous of the assistance their movement receives. Those of us travelling by foot must seek different help. But when we move, we fly.
George is a writer and researcher. He has a PhD in contemporary transatlantic literature and is the author of ‘Hybrid Novels: Post-postmodernism, Sincerity, and Race at the Turn of the 21st Century’ (Routledge, 2025). His short stories have recently appeared or are forthcoming in ‘The Brussels Review’, ‘Eunoia Review’, ‘The Interpreter’s House’, and ‘Sybil Journal’, and he was shortlisted for Ouen Press’ 2019 Short Story Competition.
losing our grip on purpose 