A Milestone Day

Jerry was climbing onto the handlebars of Bob's straight-racer for another terror run down the paved street towards Broadway Blvd.  Bob looked in the direction of the three boys, made something of an obscene gesture, and began another run down the hill.

It was amazing how fast they gained speed with the weight of the two of them on one bike.  About one third of the way down the hill Bob's feet could no longer keep up with the rotation of the straight-racer's pedals.  He removed his feet from the peddles and they gained even more speed immediately propelling them along at an even faster rate.  About fifty feet later (a brief time with such momentum, but still too long) Bob made the mistake of trying to re-insert his feet into the straight-racer peddles.  He almost suceeded, but then the extreme force of the quickly rotating peddles got ahead of him.

As Bob re-inserted his feet into the peddles the force of the peddles gave a tremendous kick to his left foot, followed by a hard kick to the right foot.  The combined immediate effect was that the heavily weighted bike took a DOUBLE skip - from front tire to rear tire and back to the front tire again.  Jerry (still riding the "hood ornament" position on the handlebars) released the handlebars and became airborne.  Just before the front tire took the second bounce, Bob applied the front and rear wheel handbrakes.  That was the final mistake.  When the front wheel impacted the ground for the second time the bike literally bucked Bob right out of the seat.  He felt the bike and himself going into a fast forward cartwheel and released his grip on the handlebars.  He, too, then became airborne with the bike flying high into the air just behind him.

Jerry had already hit the pavement at about thirty miles per hour.  He rolled violently for several yards until he hit the curbing on the right side of the road.

Bob, on the other hand, went straight forward and soon began what seemed to be a non-stop skid on his bare hands and his knees.  Although he was traveling slower than Jerry when he left the bike, he must have skidded about twelve to fifteen feet before he stopped.  But it wasn't over yet.  The bike was still in motion, taking one more tremendous bounce just behind him.  And wouldn't you know it - as Bob rolled over onto his back and looked upward the straight-racer came down right on top of him.  He was able to partially deflect the bike with his feet and his bleeding hands, causing the bike to fly off to the right side of the road.  The bike, of course, totally missed Jerry who had come to a sudden stop several yards back up the hill where he had hit the curb with considerable force, and rolled onto the grass.

"O-o-o-o-h-h!" moaned Bob.  His blue jeans and his knees were badly torn from the pavement, and the palms of his hands were scraped and torn to the bone (literally!).  One of his tennis shoes was gone, and the one remaining on his foot had the toe scraped completely through to a partially torn sock.

Fred, Jack, and Cary all looked at each other in amazement.  Then they began running down to the area of the accident, with Fred trailing and limping a little behind the other two boys.  When they reached Jerry they could see that he wasn't bleeding, except for a bloody nose.  He was sitting up, was conscious, and crying.  They quickly passed him on their way to Bob, who was obviously more seriously injured.

As they reached Bob they could see that he was bleeding badly, and he was obviously in a lot of pain.  His hands and knees were bloody black from the asphalt that had been scraped into the wounds from the pavement.  He was definitely a hospital case.

Bob's bike, a few yards down the hill, didn't look like much of a bicycle anymore.  The frame and the front wheel had been bent severely by the last impact just prior to the bike attempting to land on top of Bob.  Also, one of the peddles had been knocked off  completely when it hit the curb, never to be found by them.

Just about the time the three boys reached Bob, Cary somehow also managed to notice that a semi-truck came barreling down Broadway at super speed.  It flew right past the intersection where Bob and Jerry almost surely would have been if they had completed this run.  Even under the circumstances Cary nudged Fred and pointed to the quickly disappearing semi.

Fred chuckled under his breath when Cary commented softly, "The Lord has been merciful today."