The Traces of Destiny
My memories

I had another sleepless night, and no matter how much I wanted to go back to sleep, I realized I couldn't. Not until I can tell you how it happened.

The accident didn't happen as you imagined, or as Garin imagined. Not as she expected, I hadn't drunk anything that made her drunk that night. I am also not under the influence of any drugs. I'm totally conscious.

What happened to Maudy that night was, quite simply, an accident.

I've thought about it a thousand times in my mind. In the fifteen years since that happened, I felt deja vu at strange moments - moments of carrying wooden blocks to a tub car a few years ago, for example.

And that feeling still made me stop at whatever I was doing.

All I did, though only for a moment, and I found myself drawn back to the past, to the day that Maudy Zefanya died.

I had been working since that morning, lowering the molded logs onto the pallets to be stored in the local warehouse, and I should have gone home by half-four in the afternoon.

But the late delivery of plastic pipes came just before closing time, my employer on that day was the supplier of most stores in the eastern city of Gajakarta, and he asked me if I wouldn't mind staying more than an hour or so for the day.

I don't mind, it means overtime, an hour and a half, a great way to earn some much-needed extra cash. What I didn't take into account was how full the trailer was, or that I would do most of the work alone later.

There should have been four people working, but one person was sick that day, the other couldn't stay because his son was playing a ball game and he didn't want to miss it.

That left the two of us to do the work for the rest of the afternoon, and it was still fine at first. But a few minutes after the trailer came in, the other guy I was with had an ankle injury, and the next thing I knew, I was alone.

The temperature of the day was quite hot even though the day had gone up in the afternoon. The temperature outside was at a figure of 36 degrees more, and inside the warehouse was even hotter, over a hundred degrees that I felt and humid. I've spent eight hours, there's still two hours left to keep working.

The trucks stopped all day, and since I didn't work there routinely, most of my work was exhausting.

The other three people took turns using forklifts, so they might be able to take occasional breaks. But it wasn't me. My job is to sort the wooden blocks and then transport them from the back of the trailer to where the doors can be opened, loading them all into the pallets so the forklift can move them into the warehouse.

But in the end, since I was the only person there, I had to do everything by myself. By the time I finished, I was tired. I could barely move my arms, my back was cramping, and since I missed lunch, I was starving.

That's why I decided to go to Warteg Simplified Successful Always rather than go straight home. After a long and tiring day, there was nothing better in the world than rice with mixed vegetables, and when I finally rode my vespaku, there was nothing better, I thought to myself that in just a few minutes, I could finally relax.

the Vespa was mine back then the old Vespa Sprint Veloce, the handlebar was a little dented and the tires were a little swayed as it was already yearly on the way.

I had used that vespa a few years earlier and had only paid two million Rupiah for it. But even though it looked bad, the vespa was functioning well and I never had any problems with it.

The engine was on every time I turned the key, and I fixed the brakes myself the first time I bought it, which was exactly what was needed at the time.

So I went up to my vespaku just as the sun was finally setting. At dusk like that, the sun does funny things by bending down in the west.

The sky changed color almost from minute to minute, shadows spread all over the street like long fingers, similar to ghostly fingers, and because there were only a few clouds in the sky, there were only a few, there were times when a blinding light pierced through the helmet and I had to squint in order to see where I was going.

Whoever it is, it speeds up and slows down, stomps on the brakes every time the sun's rays move, and more than once swerves across the white line across the street.

I kept reacting, stepping on the brakes myself, but I finally got fed up and decided to put some distance between me and him. The road was too narrow to pass, so I slowed down my vespaku instead, hoping that person would stay away.

But whoever the driver is doing the opposite. He also slowed down, and when the distance between us came back close, I saw the brake lights flickering like Christmas lights, then suddenly turning red. I hit my own brakes hard, my tires squeaked when my vespaku stopped. And the car left me behind.

I think that's when fate intervened. Sometimes, I wish I hit that car, so I have to stop and Maudy Zefanya can go home.

But because I missed out - and because I was fed up with the driver in front of me - I took the next right turn, towards Jalan Budi Utama, even though it added a little extra time, the time I wish I could get back.

The road passes through an older part of town, where banyan trees thrive and are lush, and the sun has set low enough that glare is finally gone.

A few minutes later, the sky started to darken faster and I turned on the lights far away.

The road turned left and right, and soon the houses began to spread. The grounds were larger, and there seemed to be fewer people there.

After a few minutes, I turned again, this time to Jalan Kartini Merdeka. I knew this path well and comforted myself knowing that in a few more kilos, I would arrive at Warteg Simplified Successful Forever.

I remember turning on the discman, putting a simple headset in my ear and playing the button, but I didn't take my eyes off the road. Looking for my favorite song. My mind, I assure you, is focused on the journey.

The road is narrow and winding, but as I said, I know it like the back of my own hand. I automatically braked the vespa when entering a corner of the road.

That's when I saw it, and I'm pretty sure I'm slowing down. But I don't know for sure, because everything that happened next went so fast that I couldn't swear anything.

I appeared behind him, the distance between us getting closer. He went to the side, on the shoulder of the grassy road. I remember him wearing a white shirt and blue shorts and not going too fast, like sliding around casually.

In this neighborhood, the houses were on an area of half an acre, and there was no one outside. He knew I was coming behind him, I saw him glancing sideways, probably enough to see me from the corner of his eye, and he moved half a step further away from the highway.

Both my hands are on the steering wheel. I looked at everything I had and thought I was being careful. And so did he.

However, none of us saw the anjiing.

As if waiting for him, the creature came out of the gap of the fence when he was no more than twenty feet from my vespaku. A huge black anjiing, and I was several meters behind him, I could hear his ferocious growl as he charged right at him.

It must have caught him off guard because he suddenly retreated, moved away from the dog, and stepped too far into the street.

Vespaku weighing about 147 kg that was driving hit him by a landslide at that time without me having time to control.