I can't sleep Take Two

Seeing as it is three in the morning and I can't sleep I figured now is as good of time as any to tell about nightmare number two. This one isn't nearly as reoccurring or dramatic, but for some reason pops up from time to time, and makes me lose hours of sleep.

On my very first day out of training with the Sheriff's Office I was sent to the office to catch up on several reports I had acquired through out the day. There was no reason for me to be at the office seeing as we had a small sub station in my beat, and to this day I don't know why I was told to go to the office. My point being, once I got to the office I sat down and began my paperwork. I hadn't been doing it for five minutes when I heard a call for a traffic crash a quarter mile up the road. The beat officer was tied up with a case, so I said I would respond. Little did I know that this wreck would change me forever.

As I arrived on scene I noticed a small black Honda Civic flipped upside down in the middle of the highway. I exited my vehicle, and everyone was yelling at me to go to the ditch area. As I was making my way over there, I noticed the bumper of the car was stuck in a tree at least thirty to forty feet in the air. The feeling that entered my gut before I reached the ditch is unforgettable. As I approached the ditch I noticed a young girl lying there lifeless. I went to check her vitals, and knew immediately there was nothing I could do to help her. The girl was ejected from her vehicle and upon impact snapped her neck. The thing I remember the most was, she didn't have a scratch on her. She looked as if she was asleep. Shortly after EMS arrived, and initiated CPR, even though they knew in their minds she was gone. You see, they sort of had a rule that if the person is under 18 you still try everything, even if you know it won't help. This girl was seventeen. The story I received from other drivers was she was driving like a mad person, and cut off a car. Trying to avoid impact she over corrected and steered into the ditch. Here I am, just turned twenty years old seeing my first of many dead bodies. I saw many more in the next three years, but none ever effected me the way this one has. I still to this day wake up sweating after seeing her lifeless body in my dreams. I see certain people that remind me of her and I know that I won't being having a good nights sleep that night. The worst part was that being a cop is all about being in control. You have control over everything the moment you step foot on a scene. The problem was that there is no control when you stare down at a lifeless 17 year old. Your helpless. You want so desperately to fix the problem, because that is what you do, but you can't. The only thing you can do is stand there and be useless. That may be one of the hardest things you ever have to do as a cop. Being able to accept the fact that you can't fix everything no matter how much you believe you can.

Nothing prepares you for the shock your body goes into upon seeing your first victim. Nothing prepares you for the drives over to the parents or loved ones house to tell them there reason for living just died in a wreck or decided to kill themselves. Nothing can prepare you for the look a five year old boy gives you when you discover his dad has been beating him and putting cigarettes out on his feet. The look of why are you doing this to my daddy. A child doesn't understand why the big bad police are taking there daddy away. You so desperately want to explain to the kid that his daddy is the bad man, but a child's love won't let him understand that. You want to grab the piece of crap father and choke the life out of him, but "He has rights too." You want to understand why the wife and mother of two decided her life wasn't important enough to keep going on. You want to understand so much more, but sometimes there just aren't any answers. You just have to keep on going on thinking that in some way everything you are doing is for a good reason, and hope that someday it will make sense. Hope that someday you will understand why you held someones head in your hands while they asked you to please help them, but you knew they were already dead because you could feel their skull in a hundred pieces. You just hope, because sometimes that is all there is.

I know I seem to jump from one subject to another rather drastically, but that's because when I feel something I have to write it right then. So for now work with me, and I'll work on staying on topic in future blogs. Once again I have posted a book rather than a short story, so I am starting to think I am incapable of shortening these things. Oh well, get used to it I guess or move on, because it does not appear that I am going to get any better at shortening these things any time soon. Thanks for appeasing me once again and good night.

OA