When I was seventeen, I biked into a tree. It was late, and a drunk driver had their brights on. My vain attempt to avoid the collision left me blacked out on the sidewalk, sandwiched between a concrete calamity and the starry sky seam. I don't know how long I was out or even if they stopped to see me all sprawled. When I came to, I was covered in my own blood. That cruel, cranky, concrete casket was stained red like bleach on your favorite pair of pants. I got up and started walking the two blocks home, but with joints of lead and the earth trying to swallow me whole, I collapsed multiple times. Two-thirds of the way home, I crumbled on the grass and couldn't get myself up. My vision started clouding, and in the summer air, I felt frozen, tough, and done. Through the haze, a black SUV/(UFO) pulled up beside me, and three or four figures leaped out. They propped me against a tree, murmured between themselves, and left me to let the last wind out my sail. They were ghostly white and faceless, with a funny way of saying “Kid, get up or buy the farm.” Aliens, angels, or animals?