I want to tell something.

[Eric Georges Charles Weets]

I want to tell something that happened more than 40 years ago, to be precise 43 years. And in spite of the fact that this event occured so far in the past, I remember it so clear and bright as if it happened yesterday, probably because of the immensity of the impact it had on me that morning I stood there, not far from the church, in front of the butcher’s shop, waiting on the 65 to come.

I planned to go with the bus to Antwerp city where my mother lived that time. Not so much to bring a visit to the woman who brought me into this world, no, I wanted to take my chances with what was, according to me and my best friend Desiree’s opinion, one of the most beautiful creature on earth, something that you normally saw only in expensive fashion magazines or in dreams, which never come true.

This one in millions stayed on the other side of the street, where my mother and her companion Klem, lived and had a good running television antenna business. The beauty with the gracious name, Anita, was the daughter of the owners of the hardware store and luckily for me, my mother knew them on a friendly basis, so I had in a manner of speaking, already one foot in the house.

==I stood there watching my own reflection, more proud as a male peacock in all his glory, in the shop window of the butcher. For the first time in my life I was wearing, from shoes to tie, what I liked.

Before, grandmother had the last word when it was going about choosing a wardrobe, because she carried the purse, which gave her the utmost power. However, on that era came an end from the moment I started earning my own money.

It was only a few days before that I bought myself, without asking anybody’s advice, a pair of Beatles boots with elastic on the side, white synthetic socks, a fire red Bell bottoms pants, a shirt all over decorated with tiny colored flowers, a leather tie and a black Beatle coat with silver buttons till the neck. With my slightly curly hair that touched my shoulders lightly, I could surely not look any better I thought and felt for once, extremely self sure.

It started drizzling. This worried me. If the bus stayed away for long, I would look, in no time, as somebody who took a shower with his clothes on, and that was not the idea. Grandmother advised me before I left, to put one of her plastic hair caps which looked like a transparent bag, in my pocket. One of that kind old women kept, in the 50’s, on their heads, to keep the curls dry so they did not fall apart in the rain. I asked her if she lost her mind.

Because the road made an almost 90 degrees turn at the corner, around 50 meters away from where I stood, it was impossible to see the bus coming from distance. Therefore, I looked in the opposite direction. If I saw a 65 coming from that side, from Antwerp to be precise, I knew that the bus I was waiting on, should stop in front of me in about 10 minutes or so.

After plus minus 15 minutes of impatient waiting, I saw in distance a bus slowly approaching. I focused my eyes on the numbers displayed in the light box above the windscreen, but I could not see yet if it was a 65.

The light box became bigger and bigger the more the bus progressed in my direction, and a few seconds later I saw clearly the number 65. Simultaneously, and this to my surprise, I also saw, in the left corner of my left eye, a foggy red shine, which came from the break lights of a dark blue Mercedes. The screaming sound of burning rubber on asphalt sounded loudly in my ears. I turned my head in a reflex, in the direction where the noise came from.

I saw a boy 9 maybe 10 years of age on a cycle being picked up from behind by the Mercedes, and launched approximately 2 or 3 meters into the air to crash down, with a cry going through marrow and bone, half on the windshield, half on the hood of the car.

A strong current stream ran through my veins, when I saw the boy a second later, as if it was in slow motion, rolling from the hood to land sadly on the asphalt, next to the front wheel. For a moment, my heart stopped beating and all sound seemed to be turned off.

I saw cars parking in front of the accident, I saw cyclists putting their cycles on the side of the road, I saw people running out of there front doors. In no time 20 maybe 30 people gathered around the boy in shorts, laying there motionless with his arms spread, face to the ground.

Somebody picked up the boys leather school bag laying there in the middle of the street. Also his cycle was taken from the road and put straight up against the wall of the ice cream parlor. Albert, the owner of the ice cream parlor came running out of his shop with a light blue blanket and covered the child with it carefully.

Because of all the people standing around this spot of misfortune I could not see much of what was really going on, nevertheless, I heard a man crying and screaming and asking God with a sad voice, “why”. I heard Albert of the ice cream parlor shouting at the crying man, most probably the driver of the car that he had to keep his voice down. I also heard Albert asking the man, in a very unfriendly tone, if he was drunk maybe. I thought that Albert’s question was totally inappropriate and out of order and it surprised me that it came out of Albert’s mouth, because I knew him as a friendly person.

There, I had been taken in completely by what was going on further up the road, I did not hear my bus coming. So when she stopped in front of me, making that typical crunching sound busses make, when they open this automatic doors, I got so frightened that I jumped half a meter in the air.


The bus driver asked me loudly as if he thought I was deaf, “are you coming with us” I acted like I did not hear him and stepped calmly inside. The driver went immediately in first gear before I could grab the pole in front of me, so I went nicely with my head against that thing. I lost my balance for a second time, when I was counting coins in the palm of my hand, because that fool of a bus driver had to showoff with the brakes. I gave the driver correct change, he gave me my ticket with that kind of a smile on his face which said, “I got you almost, didn’t I?”

I ignored him graciously, put myself on my knees on the first seat and watched through the window. In spite of running water drops on the window, I could pick up a good glimpse of the place where the accident happened, while passing. More people than before stood there now in a kind of circle. Over the heads of the spectators, I saw a man in a dark grey suit, the driver of the Mercedes most likely, sitting with his legs crossed, back against his car, on the asphalt. He held the hand of the boy, who lay there from head to toe, covered with a light blue blanket, in his right hand. With a white handkerchief in his left he cleaned his nose continuously. The man’s head looked red and swollen, extremely sad, for sure not drunk. I could know because I knew very well how drunk people look. Don’t break open my mouth. I spent a big part of my young life between drunks and I myself too was not afraid of the smell of beer.

The bus was going too fast, I could not see anything anymore. While I turned around to sit down on a more comfortable way, I heard the sirens of an ambulance. I thought by myself, they were also not in a hurry.

I saw the bus driver watching me through the mirror above him, I knew what he was thinking, “Again one long hair, shy of working, good for nothing”. If I saw people watching me in this way, under normal circumstances, I would give them, almost automatically, the middle finger, but this time, it did not interest me a bit. My mind was still with that highly unfortunate accident.

I could not get the picture of the flying and crashing boy out of my head. Over and over again, I saw him going in to the air, every time I closed my eyes. Also that man jumping out of his car, with his arms up in the sky, completely out of his mind, got engraved in my brain.

I knew how and why the accident happened because I was very familiar with that stretch of the Kappelsesteenweg, in front of Albert’s ice cream parlor. I could tell out of my own experience that, especially when the road was a little wet and the front and back wheel of your cycle got between the cycle path tiles and the asphalt, there was a big chance that you went on your face. And that there, just that moment, a car happen to pass by, is really pure bad luck, more you cannot say of it.

I knew, for 100 percent, where the boy came from. You could see that easily on the dress he was wearing and the school bag he had with him. He was a student of the Saint Michael College, which was located, around a kilometer further up the Kappelsesteenweg on the left side. That monk’s college was one of this kind of schools, where the rich Catholics let their children study. A school for the elite of the area you can say, or the ones who thought to be the elite. Anyway, nice religious people.

I, then, nevertheless raised as a kind of Roman Catholic, not so religious anymore, could not ignore the thought that passed my mind while I sat down in a more comfortable position, that if there was a God, he was not looking very well after his own people. This accident was so freaky, so absurd, so stupid, so painful and sad that it was almost surreal. In a fraction of a second, a curtain fell and a young life came to an end. Nobody will hear his voice, laughter or crying maybe, anymore. From here on only decay, I thought and it made me shiver.