Holy &#!%

I was looking straight ahead as I walked toward my car on the 1100 block of Birchmont Drive. So when the driver of the blue VW bug about eight feet to my right applied her brakes, I only heard the skidding sound on the pavement. The sound alarmed me, so I glanced up as I stepped to the left, thinking something was wrong with the car. A moment later, a bang like gunfire and the sound of crumpling hoods. I jumped a few inches straight up, and took a few more quick steps to the left as both cars slid to a stop and shrapnel - chunks of bumpers and headlights - flew past my legs. A couple of pieces bounced lightly off my winter coat. I peered through the hissing cloud of steam billowing from both cars' radiators and waited for the drivers to emerge. I checked to make sure everyone was alright - she rubbed her chin and said she thought she was okay, and he just nodded and rubbed his shoulder - and that one of them had a phone to call help. He had a phone, and I didn't want to be a gawker, so I walked the thirty feet to my car and drove home to change my underwear. A couple of minutes later, it occurred to me that maybe I should have stayed, since I was the closest thing to a witness. But I think I would have been a pretty useless witness; I didn't see much, and only became aware that the second car was there after the crash. I did, however, hear the driver of that car - in an unwise attempt to either defend his driving skills or apologize - admit that his windshield wiper was broken and he couldn't see anything. Haha. Oops.