The blue, four door sedan rolled along the freeway, thick with holiday traffic, towards the city. Allen Springer and his wife, Jeanne, were taking advantage of the holiday from work to take their two sons, A.J., and Stephen to the zoo on the other side of the city.

A.J. and Stephen were locked into mortal combat by virtue of the connecting cable strung between the electronic games each of them held. Their world was restricted to the collection of transistors, resistors, and liquid crystal displays of the games. Allen and Jeanne were locked into the inevitable, never-ending discussion related to modern day parenting.

"Sweetheart," Allen glanced through the rear-view mirror at his sons, insuring that they were absorbed in their game, "all I'm saying is that neither of them will amount to much unless we can teach them to face their fears head on." Allen was referring to swimming classes for the boys that had failed miserably.

Each of the boys had expressed interest in learning to swim, and seeing the wisdom behind the knowledge, their parents registered them at a local YMCA for lessons. Before the first week was up, the instructors had to claim their first defeat. Neither of the two Springer boys would so much as get in the pool, let alone learn to swim. Their fear of water had proven too great.

"Honey, I know, but still I don't think that we can push them too hard. They're still young, and if they're not ready, they're not ready." Jeanne was still remembering her own experience learning to swim; her uncle, Hiram, had thrown her into the middle of the pond on his farm and walked away. It was up to Jeanne to survive, and consequently, learn to swim. She felt her experience, and the way it imprinted on her affected their sons attitude towards water.

Allen started to answer, but stopped, realizing that the discussion was going down a well-worn path, not towards a valid conclusion, but instead towards more indecision and confusion. At the same time he realized that traffic was becoming more heavy, and he needed to concentrate more on the cars, trucks, buses, and recreational vehicles surrounding them.

He was silent for a few moments, letting billboards slide past them, along with mile markers, exits and overpasses. "Do you suppose that you and I need to teach them? I mean by way of example. That was how I learned." As he finished the comment, he looked over at Jeanne.

He was mesmerized by what he saw. In the lane next to them, a station wagon was following a flat-bed trailer too closely, and was in turn being followed too closely by a large recreational vehicle. For some reason, traffic suddenly slowed in that lane, and the truck driver braked accordingly. So did the station wagon, but the recreational vehicle didn't.

In considerably less time than it takes to describe, the truck driver slowed, the station wagon slowed, the recreational vehicle acted like a hammer, driving the station wagon's hood deep under the back end of the empty flat bed trailer. The concussion of being struck from behind jerked the driver of the station wagon backwards, and as his car drove under the trailer, threw him back forwards in a violent action.

Allen Springer reacted without thinking. He verified that the road ahead of him was clear, and that the shoulder was available. He braked to a stop, not saying a word to Jeanne or the kids, put the car in park, and bolted across the freeway to where the trio of vehicles had come to rest. As he dodged across the two traffic lanes on foot, the truck driver leapt to the ground and ran towards the back of his trailer.

The driver and Allen arrived at the drivers side of the station wagon at the same time. Both, without speaking, began to check for injury to the stunned driver of the station wagon. It was hard to tell if the driver was suffering from internal injuries, and Allen was about to mention leaving him in place until the ambulance arrived, when the truck driver simply pointed towards the rear end of the station wagon. What started as a wisp of smoke soon began billowing into a column and threatened to become even more.

Without a word passing between them, Allen and the truck driver soon had extracted the driver of the station wagon from his vehicle. Before he realized it, Allen was supporting the semi-conscious man while the truck driver jumped back in his rig and pulled the truck apart from the station wagon and parked further ahead and off the freeway. By the time he returned to Allen and the other driver, the station wagon was totally engulfed in flames.

The traffic on the freeway had come to a halt in the lane where the collision had occurred, and drivers were trying to squeeze into the other lane to pass the accident. Allen looked to the burning vehicle, and the thought of an explosion crossed his mind. Once he was sure that the truck driver had the injured man firmly in hand, Allen dodged his way back across the two lanes. Leaping into his own car, Allen had thought to just pull further ahead to be out of the range of the coming explosion of gasoline and other volatile automotive petrochemicals. Instead he found himself caught by the escaping traffic and before he knew it, they were back on the freeway, heading towards the zoo like nothing had happened.

He looked over at his wife. She sat there, stiff and white, staring straight out the car, her eyes looking neither to the right or left. He glanced into the rear-view mirror and saw his sons, oblivious to the world around them, still engrossed in their electronic game. He held a hand in front of his face, and noticed only then that he was shaking in fear.

Later, as the family meandered their way around the zoo, Jeanne asked Allen what had come over him. He couldn't explain, other than to say that he saw some one needing help, and felt compelled to offer that help. He admitted to being scared, but not until it was over, and they were a mile or two away from the scene of the accident. It was the last time they discussed it.

The rest of the summer passed without the two Springer children learning to swim. Allen and Jeanne were still searching for a way to teach the two children to overcome their own fears and take action that contradicted their fears. From time to time, as Allen drove the freeway into and out of town, he soon forgot the episode of the accident, even when passing over the large, burn-scarred place on the shoulder of the road.

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