Fast Food Horror - Season 2 Episode 5 - The Scene on Route 16

Cooper picks up more then he bargined for in a snowstorm along Route 16

Episode Transcript

(00:33):
Welcome to fast food horror. Inthis episode, a good Samaritan picks up
a stranded person along the road duringa snowstorm, but he picks up a
lot more than he ever expected.In this tale entitled the Scene en Route

(00:58):
sixteen by E. J. Miller, the snowfall in my town has been
greatly exaggerated over the decades, youknow where. I speak of one mega

(01:19):
blizzard in the seventies, and we'reforever known as Snowmageddon Capital of the world.
Yes, we get our share overthe course of the winter, but
we are not feet deep in it. From October till April. We get
our squalls, our lake effect,our blizzards, but for the most part,

(01:40):
we get light snowfalls here and therethrough the winter months that make us
look like a Rockwellian snow globe,just enough to keep our town a wintry
wonderland. That day, however,was one of the former. I was
driving my bus at Gtopos, Ithink down sixteen on that frosty night.

(02:01):
I say Route sixteen because I couldn'tsee any landmarks, signs, houses,
businesses, or scenery to figure outexactly where I was. It was just
the last road I remember being onFor all I knew, I was driving
in circles across some farmer's field,or still in the mall parking lot,

(02:22):
doing laps around the light pole.It was snowing so hard. I felt
like Hans Solo as he took theMillennium Falcon to light speed, traveling through
nothing but darkness as blurs of millionsof white stars whizzed past the window,
or in my case, millions ofsnowflakes racing past my windshield at ten miles

(02:43):
an hour. And before you say, why didn't you use your GPS or
whip out your cell phone? Andthis was in the days before GPS and
cell phones. This was the lateeighties, the days of maps and the
Rand McNally, the days of pullingover and asking a kind stranger for directions,

(03:04):
or dropping a quarter in a phonebooth to call for help. I
had none of these. I couldn'teven see the last two, nor did
I want to exit the warmth andrelative safely of my posgto to find either.
I just knew I needed to keepmoving slowly, carefully, or end

(03:27):
up stuck and buried. An hourlater, my dogged perseverance was rewarded or
at least I thought it was,as in the distance I saw the familiar
flashing red and blue lights signifying emergencyvehicles, like so many lighthouses, dancing
against the snowy night sky. Probablyan accident for some poor soul. But

(03:51):
help was there at those lights,help I could use, or at least
some guidance. I found myself joininga procession of vehicles slowly making their way
in each other's ruts, in asingle file of pulsing red lights along the
snow covered road. Past the scene, an officer waved me through. I

(04:13):
rolled down my window and heard himyell, you're almost out of the storm.
Just keep going, don't stop,just go slow. I waved and
I smiled shouted back a thank youas my eyes took in the scene.
A small compact, something no longeridentifiable, had been rear ended by a

(04:35):
semi and pushed into a second semi. The air bags had deployed, now
smeared with red glass broken out ofeach window of the car, its once
sleek lines jammed between the two trucksinto a mangled mess. I set a
silent prayer for its passengers and continuedpast, focused on the road ahead my

(05:02):
focus was broken only fifty yards fromthe accident, seen by eyes drawn to
the slight figure illuminated by my headlights standing knee deep in the snow along
the right side of the road.There she stood alone, a teenage girl
about thirteen, brown hair, flyingin the icy wind, clutching her arms

(05:26):
around herself and the light blue coatthat seemed oversized for her small frame and
woefully inadequate for the conditions out there. Tears rolled down her cheeks, and
her body physically shook from either thefrigid conditions or her outward showing of emotion

(05:47):
or both. Where did she comefrom? Had she got out of one
of the cars ahead of me?Was she involved in the accident? Or
had she been caught walking in thesnow from the surrounding area. Was she
hurt? How long had she beenout there? And how had no one
else seen her or stopped to helpher? No matter, I couldn't leave

(06:12):
her, but I would have tostop quickly or else become just another snowbank.
I quickly rolled down my window asI got closer and yelled for her
to get in the back. AsI turned the heat all the way up,
I watched in my rear view asshe got in the car, still
sobbing, and put the car backand drive thankfully. It continued along the
rutted path, now quickly filling upwith snow. Hey, I said,

(06:40):
I'm Cooper. What's your name?Are you hurt? Where's your parents?
Were you in a car? Andgot out? Each question was answered with
continued sobs. I continued driving slowlyforward, looking in my rear view periodically
to check out my passenger. Ican take you home. Still more sobs.

(07:03):
As I rejoined the line of cars. My passenger, sitting in the
rear seat had down, legs drawnup to her chest, light blue coat
wrapped tightly around herself, more nowfor comfort than warmth. Were you in
the accident? Finally a response,rapid head nods than a break in the

(07:25):
sobbing, A choked voice. Mydad. They took my dad to the
hospital. They took your dad tothe hospital. He was hurt in the
accident. More head nods, followedby crying and then a muffled Sarah,

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before the crying continued. Your nameis Sarah, Okay, Sarah, I
can take you there. The hospital? Is that where you want to go?
More head nods, and sobbing myheart just for this little girl,
For Sarah, I was determined toget her to the hospital, no matter
the storm. I continued on forforty five minutes or so, the storm

(08:11):
starting to lighten up as we enteredthe city limits and we made our way
to Sisters of Mercy Hospital. Weentered through the emergency room doors, since
that's where I thought they'd take aperson involved in a car accident. I
sat Sarah down in a waiting roomchair, where she continued to sob softly,
and went to the front desk forinformation. Imagine a city emergency room

(08:35):
during a storm after midnight, thenincreased that by ten it was a madhouse,
but not yet pandemonium. I triedto explain the situation to the attendant
amongst the other noise and action goingon around us, that I had picked
up a teenage girl at an accidenton Route sixteen and her father had been

(08:58):
brought in by ambulance, That shewas unhurt but needed to be rejoined with
her father, whom she was verydistraught over. The attendant took this all
in, asked if I was anyrelation to Sarah or the father, then
told me to go sit and waitand someone would be right with us.

(09:20):
I returned to my seat next toSarah, who continued to quietly cry amazingly,
not disturbing a soul around us.Apparently everyone was caught up in their
own problems. Right with us turnedinto three hours, even though I checked
with every other attendant who was atthe desk area randomly every thirty minutes or

(09:41):
so, I swear they answer everyonewith the same line, no matter the
circumstance, someone will be right withyou. At about four am, I
had had enough. I marched upto the desk, blowing past any others
waiting in line, and I demandedI wanted to see a manager or someone

(10:01):
in charge. That we had waitedalmost four hours with nothing, no answers,
that a teenage girl had sat weepingwaiting for any news on her father.
My yelling had gotten a response,not the one I wanted, though
it had triggered two security guards whohad rushed in from some unseen doorway.

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After a brief yelling match, whichthey won, they ushered me out of
the waiting area to a security office, where I was cuffed until I calmed
down. After I collected myself,I was told by the bigger of the
pair to retell my story from thebeginning, which I did, starting at
driving through the storm on Route sixteen, coming upon the accident to find the

(10:50):
girl. When I got to thepart where I first approached the front desk
at the hospital, the second guardsaid stopped from behind a bank of monitors
and beckoned his partner over. Iheard them whispering and saw them pointing to
something on the screens. The firstguard came back over and stood me up
and walked me to the monitors.The second guard walked me through what they

(11:13):
were pointing at. Now, theseare all the security cameras in the waiting
area and the entrances to the hospitaland such. In the top right hand
corner you can see the time anddate stamp. Now you said you came
in just after midnight through the emergencyroom doors. Let's rewind. Ah.

(11:33):
Here you are at twelve eleven.Notice anything, I was alone. Here
you are walking down the hallway andentering the emergency room area. At twelve
thirteen. Notice anything. Here youare walking over to an empty chair before
walking over to the front desk.At twelve sixteen. Notice anything. And

(11:56):
here you are at twelve twenty onetill four to oh nine, sitting by
your self next to an empty chairin the waiting room. Again, sir,
notice anything. I couldn't explain it. I had watched every angle of
the waiting room and the entrance doors, and there was no signs of the

(12:18):
Sarah in the light blue coat thatI had picked up off the roadside.
Every angle was covered, there wasno blind spot, there was no angle
that was left open. There Iwas alone. I sat there trying to
figure this out, trying to makethis all make sense. The guards just

(12:41):
sat and watched me. The silencein the room was broken by the ringing
of a nearby telephone. Guard onewalked over and he picked it up.
He mumbled a couple of ascents beforeplacing the receiver back in the cradle and
walking back to us behind the monitors. He stood there, watching me for

(13:01):
what seemed like forever. He thencleared his throat and informed me that there
was indeed an accident on Root sixteenthat night, that a gentleman was brought
in by ambulance from the scene whohad suffered multiple injuries, as well as
the passenger his young daughter. Bothhad to be extracted from the car.

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No other person were found at thescene, just the daughter and him,
Just Peter Wolf and Sarah. Hisdaughter. Peter had died in the hospital
just a few hours ago. Sarahhad passed at the scene. The scene

(13:54):
on Route sixteen.