HUM by Dan Hawley (chromebook ebook reader TXT) 📕

If the couple were lucky, they would walk past a fishing boat cleaning their catch and get to see a lighthearted show of seals arguing over which one gets the next scrap of fish guts thrown from the boat.

The harbor was fairly quiet when Jason and Samantha arrived. A few boats swam lazily along the channel. An older couple passed by, holding hands and looking like something out of a Nicholas Sparks movie.

“So cute!” Samantha gushed and grasped Jason’s arm tighter.

The two continued their stroll along the seawall. An amazing assortment of boats and yachts were moored to the wooden piers. There were bright, brand-new white cruisers. There were beat-up old sailing boats, not pretty, but seaworthy. Mixed in, here and there, were even a few interesting-looking houseboats. One was two stories, painted red with yellow window frames. Four giant windows allowed people to see right into the small, basic rooms.

“How’d you like to live there?” Jason asked with a light elbow to Samantha’s arm.

“I don’t know,” she said, eyeing the floating house suspiciously. “I think I prefer solid ground.”

As they rounded the corner on the paved pathway, three cyclists sped past, dinging their bells in warning. Jason watched them go, lost in thought about how he ought to be getting more exercise and if maybe he should give biking a go.

“Hey, watch out!” a voice shouted.

Suddenly, Jason was ripped from his thoughts by the squeal of brakes and a flash of pain. A cyclist had been moving way too fast from behind the cedar hedge, and when he merged with the pathway, he had collided with Jason with a thud. The cyclist flew over the handlebars like some spandex-clad seagull, clipping Jason’s shoulder, and landed on the pavement in a heap. Jason spun and fell back hard against the pavement, hitting his tailbone and skinning his palms. The bike flipped a complete three-sixty, bounced once on its tires, and crashed to the ground with the mechanical sound of its chain rubbing against the sprocket.

The bike came to rest with the back tire spinning wildly, Samantha looking on in horror. By some stroke of luck, she had emerged unscathed. The cyclist groaned, and Jason remained sitting on the ground, bewildered.

“Jason!” Sam half screamed, “are you ok!?”

She moved to squat beside him where he sat, dazed; his arms stretched out behind him, propping him up.

“Yeah, shit. I think so,” Jason replied. “Jesus Christ.” He looked over at the lump of cyclist and felt anger begin to simmer in his guts.

His shoulder throbbed, and it hurt to move. Jason got up anyway—slowly. Once up, he took stock of himself, checking bones for breaks and feeling around in his shoulder for the source of its pain. Nothing broken or dislocated, he diagnosed. Jason rolled his shoulder gingerly and took a step toward the cyclist. A shooting pain suddenly poked at Jason’s brain, and he staggered. A faint, high-pitched note sounded in his ears. Jason instinctively reached up with both hands and held his head, working to hold his skull together. The ringing grew louder, and he plugged his ears with his fingers to stop the sound, but it was no use. The sound was already inside. Jason shook his head as his vision began to blur. He stopped and stared blankly down at the cyclist. The quickly oscillating waves of the ringing modulated and slowed inside Jason’s head. The sharpness became a dull throb. It became familiar as slow waves pulsed behind his eyes. The hum hammered slowly on his eardrums as he stared at the source of his physical pain.

“I said what the fuck were you thinking, dude!?” Jason’s voice erupted from pain and anger.

The cyclist was crumpled over, face down, holding his stomach. He groaned. The cyclist wore a black helmet that Jason could see was cracked and barely holding on around the man’s head. Good thing he was wearing that helmet, Jason thought, that would have cracked his skull open like an egg.

“Hey, dickhead!”

This time Jason reached out his leg to coax the cyclist to roll over and face the man he had almost killed. The cyclist did roll over onto his back, and a grating half groan, half gurgle escaped his throat. Jason bent over the man with a clenched fist ready to fly.

“You stupid son of a bi—”

Jason stopped cold.

His fist softened and slowly lowered. The noise in his mind cleared and only a headache remained. The cyclist was just lying there, half conscious, staring at the sky without seeing it. A trickle of blood was running down his forehead and began to pool in his right eye socket. His right arm looked like a question mark, broken in at least two places, Jason guessed. The cyclist’s right leg looked like it was screwed on backwards.

“Babe, call 911.”

Samantha snapped out of her daze, grabbed her phone from her back pocket, and dialed. Samantha and Jason couldn’t do much but stand there and wait with the broken cyclist. He was beaten up pretty bad, but he was conscious and not bleeding to death from what they could see. People started to gather around, curiously horrified by the scene. Jason absently switched back and forth from rubbing his shoulder and tailbone while not-so-politely reminding people to stand back.

The cyclist lay clutching his broken arm to his body, his forehead beaded with sweat and mixed with blood. Shock had fully consumed him, and he had the look of a trapped and terrified animal. Jason knew that look and pitied the man.

“You’re alright,” Jason said, half lying. “The ambulance is on the way. You’re alright.”

Samantha was sitting on a nearby bench, watching the scene intently. She was concerned for both men and thankful she had somehow been spared. It felt like life was working in slo-mo as she sat there on the bench, waiting for help. Two bike cops rolled up and took charge of the scene. They asked Jason what happened and took his statement.

He couldn’t help feeling a little déjà