Traffic light red.
The pedestrian signal changed.
She looked both directions twice.
Her father had taught her that.
One look told you what traffic was doing.
The second sometimes told you what people had changed their minds about doing.
The Little Girl started across.
Crutches clicked against painted asphalt.
A delivery van waited.
An elderly driver smiled and raised a hand.
She crossed successfully.
One curb remained.
The Little Girl carefully lifted herself onto it.
She was tired.
Her arms had done most of the work at therapy.
The muscles beneath her shoulders burned.
But the car was less than a block away.
She could see her mother.
Then somebody struck her.
There was no warning.
No shouted excuse.
No time to brace.
A body hit the Little Girl’s right shoulder from behind and slightly sideways.
Her right crutch flew.
The left slipped.
Her injured leg twisted enough to frighten her before pain even arrived.
The stuffed bunny left her arm.
The sidewalk rushed upward.
The Little Girl hit pavement.
One palm scraped concrete.
Her elbow followed.
The cast-like supportive wrap around her lower leg protected the worst injury.
The bunny bounced once.
Then rolled off the curb.
Into the street.
For half a second, nobody moved.
Then everything happened at once.
Someone shouted.
A woman gasped.
A car braked.
The teenage boy who had collided with her stumbled forward three steps.
He caught himself.
Turned.
The Little Girl lay on one hip.
Her face had gone pale.
The teenager looked seventeen.
Maybe sixteen.
Dark athletic shorts.
Running shoes.
Gray hoodie tied around his waist.
Wireless earbuds.
Phone in one hand.
He looked startled.
Then embarrassed.
Then defensive.
It all happened across his face before he spoke.
“I didn’t see you.”
The Little Girl stared.
Her eyes filled.
She looked toward the street.
“My bunny.”
That was all she cared about.
The teenager looked down the sidewalk as though calculating whether continuing to run could make the problem disappear.
That was when the Biker moved.
He had been sitting outside the diner thirty yards away.
Coffee on the metal table.
Black motorcycle parked at the curb.
Worn leather vest.
Charcoal T-shirt.
Faded jeans.
Heavy boots.
Tattooed arms.
Gray-brown beard.
The kind of appearance that made people make decisions before conversation began.
The Biker was fifty-two.
He had noticed the Little Girl earlier because people on crutches changed the flow of pedestrian traffic.
Most pedestrians unconsciously moved around them.
Some slowed.
Some stared.
Some overcorrected so dramatically that their attempt at politeness became its own obstacle.
The Biker noticed movement.
That was simply how his mind worked.
Motorcycle riding trained attention into habit.
Cars.
Doors.