A few days had passed and Oscar, in his old blue Chevy, had successfully made it to Idaho Falls, Idaho; only ½ a day’s drive from there to Casper. Driving slightly over the speed limit, Oscar attracted the attention of a police officer who had been sitting idly by on the side of the road. Again the voice broke through a static in his ear, “Time is fleeting.”
“DON’T YOU THINK I KNOW THAT?!” Oscar belted out, “TIME IS FLEETING… TIME IS FLEETING!? WHAT THE HELL IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN!!?”
The voice surprisingly responded, “I mean you are going to die, Oscar.” The voice sounded bland, and serious. The voice gave Oscar chills up his spine.

The police officer was still following Oscar. Fog was starting to set and it had just rained. Oscar had come to a traffic jam. As he sat in his car, Oscar pulled his knees to his face and gradually got louder in saying,” this cannot be happening to me! I do not have time for this!” Oscar repeated this statement time after time until he was screaming in anger and frustration.
Suddenly Oscar realized what he had to do. Quickly, Oscar unbuckled his seatbelt, opened the door of his beloved old blue Chevy, and bolted through traffic. Although Oscar had left the car door open, it took the officer 5 minutes to notice Oscar was gone. The officer was furious and even worse… when he found out who the old blue Chevy belonged to, he screamed, because he’d let a killer get away.

Oscar was still running through traffic when he came across an ugly red Ford truck. Oscar didn’t have the time to be picky though. Oscar threw open the truck door and screamed at the plump man inside the vehicle. Oscar’s voice boomed as he yelled, “GET OUT AND LEAVE THE KEYS!” Oscar was taken aback by his own voice. He was scared. “What am I doing?” Oscar pondered, “I’m stealing from an innocent man, I’m running from the Government, and I murdered someone…” He thought about how he was becoming something he said he never would.
The stocky man he had yelled at had slipped out the passenger side of the car and was lying on the ground. He had left his keys and wallet in the car. Oscar peered his head over the right window of the truck. When he saw the man’s face he said “I’m so very sorry, please forgive me… but thank you for your forced generosity.”

As Oscar slid back to the driver’s seat he felt a tear roll down his cheek. It felt like a gentle, graceful roll, unlike the tears he usually got which were heavy and clumsy and felt as though they tumbled down his face and fell to their pending doom. Oscar took the next exit off the highway and stayed the night at a motel using the money he found in the plump man’s wallet.
That night Oscar sat in a bed that smelled of musk, strong perfume, and mold. He laughed as he said, “They must not clean the sheets here.” But then he was just disgusted because he figured it was probably true. Oscar began to cry again, not because he was upset, it was because he was angry. Oscar violently threw his fist at the wall beside him. The wall crumbled like stale bread. Oscar’s sobs grew louder and heavier.
Suddenly, Oscar slipped into a deep sleep with vivid dreams. “NO! NO!” the man in his dreams screamed. “I’m so sorry.” Oscar claimed as he put a bullet snugly between the man’s ocean blue eyes. Oscar woke with a cold sweat covering his body. He had adopted the smells of musk, strong perfume and mold from sleeping in the disgusting hotel bed.

Oscar left the motel as it was. He climbed into the ugly red Ford and he thought about how he missed his old blue Chevy. The engine revved and Oscar pulled away from the revolting motel. He was speeding, but as soon as he realized he was he slowed down because he didn’t need to attract the attention of another police officer. By three in the afternoon, Oscar has reached Casper, Wyoming.
He was looking for Richard’s yellow town house. It was located at 120 West Durbin Street. Oscar hadn’t seen Richard in about 20 years. During Oscar’s tough childhood, Richard was the only friend he had. When Oscar was 7, his parents got a divorce and after that, neither his mother nor father acknowledged that Oscar was even alive.

Oscar did everything and anything he ever wanted to and since he was 7, that was amazing. What he didn’t like was that he had to buy everything he needed by himself, and seeing he could not get money, he would either go out and beg, or steal from his mom. He also wanted to go to school more than anything… But it seemed impossible.

When Oscar turned 8, his mother started to beat him on a daily basis due to her alcohol problem. When he had turned 10, his mother broke his arm for the 5th time in a fit of rage. When Oscar arrived at the hospital by himself yet again, child services got involved. A tall, thin woman came to talk to Oscar after he had gotten a brand new cast on. As any 10 year old boy would be, Oscar was excited about the color; he had chosen a dark blue color and he loved it.
“Hi there, young man, what’s your name?” Jamie, the tall woman from child services asked.
“What’s it to ya?!” Oscars smile faded to a straight face.
“I don’t know… I’m just curious.” She replied.
“Well Ma says I’m not supposed to talk to strangers ‘cause they could hurt me.” Oscar said quietly as he looked at the floor. He felt ashamed lying to this nice lady because Oscars mother never told him anything about talking to strangers, quite frankly, he didn’t even think she cared.
“Oh is that so?” Jamie asked.
“Yeah-huh.” Oscar stated with a single nod of his head.
“Well what does your daddy say?” Jamie questioned.
“Same ‘xact thing.” Oscar said trying to sound convincing. Although he was sure he didn’t because for one thing, he hadn’t seen his father since he was 7, and for another thing, Jamie did not look convinced.
“Oh… well my name is Jamie. Now if you introduce yourself, we won’t be strangers anymore.” She smiled.
“I’m… Oscar.” He said hesitating.
“Well hello Oscar, it’s very nice to meet you.” Jamie laughed as she held out her hand to shake Oscars. Except the moment she raised her hand to meet his in the middle, Oscar coward in fear. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to frighten you.” She frowned as she lowered her hand back to her side. “So Oscar, what did you do to that arm of yours? Did you fall off the playground at school? Say, where do you go to school?” She looked at him quizzically.
Oscar began to cry as the truth spilled out. “I don’t go to school, I haven’t seen my father in three years, my ma hates me and she hurts me after she has her ‘daily alcohol’ as she calls it. I want to go to school. I want to be smart like all the other kids I know and see.” Oscar sobbed and tears streamed down his face.
“Would you like to come, and get away from all of that?” Jamie spoke softly trying not to startle Oscar again.
“But… What about Ma?” Oscar whispered.
“She’ll be fine.” Jamie smiled even though she knew Oscar’s mom was going to jail.

Oscar ended up living with Jamie. She fed him and sent him to school, fed him, and loved him like he was her own son. At school, Oscar met Richard and they became the best of friends. They knew everything about each other and they even attended college together. While Oscar was at college, Jamie was shot and killed in the middle of a bank robbery. As soon as he found out, he raced home immediately.
After the funeral, Oscar packed up and moved away from Casper, Wyoming. He was planning on leaving and never coming back. Yet here he was… in a hopeless effort to get home to Casper. All because he had accepted a job he was recruited for; the job where he was forced to kill a man.

Oscar had just passed his and Jamie’s old house, the realization that he used to live there made him snap back into reality. Richard’s house was just a block away. Minutes later he pulled up to the yellow town house. He approached the door while thinking, “Dare I bother Richard with my burden? It’s not even his problem… But I’ve come all this way….” So he knocked on the door.
A man with a bright orange mustache answered the door. He had the same honest eyes he had always had. It was Richard. Suddenly a little red haired boy peeked out from behind Richard’s leg and quietly asked, “Who is it daddy?”
“I’m not so sure.” Richard replied in a hushed tone, “go get your mother… tell her we have a guest.”
As soon as the little boy scampered off, Richard gave Oscar a toothy smile. “It seems like it’s been forever.”

Although Oscar wanted to wrap his arms around Richard and give him a big hug, he didn’t. Instead, he pulled Richard outside and slammed the door behind them. In a frantic slur of words, everything came pouring out of Oscar’s mouth nonstop when suddenly the voice returned.
“Time is fleeting Oscar. You are going to die.” Oscar’s words stopped abruptly.
“Wait. Wait. Why did you stop talking?! Continue! What happened? Oscar what happened? What’s wrong?” Richard questioned in a panicked voice.
When Oscar gained the ability to think clearly again he explained in full detail. “Richard, I’ve hurt someone. I’ve hurt someone real bad… I’ve taken a life. I didn’t mean to… I mean… I did but I shouldn’t have done it. I was hired. The Government hired me to murder a man that was interfering with one of their investigations and they didn’t want him to know what happened first so they hired me to kill him. Now they’re after me to cover up their horrible tracks. They don’t want America to know that the Government wanted someone murdered. In all honesty it was just for them to continue making money. It was all for profit.”

As Oscar finished his story, Richard’s son opened the door. He stepped out of the house along with the woman that Oscar assumed was Richard’s wife. She was stunning. As soon as he saw her smile, he recognized her.
It was Lisa Moore. Lisa Moore was the first and only girl Oscar had ever dated and he had left Casper with very little thought about what effect it would have on her. He had loved her. He was going to ask her to marry him. He had a ring and everything. It was a beautiful ring. But now it didn’t matter because he had left her alone and she had gone to Richard.
When Lisa saw the frustration in Oscar’s eyes she blushed and slightly giggled… The way she did that had not changed. And the way it made him want to laugh had not changed either.

Suddenly, Oscar felt a burning pain in his leg. He turned around, only to see the horrid sight of the black truck that had lured him into his terrible job in the first place. The burning sensation in his leg was caused by a tranquilizer dart. He noticed that everyone else got shot with one too, including Richard and Lisa’s son.
“Are you kidding me?! Youucoulddkkillllhimm.” Oscar’s words were incredibly slurred as he fell to the ground.

When Oscar woke up he was in a cage. Richard was on the ground in a bloody mess next to him. It looked like he had been caned with a large stick. Oscar sat and cried thinking that Richard was dead and it was all his fault. He practically killed his best friend all because he went to burden Richard’s happy life with his stupid problems. Richard suddenly made a jerking movement. He sat up and screamed in pain and agony.
“What have you done with my wife?! What have you done with my son!?!” Richard shrieked.
A voice came loud and booming over an intercom, “They’re fine. What is your name?!”
Richard spit blood in disgust. “You filthy, horrid people! You’re supposed to represent America and you do this in privacy! You have a country to run. My name is Richard Norman Smith and I say you can all go to hell!”

Suddenly a big, heavy looking man came out of the shadows with a plank of wood and smacked it into Richard’s leg. Richard’s leg clearly was broken as he screamed in pain.

The voice came over the intercom again, but this time sounding like they were playing some sort of sick game. “How do you like the show Oscar?”

“It’s sick, you’re sick and you’re crazy. Let Him go live in peace with his family.” Oscar screamed in terror.

“Oh, now I can’t do that. He knows too much.” The man on the intercom laughed. Suddenly, a bullet went flying through a pane of glass. Oscar couldn’t tell which way it was going. Then, over the intercom, Oscar only heard static. When he looked over at Richard, Richard was holding a small hand gun.

Richard snorted up the blood that was dripping out of his nose as he said “That’ll teach you to mess with my family.” Weakly and just barely getting up, he hobbled over to Oscar’s cage and let him out. Oscar helped carry Richard out of the dark room they were in. When they got out of the room, they saw Richards’s family. Lisa was in tears as she hugged Richard. “I love you.” They both whispered to each other. Oscar apologized to Richard for getting him into the whole mess. And again, they departed and went their separate ways. Before Oscar left town in the old red ford, he decided to visit Jamie’s grave.

He recited his favorite poem by Robert Frost, the poem Reluctance.
“Out through the fields and the woods
And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
And looked at the world and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
And lo, it is ended.
The leaves are all dead on the ground,
Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
When others are sleeping.
And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown hither and thither;
The last lone aster is gone;
The flowers of the witch-hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question 'Whither?'
Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?”
Oscar cried as he recited the poem. He told Jamie he loved her and he walked away slowly, remembering everything she had ever taught him. He climbed in the truck, and drove out of state. No one, not even Richard had seen him since that day.