The hill on Alpine Road looked steeper than I remembered. My tires hissed over loose gravel as I rounded a bend in Portola Valley. Below, the canyon dropped away in a blur of oak trees and shadows. A pickup truck pulled up behind me, its engine growling. The road narrowed. The truck stayed close—too close. My hands tightened on the handlebars. A patch of gravel skidded beneath my front tire. The bike lurched. For one sickening second, I felt weightless. Then the tires caught the road. The truck blasted past, but my heart beat kept racing long after it disappeared.
Swetha Amit secured an MFA from University of San Francisco. The author of a memoir and three chapbooks, she has appeared in Bending Genres, Ghost Parachute.