The Boy and The Bike (by Brian Van Slyke)

The boy with the blue and red bike made it clear to the hill that he was not afraid to go down it. The hill stood there and taunted the boy. Walking the red and blue bike to edge of the hill, the boy peered over and saw a distance to the bottom that was probably somewhere near one million feet steep. The tall, green trees laughed at the boy. The boy puffed out his chest and the trees went silent.
The black asphalt that leads the way to the bottom of the hill had no particular emotions about this epic event. It was just an asphalt road that’s sole purpose was to be tread on and to allow other people to use it for their own means. But the asphalt didn’t care, because it never knew any alternative. It didn’t care if the boy made it to the bottom of the hill and pumped his arms excitedly in the air with triumph, or if the boy fell on his way down the hill and cracked his skull open with his brains splattering everywhere. What did the asphalt care if it had splattered brains all over it? Who did the asphalt have to impress?
The hill, on the other hand, had great interest in this event. Just as it had great interest in every car or bike that went up or down the hill. Ever since that damn asphalt road came along, the hill was being used. No longer was it a haven for rabbits and foxes, bees and flowers, worms and all those other beautiful bugs. Now most of its trees were cut down and the cars pumped their exhaust out into the hill’s lungs. The hill wanted the boy to fail, just like it wanted every car to fail as it went up or down the hill. Whether a tree fell in the boy’s path or he hit a rock on the road, the hill would not allow the boy to make it down alive. No more bikes, no more cars, no more sneakers pounding along the road. Only the boy’s brains splattered all over that damn asphalt.
The bike was probably more excited than the boy about going down the hill. The boy had always ridden the red and blue bike a block this way and then a block that way. The boy lived on top of a hill that was blocked on one end by a long fence that belonged to the crazy neighbors and on the other end was blocked by that amazingly steep descent of a hill that the boy had always been afraid of. The bike, being a bike, and having the instincts of a bike, wanted to travel far and long. But the boy kept the bike in the garage where it was dark and lonely because the garage was always mopey and the cars thought they were too good to be friends with the bike. Well, now, it was the bike’s moment to shine. It loved when the boy rode it, but it was getting tired of just seeing the same old road. It needed to get out, to go down the hill, to see what was beyond the hill, to know more than that depressed garage and those snotty cars. The bike would feel the exhilaration of its wheels ripping across the asphalt and screaming goodbye to the world the hill confined it to.