It started before he was born.
His mother was eight weeks pregnant with him when she tumbled backwards down the escalator at the shopping centre. When he was a toddler, he managed to get hold of the plastic bag the shopping came home in. He was pulling it over his head when his mother screamed and took it away from him. There was the time he swallowed one of his plastic building blocks. There was another time when his mother saw him reach up for the handle of the saucepan that was boiling potatoes at the time. His mother caught him one day trying hard to push a metal nail file into a power socket. Of course, there was the time he fell into his uncle’s swimming pool. He was floating face down when they found him. It took a while to resuscitate him. Then, there was the day his father found him playing with his old service revolver. He was holding it up, peering down the barrel when his father came into the room.
Of course, there were numerous incidents, like falling out of bed, cutting himself on a tin opener, hitting his head on a cupboard door, burning his fingers when playing with matches, drinking paint stripper and setting light to his pajamas.
Somehow, he managed to survive all these.
That’s why it was so unexpected, when he stepped out in front of the truck.
