The Honda bounced over the bump in the road. Karen told herself it was nothing, just a lane marker, nothing to worry about at all, no reason to stop.

She followed Dr. Birnbaum's instructions to the letter. If she hit a bump on the road, she wasn't to stop to see what she had hit. Potholes and poor road construction were to be expected, just part of the driving experience. A body wasn't being dragged under the wheels of her car. It was a chemical imbalance in her brain telling her the wrong information, feeding on her fears.

But that hadn't always been true. A body had been caught under the wheels of her car once--her own daughter. How could any mother run down her own child?

But Karen had.

Laurie had been three at the time and Karen hadn't seen her when she reversed out of the garage. Karen thought she was still inside the house. But, the inquisitive child had wanted to wave her mother into the street like a traffic cop and stood directly in Karen's blind spot.

Karen hadn't seen Laurie until it was too late, until she heard the screams. Laurie had been lucky, nothing but a concussion and couple of stitches that would heal in a few days. But Karen didn't heal--she got worse.

Two days after the accident, Karen was driving back from the store when she felt the car ride over something. She checked her rearview mirror. The old man waiting at the crosswalk was missing.

Oh God, I've mowed him down, just like Laurie! Karen slammed on the brakes. The Honda slued to the right and rode the curb. She knew what she would find--the old man's tattered body entangled in the driveshaft and wheels. If she was lucky, he might be alive. Karen leapt from the car and flung herself on the ground. Nothing was underneath the car--no body, no bloodstains in the road, no shredded clothes--no horror.

From that moment on, every time Karen felt a jolt, she stopped, sure that she had taken a life with her car. It was impossible for her to drive without someone else with her. Tom--her poor, suffering husband--had to ride shotgun, repeatedly telling her not to worry and that she hadn't just committed automobile homicide. The final straw came when she stopped I-80's San Francisco-bound traffic. Believing a woman was trapped under her car, Karen stopped in the middle lane to save her. Luckily, the rush-hour drivers had their wits about them and no one slammed into Karen while she scrabbled under her car, but four other vehicles collided with each other causing extensive damage. The courts had no option but to revoke her license. The judge added the stipulation that she had to seek psychological help.

That had been two years ago and now she was on her first solo drive. It wasn't easy. She had to use every one of Dr. Birnbaum's exercises and the belief in herself, not to pull the car over to check under the wheels.

Dr. Birnbaum had made her mission clear at their first consultation. "Karen, you've got to be strong. You've got to get angry at this monster that haunts you. Yes, Karen, it's a monster. And you've got to kick its butt if you want to drive the way you used to."

The Honda shuddered from another hit and Karen got angry. "I didn't hit anything except for a bump in the road. You're my monster and every time I ignore you banging on my car, you get smaller. Do you hear me monster? Or are you getting too small to hear?" she shouted.

Her monster was silenced.

She felt confident. It was working. She was giving her monster hell and it didn't like it. She smiled.

It was worth the agony she had been through for this moment. To acclimatize her to different sensations, Dr. Birnbaum had made her drive over objects in a parking lot to replicate every conceivable kind of bump in the road.

"You see Karen, your monster has robbed you of your driving experiences. He's got your knowledge locked up and you've got to release it. You've got to learn the difference between a body and a tin can," he said.

He made Karen run over bags of cement, shopping carts, mannequins and anything else he could throw under her car--except a body. At the start, he had allowed Karen to get out and check what she had run over. But with time, he refused to let her check for dead bodies, regardless of her anxiety.

"Karen, there's nothing to see. It's the monster feeding your brain with false truths," Dr. Birnbaum said.

"I know, Dr. Birnbaum," Karen said, recalling his words. "They're just bumps in the road."

Karen struck another bump and checked the rearview mirror. Her mouth went dry and her confidence evaporated. A body lay ragged in the road.

"It's nothing. It's a chemical imbalance deceiving me," she said.

Karen took her gaze from the mirror and returned it to the road ahead. She knew it was mirage, it had happened before. How many times had she come to a screeching halt because she believed she heard or saw a body go under the wheels of her car? Too many, that's how many.

She flicked her gaze back to the mirror. No body lay in the road now. The monster had tried to deceive her again, but it had failed. She sighed with relief and focused on her driving.

Dr. Birnbaum had asked her, if things were going well, to drive through a school zone. It would be the ultimate test for her, a vindication if she succeeded. She felt up to it. She made a left and headed for Jefferson Elementary.

Karen was almost through the school zone without incident when her monster tried its worst. The thud was sickening as a child rolled up over the hood and stared directly at Karen with dead eyes. She knew it was her monster up to its usual tricks. Didn't he have anything new to try?

"Take your demon away," she instructed her monster.

The boy's body slid from the hood as commanded, leaving a bloody smear on the Honda's white paintwork. Within moments, the bloody streak faded into nothing. And why did the blood disappear? Because there was none, she told herself.

As Karen left the school zone, her monster continued to throw obstacles under her wheels. She ignored the disruption. They were just bumps in the road.

She had succeeded. Her monster could throw as many fake bodies at her as it wished, but she knew they weren't there. Instead of driving home as planned, she decided to make it a longer drive. And why not? It was a beautiful day.

# # #

"This is live "copter three and I'm Rob Deckard for KTUZ. We are still following the progress of this car. The driver is believed to have been on the road for hours and has struck and killed at least twenty people. Some of those were children!"

"Oh my God! She just hit a dog. She never once bothered to slow. I can see the remains of the dog still being dragged under the wheels of the vehicle. I think it was a Shepherd. How can anyone not stop?"

"The police are moving in now. The horror should be over in a moment. This is the worst moment of my broadcasting career."

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to try and get a closer look at the driver. Yes, I can see the woman's face. My God, I don't believe it. She's smiling. She's God damn smiling. What must be going through this maniac's mind?"