Breakdown of ¡Ojalá no hubiera atropellado tu bicicleta!
no
no, not
la bicicleta
the bicycle
tu
your
haber
(auxiliary) have
ojalá
hopefully / I hope
atropellar
to run over
Questions & Answers about ¡Ojalá no hubiera atropellado tu bicicleta!
Why do we use hubiera atropellado here instead of a normal past tense?
We use the past perfect subjunctive (sometimes called the pluperfect subjunctive) after ojalá to express regret about something in the past. Because the speaker already ran over the bicycle, changing the past is impossible. Using hubiera plus the past participle atropellado shows that this is an unfulfillable wish.
Could I say ojalá no hubiese atropellado instead?
Absolutely. Hubiese is the alternative form of the imperfect subjunctive for the auxiliary verb haber. In Latin America, hubiera is much more common in everyday speech, but both are grammatically correct and mean the exact same thing.
How do we know who ran over the bicycle if hubiera can apply to multiple pronouns?
You have to rely on context. The yo, él, ella, and usted forms of the past subjunctive are identical. Since this is an apology to the bike's owner, the speaker is clearly talking about their own actions. If it were ambiguous, you could add the pronoun for clarity: ¡Ojalá yo no hubiera atropellado tu bicicleta!
Does atropellar work for inanimate objects as well as people?
Yes, it can be used for inanimate objects too. While you will often hear atropellar when a vehicle hits a pedestrian or an animal, it works perfectly well for objects that get hit or run over by a car, like a bicicleta.
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