Story

My great-aunt Marvella read my most recent blog posts and asked me to write a short story based on the Good Samaritan for her Sunday School. She thinks that most of the time we don't realize just how amazing it was for the "good samaritan" to help that man. So this is what I came up with for her and I thought I would share it with you all. I realize its probably way to long for a single blog post but maybe you can just take it in chunks.

It hadn’t been Aubrey’s idea.
The teenage girl had never wished more fervently that she was somewhere else than where she was right at this moment. As she steered the large van to a stoplight she told herself again that she should have never let them talk her into this. She remembered the grandmotherly woman’s face peering into hers. “Please, Aubrey just this one trip. These kids are counting on you.” Out of guilt, she had reluctantly agreed to shuttle a group of kids home from an event at her church. There had been only one problem. These kids all lived in the heart of downtown Chicago, in the center of the busyness, the noise, the crime…Aubrey was terrified of going there.
Now it was late. The kids had all been dropped off. Outside snow flurries whistled against her windshield wipers and icy wind howled. She could barely see, her headlights scarcely cutting through the inky darkness. Bruised storm clouds hung overhead, their bellies heavy with snow.
Aubrey nervously switched on her blinker and turned left. She chanced a glance out the window. Boarded up windows and dirty shacks lined the alleyway. A couple of teenagers lounged against one of them, smoking cigarettes. Splashes of colorful graffiti decorated cement walls. It seemed to Aubrey that downtown Chicago had never been more frightening.
As she continued to drive, a warning light flashed from the assortment of dials behind the steering wheel. WARNING: LOW GAS! Aubrey groaned in frustration.
Nervously she tapped an uneasy rhythm on her seat, “Come on, come on! Just get me to a gas station,” she muttered nervously. Her car began to sputter as she whipped around another corner, scanning the area frantically for a gas station. The old van gave one last groan. The car managed to go 15 feet more before it coasted to a stop at the sidewalk.
“Great, just great!” she yelled. “I’m stuck in downtown Chicago with no gas in the middle of a snowstorm and…” Aubrey fumbled through her purse and came up with her cell phone. She flipped it open. A brief glance revealed that it too was dead “…and no cell phone! Ugh.” Aubrey leaned her head against the steering wheel. She watched through a foggy window as dozens of cars sped past her. “I hope somebody’s in a good mood,” she muttered.
Then, she wrapped her coat more tightly around her and opened her door. An icy blast of wind hit her as she stepped out of the car. Aubrey waved a gloved hand frantically at passing cars. One car slowed and Aubrey redoubled her frantic waving. A policeman eyed the teenage girl, alone on the dark sidewalk. But then turned and drove away without a second thought for the frightened girl on the road. Aubrey stared in disbelief at the receding police car. Could he really be so heartless? What would it have taken for him to let her borrow his cell phone?
She was pretty, young, strong; she would have to get herself out of this mess. After all, he couldn’t do everything, could he? His job was to fight crime not to babysit irresponsible teenagers who had forgotten to fill up on gas.
Wind blasted at her. Snow sliced against her cheeks. Aubrey continued to wave at the passing cars. Faces turned from windows, heads were bowed, eyes were averted… Nobody wanted to notice the stranded girl on the side of the road.
Two approaching forms caught her attention. Two teenage boys cockily walked up to her, their eyes taking in her situation.
“Um, I’m Aubrey. I’m lost here. My car ran out of gas. You don’t happen to know where I can get some gas, do you?” she asked timidly.
One of the boys nudged the other in the arm, “Hey, isn’t that cute, Brian? She wants our help.” The other kid snickered stupidly. Aubrey began to back against her car.
“Listen, kid we don’t help anybody but ourselves.” Brian stepped closer. The other kid grabbed her purse. “You’re gonna come with us now.”
“No, please don’t,” she cried as each of them grabbed one of her arms. “Please, please stop!” she pleaded as they forcefully pulled her away from her van. Tears leaked from her eyes and froze as they slid down her cheeks.
“Hey boys, whatcha doing with that lady?” Aubrey nearly gasped with relief as her savior appeared from a whirlwind of snow. “You leave her alone, you hear?”
“Aaaah, we were just having a little fun,” one of the boys protested.
“You better get outta here before I call the cops. I don’t ever wanna see you again, now git!”
The boys left quickly, kicking up snow in their wake. Aubrey turned to thank her rescuer and nearly gasped in shock again. He stood at least a foot and half taller than her, with thick muscled arms and legs. His skin was the color of ebony and tattoos crisscrossed his arms.
“Those boys hurt you, ma’am?”
“No…no, not yet,” she managed to say as her pounded within her chest.
“Well, you’d best be getting on home now. Chicago is no place for a pretty thing like you in the middle of the night.”
“But, that’s just it. I’m lost. My car ran out of gas and those boys just took my purse.”
“Well, then you’ll just have to come with me. My trucks down there a ways. I’ll get you some gas and then get you on your way.”
The relief that flooded Aubrey was replaced with fear. Could she trust this stranger? His appearance gave her every reason to believe that he could and would harm her. But then again what choice did she have? The alternative was being stranded out here, alone until the snowstorm let up.
“Here, let me help you. How long you been out here, miss?”
“A while…I came in early this evening.”
Numbly, she let him guide her across the icy sidewalk until they reached a beat up red pickup. She slid into the passenger’s side and buckled herself in. In a moment he joined her. “What’s your name?”
“Aubrey, Aubrey Stone.”
“I’m Gabe. What are you doing ‘round here?”
Warmth was starting to slide back into her fingertips. “I was taking a group of kids home from our church and I ran out of gas and got stranded here. I didn’t have my cell phone and no one would stop to help…until you came along. Thank you.”
“My pleasure.”
They drove on in silence for a few moments until Aubrey said, “Do you live in Chicago, sir?”
“Don’t do none of that ‘sir’ stuff. Call me Gabe, same as everybody else. But, no I don’t live here…just passin’ through.”
“You have a family?”
He didn’t answer, and Aubrey began to think he never would, but then he said, “No, no family.”
“What do you do?”
“Do you always ask this many questions, Aubrey?”
She paused, “Yes.”
“I thought so.” Just then Gabe pulled into a gas station and got out of the truck. He entered the gas station store and Aubrey watched as he talked to a man in boots and stained overalls, then exited with a gas can. He walked over to the truck and plunged the hose into the can, squeezing it with his powerful muscles. Aubrey watched his fluid movements and wondered what such a man was doing all alone.
Gabe reentered the truck and placed the gas can down near Aubrey’s feet.
“There you go. Should be enough to get you home.”
“Thank you so much…Gabe.”
Half a smile broke out on his rugged face. “Let’s get this back to your car.”
They drove back to her car and Gabe easily filled up the gas tank until the gauge rested just above the halfway mark.
She thanked him again and was just about to enter her car when he put a hand on her arm. “I thought I should tell you… my wife left me and took our son a while ago. They were all the family I had.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I brought it on myself…I was drinking. Drinking real bad. One day I drank too much. Yelled at her, got real mad. Then I hit her. Later she came to me in jail, told me she was done. That was the last straw. She was leaving. It broke my heart. She was the only thing that kept me going, her and our son. Then, I got into drugs. Got in real deep. Served a few more years in jail. When I got out I promised myself I would be a better person. I know you’re probably thinking I deserved everything that happened and maybe you’re right. Most people treat me different when they know. They don’t trust me because of my past… I just thought you should know.”
Gabe turned and started walking away. “Gabe, wait!” Aubrey called. “Thank you.”
He smiled, and this time it reached his eyes, “My pleasure.”
Then her Good Samaritan turned and was swallowed up by a flurry of snowflakes.