This is a work of fiction. All persons are intended to be age 18 and above.
*****
Sooner or later, if you drive often enough, you will climb into your car one morning, put the fob near the ignition, press the button and ...
... nothing.
You try it again. Nothing. Then again. Maybe the battery in the fob has gone dead. The car still won't start. You stare into the distance, your brain frozen with indecision. What the hell? You start to think: Maybe it's not the fob. Maybe it's the car battery. You turn on the headlights. They spring to life, then quickly fade to yellow and die altogether.
Shit.
It's the car battery, the freaking car battery.
So now what do you do?
That depends on where you are. If you're parked in your driveway you start calling friends to give you a jump. Except they all work during the day, and can't take an hour off to help you with your car. You knock on your neighbors' doors but they're not home either.
Shit, shit, shit.
It's looking like a tow truck is your last option. That'll be a hundred bucks. What a racket. In your next life, buy a tow truck and work banker's hours. You'll be rich before you know it.
I've found myself in that position and I'm sure it'll happen again, which is why I added a set of jumper cables to the box of car repair tools I keep in the trunk. You never know when some poor stranded motorist will need a jump, and besides: I like the karma I get from helping others.
In fact just the other day those jumper cables paid dividends in a big, big way. I'm still grinning over the memories. In fact, if I try hard enough I can still taste them.
I had friends visiting and we met for dinner at this out-of-the way place in a quiet part of town. I usually don't drink alcohol when I go out because I don't want to risk an accident or a ticket, but these friends insisted, so I had a beer with my meal. Problem is, one beer usually leads to two beers, then three. I was able to get out of there before that happened, but my taste buds had been activated, and they wanted more beer. So I stopped at a convenience store to pick up a six-pack.
The minute I got out of the car I was approached by a kid. I was instantly suspicious because this convenience store is a notorious hangout for homeless guys wanting to bum money for alcohol and cigarettes. I don't mind helping people when they're down on their luck, but these guys made the streets their lifestyle and I had little sympathy for them.
My suspicions were unwarranted because as the kid got closer, I could see he was wearing a vest with the store's logo on it. He worked here.
"Excuse me sir, I hate to bother you," he began, "but I wondered if you could help me out. I need a jump."
Funny he chose that word. I would love to have "jumped" him because he was a luscious guy, about 5-11 or 6 feet tall, 150 pounds, a nice tan, with brownish-blonde flyaway hair. He looked like a young River Phoenix, down to the cute button of a nose. He didn't have much of an ass, at least what I could tell through his baggy jeans, but the slight bulge in his crotch suggested he was packing more than minimal equipment on the front side of things.
"Sir?"
Oh God. I must have been staring. I shook my head to snap out of it, then stammered to recover. "Um, yeah. Sure. Where are you parked?"