Love's Real Stories

Cell phones are great, but they deprive people of monumental moments in life. For instance, if I’d had a cell phone the day I ran out of gas on the Oro Bangor Highway, I never would have experienced the monumental moment in which I met the Meanest Man on Earth.

That day I sputtered to the side of the road on that deserted stretch of highway when the temperature reached 110 degrees, instead of wondering if I would live to see another cold beer, I would have simply whipped out my cell phone and called my buddy Tim, who is never far from a can of gas, not to mention a cold beer.

But cell phones had not been invented, so no option existed other than to start hoofing down the Oro Bangor Highway in search of a friendly face. I saw none except for the face of a cow, or maybe it was a bull. We were both too hot to care about the difference.

An hour later, dehydrated, disoriented, and delirious, I veered down a dirt road and came upon a residence surrounded by a barricade made of crisscrossed strands of barbed wire and warped sheets of corrugated metal. Four or five “Keep Out” and “No Trespassing” signs, perforated with bullet holes, dangled here and there.

I realized a shadow in the corner of the front porch was a man sitting in a tiny chair. Actually, the chair wasn’t tiny. The man was huge. He wore overalls with no shirt, and he had a bald head the size of a watermelon. He stood up, and the instant he did, two Redbone hounds shot at me with outstretched teeth and slobbering lips.

“Hut!” said the man, and the hounds slid to a halt. They stood on guard, watching me through droopy bloodshot eyes.

I smiled hopefully and blabbered, “I’m a Realtor…listing a property up the road….ran out of gas…..sure is hot…ha ha….. maybe I could use your phone.…?”

My smile faded as the man stared at me.

“Well I’m not sellin’,” he said, and went inside.

I stood weaving and wobbling in the heat, in disbelief. “That’s it?” I thought. “Kill me or help me, but don’t do nothing.” That was a double-negative, but that’s how I felt.

“That’s gotta be the meanest man on earth,” I muttered to the Redbones. They weaved and wobbled in the heat, and nodded in agreement. I eventually tiptoed backwards, then turned and trudged back up the dirt road.

A pickup passed on the highway and came to a stop a few yards in front of me. I recognized the watermelon-head at the wheel. The Redbones in the back of the pickup recognized me, and bayed and bellowed and slobbered.

The man lumbered out and beckoned to me.

“Git in,” said the man. I moaned hoarsely through cracked lips.

“I’m Harold Robbins,” he said, shaking my hand as I got in the truck. “Here, you better drink some cool water.” He opened a cooler and handed me a thermos. Then he pulled out a sandwich and a piece of pie.

“You took off before I got the gas can loaded in the pickup, partner. A man could die in this heat!”

We pulled up to my car and Harold gassed it up. Then he smiled and reached in the cooler and pulled out a cold beer.

Good thing I didn’t have a cell phone that day. I would have missed a monumental moment in life.

I never would have met the Nicest Guy in the World.