By Sam Marcucci
After a few miles on the highway I saw a hitchhiker on my side of the road who didn’t look too bad; so I picked him up.
Almost exactly one mile later, I realized what I had just actually done.
There was this…smell…that I was beginning to get a real good whiff of about a half-mile into it, like a really good whiff—and it was weird because I’m still pretty sure for that first half a mile I didn’t smell anything… So that right there probably should have been the first red flag. If I had been paying attention, the first real red flag probably should have been the odd and (from the outside) unexplainable shape of his only bag. Which in itself looked as if it should have been giving off its own mysterious smells; but instead was offering a strong distinct aroma of frebreeze which I was forced to inhale when he quickly threw the bag behind us into the backseat. And at the time, I remember thinking, “Well that’s nice,” as I tried to tighten my grip on the now-fading hope that by pulling my car over and unlocking my doors, I had not just made a huge mistake.
He did—however—look me in the eyes and thank me after putting his bag in back, which I remember he did very quickly; I mean immediately after entering the car. So again…there’s another one…Looking back, that probably should have been another red flag, if not the first one.
And you know what, I’m just gonna say it: yes, there were a lot of red flags, that yes, I missed. And, if you think about it, it’s not even that I missed them, more that I half-consciously refused them and whatever significance they held. Because now I can tell you: after picking up a hitch hiker, one of the only things you’re trying to do is ignore as many red flags as you can.
For a little bit, I was doing pretty well. Once they are actually next to you and have their mysterious bag in the back seat, you try to pick out why this wasn’t a mistake. And I’ll admit, at first, I was doing this pretty frantically; trying to tell myself “Well at least it looks like he’s got on a nice suit, he kinda looks like he might be a classy guy”…and then I realize it is not a suit and he’s up close in your car and right next to you and it’s really an old bathrobe.
But I sucked it up, he was already in my car. I had made the decision. I could smell whatever (the fuck) that smell was, but we’re going. We’re driving. I committed, he’s buckled up, it’s too late. I had to make the best of it. It’s just a hitchhiker.
But then, he started to talk—he started to say some things…and you know; it might not have been that bad if he hadn’t reached over and turned the radio off first.
About one mile after being picked up, after his bag was well settled in the back and I had begun to go through all the memories in my head of the strangest things I’ve ever smelled, trying to come up with something that was at least similar to what had now won the battle against the lingering frebreeze fumes and was freely making its way through the AC system, he reached over and turned off the radio, and he said quietly, “Where are we going?”
Finally, because I was so deep in my own suppressed doubt, that right there was the red flag that burst through bright and loud, and unconsciously made me life my foot from the gas. And in the silence of no radio and him waiting to find out where we were indeed going, I must have gone blank or shut my eyes or fainted completely because the next thing I remember is his hand already reached over correcting the wheel, putting the car back into the lane I had been driving in, and him saying (just as quietly) “It’s okay…”
And I don’t know too well what happened here either, but after hearing that I suddenly punched on the radio so he wouldn’t over-hear me in my head, where I was shouting over and over: “He’s gonna touch me before he kills me. I know it—he’s gonna touch me, then he’s gonna kill me, then he’s gonna touch me.”