The old man sat in his gas station on a cold Christmas Eve. He hadn’t been anywhere in years since his wife had passed away. It was just another day to him. He didn’t hate Christmas, he just couldn’t find a reason to celebrate. He was sitting there looking at the snow that had been falling for the last hour when the door opened and a homeless man stepped through.
Instead of throwing the man out, Old George as he was known by his customers, told the man to come and sit by the heater and warm up. “thank you, but I don’t mean to intrude,” said the stranger. “I see you’re busy. I’ll just go.”
“not without something hot in your belly,” George said.
He turned and opened a wide mouth thermos and handed it to the stranger. “it ain’t much, but it’s hot and tasty. Stew. Made it myself. When you’re done, there’s coffee and it’s fresh.”
Just at that moment he heard the “ding” of the driveway bell. “excuse me, be right back,” George said. There in the driveway was an old ’53 Chevy. Steam was rolling out of the front. The driver was panicked.
“mister can you help me!” said the driver, with a deep Spanish accent. “my wife is with child and my car is broken.”
George opened the hood. It was bad. The block looked cracked from the cold, the car was dead. “You ain’t going in this thing,” George said as he turned away.
But Mister, please help…” the door of the office closed behind George as he went inside. He went to the office wall and got the keys to his old truck, and went back outside. He walked around the building, opened the garage, started the truck and drove it around to where the couple was waiting. “here, take my truck,” he said. “she ain’t the best thing you ever looked at, but she runs real good.”
George helped put the woman in the truck and watched as it sped off into the night. He turned and walked back inside the office. “Glad I gave ‘em the truck, their tires were shot too. That ol’ truck has brand new.”
George thought he was talking to the stranger, but the man had gone. The thermos was on the desk, empty, with a used coffee cup beside it. “well, at least he got something in his belly,” George thought.
George went back outside to see if the old Chevy would start. It cranked slowly, but it started. He pulled it into the garage where the truck had been. He thought he would tinker with it for something to do. Christmas Eve meant no customers. He discovered the block hadn’t cracked it was just the bottom hose on the radiator. “Well, shoot, I can fix this,” he said to himself. So he put a new one on.
Those tires ain’t gonna get ‘em through the winter either.” Hetook the snow treads off of his wife’s old Lincoln. They were like new and he wasn’t going to drive the car anyway.
As he was working, he heard shots being fired. He ran outside and beside a police car an officer lay on the cold ground. Bleeding from his left shoulder, the officer moaned, “Please help me.”
George helped the officer inside as he remembered the training he had received in the Army as a medic. He knew the wound needed attention.
“Pressure to stop the bleeding,” he thought. The uniform company had been there that morning and had left clean shop towels. He used those and duct tape to bind the wound. “hey, they say duct tape can fix anythin’,” he said, trying to make the policeman feel at ease.
“something for the pain,” George thought. All he had was the pills he used for his back. “these ought to work.” He put some water in a cup and gave the policeman the pills. “you hang in there, I’m going to get you an ambulance.”
