Transcript
Geico Representative (0:00)
Geico's motorcycle expertise gives me the coverage I need. Like 24.7claims, I'm on cloud nine.
Cloud Expert (0:07)
Clouds are wholly unable to support the weight of an adult human.
Geico Representative (0:09)
What's happening?
Cloud Expert (0:10)
Furthermore, clouds are not numbered. Even if you procured a jetpack and searched, you'd find no cloud numbered nine. However, at that altitude, you'd likely befriend a flock of migrating snow geese. Geese who'd encourage you to leave your 24.7geico motorcycle claims insurance behind, as they would take you in and even share their dinner of crickets and clovers with you. GEICO assumes no liability for any indigestion that may occur from a clover cricket dinner. GEICO expertise for your motorcycle geico's motorcycle.
Geico Representative (0:31)
Expertise means I'm covered by people who know bikes like I do. I'm happy as a clam.
Cloud Expert (0:36)
No conclusive scientific research has shown clams can experience happiness.
Geico Representative (0:39)
It just meant that I feel really good about my coverage.
Cloud Expert (0:41)
I mean, even if you took the clam out for the best day ever, visiting the zoo, taking a scenic ride, knowing you're insured by specialists, and sharing a strawberry ice cream cone together, the clam would not feel happy and your strawberry cone would taste sorta clammy.
Geico Representative (0:51)
Ew.
Cloud Expert (0:51)
Geico's motorcycle specialists who know bikes like you do assume no liability for clammy ice cream cones. GEICO expertise for your motorcycle.
Narrator (1:05)
It was a long time ago, before cell phones were prevalent, and I was a mom in my early 30s who had just driven our kids to the pediatrician. The Macon, Georgia doctor's office was an hour away from our home, and I was just taking the two youngest of my three, ages one and three years old, to our scheduled appointment. Because we lived so far away, their office always gave us the last two appointments of the day, and we were grateful. The doctor had just built a new building off a fresh spur of the highway, so the location was quite isolated in every direction, but a very nice facility compared to his old spot by the hospital there. His new building was also pretty far back on the new lot, and my car, a black Jeep Cherokee we had owned for two years, was one of only four or five cars in the parking lot. When arrived, I parked near the front door, removed the kids from their car seats, and for the next hour or so we waited, then saw the doctor, paid and finally exited. Back outside, mine was the only car left in the lot as I had loaded the children in their car seats for our trip home. But as the receptionist locked the front glass doors, my car somehow wouldn't start. When I turned the key, there was just an odd clicking noise gathering the children once again, I knocked on the door until someone allowed us back in and I asked to borrow their phone to call a nearby garage for service. I found one in the phone book and the man said that he would come but that it might be a bit so I told him my location. I left to go back out to the car, rolled down all the windows and loaded the children back into their seats once more as we waited. Soon we watched as all the lights turned out in the building again and everyone left their cars departing one by one from behind the building somewhere, leaving us now completely alone in the parking lot as it was still light. I spent a lot of that time trying to tend to the children, digging through our car for snacks and a bottle, making sure that they weren't getting too hot, etc. Although the service station attendant said that it was probably going to be quite a while, I was pleasantly surprised when a truck pulled into the empty parking lot pretty soon and then a man got out of his pickup, smiled and nodded to me and said he was going to raise the hood. He was middle aged and a bit scruffy, but quite frankly many gas station attendants sometimes looked that way, especially at the end of the day, and I was grateful when he began doing something under the hood almost immediately. I sat down again in the driver's seat with the door open, waiting for him to tell me to try the engine, but he seemed to be taking a long time checking the connections and I longed for him to just grab jumper cables, yet he never did without getting out of the car. I asked him what he thought was wrong and then he said oh, it's just a loose wire, not the battery, and continued doing whatever he was doing. I couldn't see his face at all from where I was sitting, but his hands were slightly visible through that horizontal slit between the windshield and the raised hood as we waited. More than once he said that it was merely a loose wire and if I would just come up here really quick he would show me which one it was so that it would never happen again. I remember kind of smiling and shaking my head saying that sadly there was no reason to show me anything as I really didn't know anything about cars. I just thanked him and continued to stay in the driver's seat again, just waiting for the inevitable signal to try to start the ignition that was most surely coming at any moment. At one point I remember thinking that he was definitely flirting as he spoke, but I was trying above all to be polite and kind, as he was indeed helping us. We were hot and tired and just miserable, and truthfully, I was distracted with the kids. Oddly enough, he was starting to sound a little frustrated with me because I wouldn't come up and look at the engine. I remember thinking that I certainly didn't want to make him mad where he left us there all alone, you know, with the sun sinking so quickly. And then the strangest thing happened. Another truck suddenly pulled into that desolate parking lot, and as it did, this nice guy working underneath my hood suddenly slammed it shut, ran to his truck, started it, and then drove away very quickly without even saying a word of goodbye. I was both confused and a little anxious when he did this because I didn't know who was now arriving. I even remember feeling a little frightened that he had suddenly left me there all alone with two little ones, defenseless. Why wouldn't he at least stay and speak to whoever was parking next to me now? It certainly seemed like the southerly gentleman thing to do. I looked around and I was very aware once again that there were no visible cars on the road, no homes or businesses nearby, and the sun was continuing to set rather quickly as this new, also unmarked pickup pulled in next to me. I got out of the car once again, this time more apprehensively. Upon exiting though, he immediately introduced himself and his name and voice seemed to match who I had spoken to on the phone much earlier. He then actually called me by my name, apologized for being so late, and then finally smiled and stared towards the road, pointing and asking who the man was that had just left. So suddenly relieved and unfazed, I just smiled back in surprise and told him, well, I really don't know. I thought all this time he was you. And we both just laughed silently as he then grabbed jumper cables, walked to the front of my car, raised the hood and actually started to work. I immediately sat back in the driver's seat once more, suddenly grateful that with luck that air conditioner would be blowing full blast shortly and once again checking on the children, all while listening to the familiar words. Try it. I had my bag completely turned when he surprised me by suddenly coming to the driver's side door. In the strangest voice he said, um, ma'am, is this yours? And when I looked into his hands, he was holding a long thin dagger like looking device that was about a foot and a half long in length. It appeared to be very old and covered with reddish rusty, yet on one end it had tiny circular small finger holes, as if it was a mix of a long thin sword and scissors oddly combined. I remember being amazed but not exactly frightened and I asked him where he found them. It was under the hood, ma'am, he replied. I said just matter of factly that I had never seen them before in my life, but how weird was it that those things had somehow been stuck and undiscovered in my car for all those years and just shook my head in surprise. He continued to stand there and stare at them unbelievingly, and he looked oddly pale too, like he just couldn't find the words to speak for a bit, just continuing to stare at the unusual object. Honestly, I didn't care one bit about it. All I could think of was getting the car going, letting me pay him and then leaving. He didn't say anything else, just quickly set them on the curb, started his truck and then signaled for me to start the jeep and when it immediately caught, my 3 year old cheered. Grateful, I quickly turned on the air conditioner full blast, rolled up the windows, aimed the air vents back towards the backseat and reached for my purse to pay him. I stood up and took a few steps to meet him so I could hear the amount now owed. With both our vehicles running, he came back around to my driver's side but instead of handing me the bill, irritated me a bit by walking right past me and picking up that weird object once more. Ma'am, he said slowly, I want you to look at these one more time and he held them out for closer inspection. This time I moved a bit closer and I actually really looked in his hands. The item still appeared incredibly large, possessing an almost bayonet looking quality except for the strangely small tin loops on one end. I had never seen anything like it and I told him so as he held it. He spoke quietly and slowly to me, as if trying to desperately make me understand something that was somehow still going over my head. These weren't hidden somewhere in the engine, ma'am. They hadn't been there very long at all because they were sitting right on top. They must have just been put there. I shook my head no and then half smiled as I then said but they're obviously very old and rusty. To which he responded more closely and then replied yeah, but see how sharp they are. These look like they've just been sharpened. And when I looked down he was right. The long skinny dagger like shape was unusual, but by far the oddest quality was just how sharp it appeared to be. The edges at the tip where the rust had been removed were gleaming silver. As I paid him, his final words to me were, ma'am, I don't know what was about to happen here, but I'm really glad I pulled up. When I did, he quietly thanked me when taking the payment, and he told me that I probably needed to call the police when I get home, then asked me where I wanted the item. I didn't want to touch it, I didn't want to take it at all, but I released the back window so he could place it inside. We then both left the lot together, him turning one way, me turning the other towards the small winding highway that would lead me home, still an hour away. I indeed contacted the Macon police the moment that we arrived home, and I got the children inside safely, but although they listened politely, they declined when I offered to bring the scissor like thing to them later. The officer I spoke to said they sounded as if they were specialized surgical shears for my description and measurements on the phone, which I found quite disturbing, as you can imagine. I remember wondering how he would even know that, why he would say that I had tried so carefully not to touch any of the surfaces, hoping that they might be able to lift prints or test it for blood if they wanted. But the story seemed to bore him a bit, and he didn't seem too interested. His attitude insinuated that as there was no longer an emergency, it was really of no importance now, at the very end of the call, as if to wind things up, he did say that it sounded as if I was very lucky and that I might want to keep the shears for a few days, just in case someone from his office got back with me later. But that was all. I wrapped them carefully in a newspaper and placed them in the brick storage unit behind our house, and there they remained for several more years, untouched, until we moved away and I finally, not wanting to bring them across several states, reluctantly threw them in the trash. Around that time, though, if you look through old news reports, women were going missing all over Georgia. Some bodies were eventually found, but others remain missing to this very day. I have often wondered what would have happened if the service station attendant hadn't arrived when he did. If my children would still have a mother, if I would still have my son and daughter, if I would have missed all those years with them. I guess I'll never know. But I learned something very important about myself that day. I had always felt that I was pretty aware of my surroundings, pretty good at reading people and staying safe. But because I was exhausted and tired and hot and stranded in a different city. My common sense and intelligence simply left me for a bit and wasn't working that well at the time. And many of my friends and family still think that our car trouble that day and my lack of awareness could easily have cost us our lives. I'm so glad that didn't happen.