First, it was downpouring outside, so the floor was wet and muddy from previous customers. It also had a wet-wool smell, either from customers’ drenched coats or that mongrel dog who snuck inside to snatch a low-lying bag of chips before being driven out again. Poor thing.

Several florescent lighting tubes were out by the porn magazines corner. Fitting. The coffee decanter had boiled down to a dark, foul brew that surely no person in their frozen mind would touch. Patches of sugar and cream-powder stuck to the counter like leprosy.

All I needed was some gas. “Ha-ha – for my car, you idiot!” Everyone’s a comic. I gave him a twenty and he pushed some buttons. Had that greenback slipped into his pocket instead of the cash drawer? I didn’t care. I just wanted to get the gas – gasoline – and get out of there.

I had to push the glass door hard now to open it. A rag-bundled old woman (man?) with straggly hair, missing teeth, and even worst stink leaned against it.  “Excuse me, ma’am.” I pushed harder and slid out the door. The glass was warmer, so I guess that’s why she picked that spot.  She was sopping wet and shaking.

“Oh, God!” I screamed silently as I trudged to my car, pulled the pump down and stuck it into the tank. Nothing.  I glared at the clerk through the window, and started to move toward it.  The pump came on.

When my $20 was eaten up it clicked off and I started to pull it out. I jumped as something dank and smelly leaned against my leg.  The yellow eyes of a mangy dog, it’s head hanging low, looked up at me.  I stumbled back a few steps and noticed the rag bundle by the door, black eyes in a yellowish-dirty face stared at me too.

No! I would not give my last $20 to that creature!  I was running from my home – I could bear it no longer – and I needed that money to get farther down the road. I needed it to buy a burger, a coffee. I needed it to…..

But yellow eyes and dirty yellowish face stared at me. Needy. Hungry. Sad. Homeless.

The area around me and my car suddenly turned pinkish-gold. Dark, mean, storm clouds parted to let a splash of blue sky and beam of sunlight through. I gasped and blinked!  And I saw a vision of my home, my messed up marriage, my….my handicapped daughter. The lost job. And the bills. My eyes burned. I squeezed them shut, then opened them.

The hanging directional traffic light in the intersection by the gas station turned “go” for left turners….a bright green arrow, pointing the way I’d come. I stared at it and made a decision.

I put the pump nozzle away, shut the tank door on the car, and walked to the driver-side door. I reached inside to the passenger seat and grabbed an energy bar and a banana I’d left there. I stood for a moment, then walked to the homeless woman and dog. I handed her the food and my last $20. Light beamed from her toothless grinning face. The mongrel’s tail waved a bit too.  As a last thought I took off my puff-jacket and draped it around her shoulders.

In my car I gazed briefly in the direction I’d been going. It no longer looked promising. I started the engine, did a U-turn, signaled and joined the meager traffic in the direction of home. “Oh, God,” I repeated. It was a prayer.