The worst part of picking up a hitchhiker is that you don’t always see the thick black lines of the swastika tattoo on their neck until you’re a mile or two into what looks like a regrettable decision. He had just finished telling me he was heading to Des Moines, Iowa. Des Moines was south and we were driving north.   

“Want to smoke some weed?” he said.

My eyes went from the familiar lines of the tattoo riding up his weathered cheek, back to the road, then to his left hand holding a silver pipe. His right hand was deep inside a red bag with drawstrings that doubled as shoulder straps.

“Ah, so this is how I die,” was the first thought I can remember having about picking this guy up. I know I didn’t think about stopping, it just — happened. I saw a guy on the side of the road and I pulled over. I didn’t question it — not once. Then, I looked at him, really looked at him, for the first time.

He was a white man about the same size as me maybe ten years older. A tight black stocking hat was pulled to the rim of purple aviator sunglasses. The skin on face his was a deep brown, cracked and scarred. He was wearing a puffy, black winter jacket on a beautiful fall morning.

“I’m George,” I said sticking out my right hand. I decided that if he was going to hurt me, he was going to have to do it knowing my name. The idea, I guess, was that it’s easier to hurt someone when they are a nameless face.

My hand hovered in the air between us. I glanced at the road and watched his right hand moving inside the bag causing the red canvas to ripple. Seconds ticked passed to the unsteady banging of my heart. Finally, he looked to my hand and pulled his from the bag gripping mine in a rough, firm handshake.

“I’m Benjamin.”

“Nice to meet you, Benjamin. How are we going to do this? Des Moines is south and we’re going north.”

“Yeah, I know that, but I was hoping you could take Highway 13 to get me to Interstate 35 or drop me off next to the exit for 13 if you can’t.”

That actually made a lot of sense. We were heading north, Benjamin did need to go south, but a good way to get to Iowa was exactly the way he wanted to go.

“Sounds like a plan. I’ll drop you off on the exit to 35.”

The swastika staring back at me whenever I looked over at Benjamin kept me from feeling completely comfortable. But, now that I understood the direction and could see both of his hands, I drove on with something approaching optimism.

“I wear these glasses because I lost my eye in the Korean War.”

“That’s crazy. My father-in-law lost an eye in the Vietnam War.”

The fact that the Korean War ended sometime before Benjamin’s birth wasn’t an issue for me. With around five miles between us and our destination, I had decided that whatever Benjamin said I was going to be in complete agreement. As far as I was concerned, there wasn’t a war he couldn’t have lost that eye in.

“You sure you don’t want to smoke this weed with me? I just got back from Denver so you know it’s good stuff. Now, that’s beautiful country. You ever been to Denver?”

“I’ve been there a couple times,” I said ignoring any reference to him and I getting high together. “I love the mountains. Is that where you’re from?”

“Nah, I got a place in San Diego. You ever hear of El Cajon? It’s a pass in the mountains. You might like it there. That’s where my house is. My mother lives in it, but it’s mine. I bet you didn’t know I’m a millionaire. Drew Carey gave me a million dollars, but my mother’s holding on to it. She says she doesn’t know anything about a million dollars, but that’s what she always does. It’s just sitting in a little TCF across from a McDonalds in El Cajon. I guess I’ll just have to wait until she dies to get my money. I bet she’s got ten more years in her; I haven’t seen her in awhile though.”

“That’s crazy!. Drew Carey gave you a million dollars?” Like a wily veteren of a thousand Improv acts, I was ready to agree.

“I know! I was just walking down the road in El Cajon and there he was. He gave me a ride and we talked for hours. When he dropped me off, I thought I would never hear from him again but boy was I wrong. On the night he quit The Price is Right, you know the night Jack Black tried to give away a car and some dude punched him . . .”

“Wait, Jack Black got punched by a guy on The Price is Right for trying to give him a car?”

“Yeah, I don’t understand it either, but that was the night when Drew Carey said he would give me a million dollars. At the end of the show he told everyone he was quitting and then said, ‘Benjamin Sabot, I’m giving you the million dollars I promised you.’ He didn’t ever promise me a million dollars but I wasn’t going to argue. The problem was that I heard about it in a prison in Florida so I didn’t have a way to pick it up.”

“Wait, you were in prison in Florida?”

“When I got out and made my way back to El Cajon, five guys at the McDonald’s said they saw Drew Carey drop off the money and my damn mother pick it up. But, she says she doesn’t know a thing about a million dollars or Drew Carey. That’s just like her.”

Benjamin stared out the window shaking his head in apparent disbelief at both his incredible luck and his ongoing misfortune.

“Hold on, so Drew Carey dropped off a million dollars in cash at a McDonald’s near San Diego and your mother took it?”

“I don’t think it was cash. Drew’s not dumb he just didn’t know how smart my mother is. How could he?”

“What’s she doing with Drew’s million dollars?”

“She hasn’t spent a penny! She would never spend my money. She just doesn’’t want me to have it. I guess I’ll just have to wait until she dies, but she’s real healthy. It’s nice to know that life won’t be so hard someday though. Life won’t have to be so hard then, you know?”

Interstate 35 was quickly approaching. The fear from earlier had been quiet while Benjamin told his stories. Now, finding space in the silence, it came roaring back. Benjamin’s tattoo and its placement warned that he was capable of violence. His words indicated that his grip on reality might be a little tenuous. If this was to end badly, the next few minutes would be rough.

“How are we going to do this? That’s the exit on the right.”

“Well, you pull over, I get out, I smoke this pipe, and then I try to make it to Des Moines before it gets dark.”

Another solid plan. The car had barely come to a stop when Benjamin threw the door open and jumped out.

“Thanks for the ride,” he yelled over his shoulder.

He was three steps away and moving fast down the ramp to the Interstate when I spotted his baby blue lighter sitting on the seat. I used it to knock on the window, but he either didn’t hear me or refused to turn around.

“Benjamin!” I yelled rolling down the window. “You’re going to need this.”

The man that turned back towards me might have been dangerous, but what I saw in him then was fear. He was scared of me too. I had forgotten that while everyone is afraid of hitchhikers, hitchhikers are afraid of the types of people that pick up hitchhikers.

“Your lighter man.” I leaned towards the open window and shook it for him to see.

“Jesus,” he said running back to the car. “This would have been a hard day without that. It would’ve been a hard day for sure.”

He didn’t say ‘thank you’. I didn’t say ‘goodbye’. Both of us seemed okay with it. 

I could see a flicker of flame lighting Benjamin’s pipe as he trampled through the long dead grass leading down to the speeding cars below. I easily merged back into traffic and thought about the rain forecasted for that evening and wondered what it must be like to be a man named Benjamin with a swastika tattooed on your neck.

A life full of hard days — that’s for sure.

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George J. Blesi lives in Minneapolis, MN with his wife, daughter, dog and two cats.

Photo: Hasin Farhan