We checked the weekend forecast before we left for Blowing Rock: sunny and highs in 60s, the perfect kind of mountain autumn weather. We pictured coffee and eggs for early breakfasts, walks in the woods and around Bass Lake, the late afternoon sun slanting across our faces as we sat on a porch. We packed up the car and drove across the state line and into North Carolina. The day was heading into evening, and my parents were with us, and the four of us were chatting as we drove along a winding country road.

Then it burst into our conversation—the sound of clanking metal. Suddenly we were pulling off the road and onto the end of a gravel driveway with a NO TRESPASSING sign, a locked gate, no houses in sight. The tire was blown—how bad, we didn’t know. My husband, Preston, tried to use a repair kit to fix it, but the repair kit wasn’t kicking on, and when it finally did after an hour, it failed to fix a thing. By that time, we had called AAA for a tow, but where to go? Back home, or on to our destination? We were forty miles from home already, so we opted to keep on.

But there was one hitch: “There’s room for only one person in the tow truck,” the AAA employee said. It was nearing dark, and there were three of us who would be left on a rural country road soon, so I called the first person Preston and I could think to call: David.

To tell you about David, I need to take you back two years ago to a summer day when Kibbi, our dog, was of course still alive. Preston and I were walking her on the streets of Blowing Rock when we came upon a guy with flip-flops sitting out on a stoop listening to beach music and throwing a ball for his elderly border collie, Jim. The dogs sniffed each other, and we began a conversation that evening we kept having every time we saw David throwing a ball for Jim out on that stoop on other nights, on other weekends.

Sometimes dogs give you what you don’t yet know you need.

That summer and then that fall, we kept running into David and Jim until finally we humans exchanged numbers, and instead of waiting to run into each other, we got together—for walks, for lunches, for dinners out or in. One time we took David to the next town over when he’d had surgery and needed meds. One time I worked with him on a document for his work. One time he agreed to march around town with me when Preston had opted for a run. Many times, the three of us have talked over issues each of us were facing in our lives: medical, cultural, professional, personal. We have exchanged personal histories, theories about the human race, and our various political persuasions.

Jim died less than a year after we all met, and David used to say our friendship was Jim’s last gift, but now that Kibbi has died, I’d say it was one of her gifts, too. When the AAA employee said only one person could fit in the tow truck, when we were thinking about who to call in Blowing Rock who would be willing to make the drive to come out and get us, the truth is we didn’t hesitate to call David, and he didn’t hesitate to say yes. He offered to pick Preston up at the tire place, too, even though it was getting later in the night. That’s the kind of friendship we all have.

I thought about that as David drove me and my parents to our destination. He had shoved his belongings aside to make room for ours in the bed of his truck. He had adjusted the temperature to whatever we wanted. He made us laugh and told stories, and we forgot for a few minutes our car had a blown tire, that it was getting late, and I forgot about the pain of losing my beloved dog, and I thought then only of this friendship she left, this lasting gift.

(Photo credit: chmyphotography from unsplash.com)

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