Moment of Falling in Love: At the Gas Station

November 14, 2020

We were leaving my hometown after a weekend with my family. David was meeting both my parents and my siblings for the first time, so it was a big weekend for him.

They seemed to like him, were smiling a lot and being completely themselves, not trying to put up a front just to impress him.

He seemed to like them, answered all their questions and made himself comfortable in the house, not trying to put up a front just to impress them.

They seemed to like each other, but I definitely had to check in with all of them to make sure, starting with him as soon as we call each other on our way back to our respective cities.

But first thing’s first: gas. Neither of us wanted to get stranded during our 3-hour drives home because we ran out of gas.

I led him to the closest gas station to my childhood home (though, I forgot how to get there and almost got us lost on a 4-minute drive), and we parked our cars close to each other. Before getting out of my car, I reached for my purse in search of my wallet. I liked to get my debit card ready and hide it in my pocket before hopping out to pump gas so that I seemed less alluring to anyone who would want to rob me and take advantage. Some people would say I was paranoid, but others would say I was just...prepared.

As I put my purse back in its designated spot in my car, I looked out the window and noticed David jogging toward me.

With furrowed eyebrows, I opened my car door and asked, “Hey, what’s up?”

He waved his hand, ignoring my question and, instead, said, “Give me your card.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“Give me your card. I’m going to fill up your gas.”

My jaw went slack for a second, but I eventually caved and gave him my card, grateful that, not only was he filling up my gas for me so that I wouldn’t have to be out in the dark and in the cold (two things he knew I didn’t like), but he didn’t offer to pay for it, knowing I’d feel bad and knowing it would technically be breaking our current boundaries (we were paying for ourselves for everything until we would make our relationship official in just a couple months).

After filling up my gas, he told me he would put air in my tires. He noticed that my tires were low and he knew I relied too much on Jiffy Lube to do anything about it that night. Again, my jaw went slack, in shock that someone could be so kind and so good to me.

We drove over to the air pumps and again parked our cars close to each other. Before I could get the chance to say, “Actually, no, it’s okay, I can try to pump it myself or wait until tomorrow,” he was kneeling next to my car’s tire holding the pump hose steady as the tire was being filled, whistling and carrying on like this was normal.

But this was not normal.

Never has any guy actually considered what I didn’t like to do and offered to do it (when possible, I tried to avoid pumping gas at night) while also offering to be the person at risk instead of me (I’m just saying, there seems to be more robberies and shootings at gas stations, maybe something to do with all the exposed debit cards and unlocked cars).

This experience made me see him in a new light. And as I watched him get back into his car, I couldn’t help but think, I could get used to this.