The Hitchhiker’s Rule

“You should never pick up hitchhikers.”

That’s what the man in the back seat told us—right after we’d picked him up.

David and I were driving from Tulsa to Wichita on a hot summer afternoon, the kind where the air wavers above the asphalt like smoke. The highway stretched out straight and empty, shimmering beneath a wide, cloudless sky. Around two o’clock, we spotted him—a small, wiry figure walking briskly along the shoulder, a felt fedora on his head and a suit jacket slung over his shoulder.

David was driving. I nodded toward the man.
“Shall we give him a lift?”

David smiled. “Sure.”

We pulled over, and the man climbed in. He was polite, almost formal, as if stepping into someone’s living room rather than a car. He told us he’d been in Tulsa for a cousin’s wedding. His car had broken down, and now he was hitching to Stillwater so a family member could drive him back to fix it. He mentioned his tribal nation—Oklahoma-born and proud of it—and then settled into quiet conversation, hands folded neatly in his lap.

Half an hour later, we saw another hitchhiker—a tall, broad-shouldered man standing beside the road, thumb raised, his T-shirt darkened with sweat.

David glanced at me. We both grinned. Why not?

I turned in my seat. “What do you think? Should we pick him up?”

The change in our passenger’s face was immediate and almost comic. His eyes widened; his shoulders tensed.
“Oh, no,” he said earnestly. “You should never pick up hitchhikers.”

David’s mouth twitched. “That so?”

Our passenger realized the irony the instant it left his lips. His face flushed red. “I didn’t mean—well, not all of them. But you never know, right? Some folks pick up a hitchhiker and are never heard from again.” He gave a nervous laugh, then glanced at his folded hands. “Guess I shouldn’t be the one to say that.”

David slowed anyway. The big man climbed in, nodded once in thanks. He smelled faintly of sweat and freshly cut grass.
“Appreciate it,” he said. “Didn’t think anyone was gonna stop.”

The two men exchanged brief, polite nods—mirror images of travelers who’d long ago learned how to keep moving. The car settled into an easy silence, the kind that comes when strangers share a small mercy on the road.

For the next several miles, the conversation drifted: roads taken, towns passed through, the long hours between rides. The smaller man leaned his head against the window, eyes half closed, letting the rhythm of the highway lull him. The taller man talked about heading north, maybe finding work in Kansas City. Between the two of them, something like kinship formed—two stories told from different bodies, both shaped by motion and weather and chance.

We never learned either man’s name, but it didn’t seem to matter. By the time we neared Stillwater, it felt as if we knew them both.

We dropped the smaller man off first.He stood beside the car for a moment, adjusting his hat.
“Thanks for the ride,” he said softly.

“You’re welcome,” David said.

Then the man turned toward the other passenger, hesitated, and added, “I owe you an apology. I almost told them not to stop for you. I’m afraid of hitchhikers—think they’re dangerous. Funny thing, isn’t it? I’m one myself.”

He gave a quick, embarrassed smile, waved once, and walked toward his house.

Back on the highway, the larger man chuckled. “Funny little fella.”

“Yeah,” David said. “Seems like a good guy.”

For a while, no one spoke. The road stretched ahead, pale and endless in the heat. I thought about the smaller man’s words—the fear that rode beside him, the strange honesty of warning others about people like himself. There was something humble in it, almost tender.

The kind of truth, I suppose, that only comes to you when you’ve spent too many miles on the side of the road—waiting for someone to stop.