Safety Belt:

One day, bright and sunny, a young woman was driving along the street. She was on her way home from work. She had brought her child to work that day. There was a bit of traffic on the road and she divided her attention between the road and her child, in the back seat. As they were passing through an intersection, a truck driver struck the car they were in. Their car rolled over a number of times until it stopped, on its roof. The truck driver, quickly emerged from his car and ran to the flipped car. People gathered around this car. They shouted and yelled. The child in the backseat was crying. But the mother was not responding. A clear, metallic liquid was emptying itself from the wreck onto the dirt below. There was a spark and the liquid caught on fire. The group gathered around the car were crying and screaming. Others reached into the windows but could not reach the child or her mother. And seeing the fire growing, some from the group gave up hope, knowing that it would have been suicide for them to help further. Two men from the group remained and while they reached inside the car, they realized that the mother was not going to wake. The smaller of the two entered into the opening of the window and unlatched the safety belt of the child. The child fell into his arms and he crawled out from the car. She was scratching and holding on very tightly but when he got her out, she still clung on. The other man pulled her away as he entered the front seat window and unlatched the mother’s safety belt. When he did, she fell onto her head but he was able to soften the blow by holding onto her shoulders. The fire growing, he was losing time. She was still unconscious so he had to drag her and he could only do so in small steps. Rearranging himself so that he could push her from the vehicle, he noticed that the fire was now creeping into the window. He spotted the man holding the child and standing some steps back. When the woman was at the window, this man put the child down and ran to grab her. When he pulled her from the vehicle, he brushed off the few flames that were developing on her pant legs. He quickly pulled her to safety and then when he turned about to the car, he was struck by terror. The car was fully aflame. And the other man, he assumed to be still inside. He fell to his knees and started to cry but then turned around and saw the woman and her child. The woman was just starting to regain consciousness as her child nursed her. Shortly after, the police and the fire department arrived. The car, though it had been fully on fire, did not combust. And as the firemen focussed their hoses at the car, the people surrounding started to see something moving inside. This did not stop the firemen from keeping their hoses going until the fire was completely out. When they turned them off, they were shocked by the appearance from the middle of the charred car, a man, fully clothed and healthy, standing and catching his breath. All around rushed to him and asked what happened. “All I saw was flames on every side of me,” he cried. “I’ve never prayed so hard in my life. Those hoses were worse than that fire.” A couple of emergency personnel approached him and covered him in towels, took his vitals. When asked what he was feeling, he said, “Are the woman and her child alright?” When they acknowledged, he walked away slowly, assessed his car, opened the door, got in and drove off. - From my Book Fables of Good Will.