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It was after midnight and I was driving home from work. 'Work' was in the city of Fresno,California. 'Home' was in rural Fresno County, an agricultural area famous for its grape vineyards, fig orchards, and meth labs. It was June 2001 and I was 21 years old. I was working 40 hours a week for minimum wage in a group home for troubled adolescents.

As I passed that same lone liquor store that I drove by every night, a woman stepped in front of my car and I had to swerve off of the road. The tires hit the dirt and I hit the brake without thinking about it. The liquor store's lights illuminated the pitch black highway. The woman was waving her arms in my rear view mirror and coming towards my vehicle. She was probably in her fifties. And the right side of her face was covered in blood.

I put my vehicle in park and partially rolled down my window. "Please help, please help," the woman sobbed. I realized that she was a Mexican migrant field worker.

"What happened to you?" I asked.

"Speaking Spanish?" she asked me.

"Porquito. Not very well." I admitted.

"My husband beat me. He drinking. Borracho! I leave. He going to kill."

"Did you call the police?" I asked, already knowing the answer.

She shook her head. She pointed northwest and said, "We live at camp. No papers."

"Do you want to go to the hospital?" I asked. Her head was still bleeding. It looked like she'd been hit with a beer bottle. There was a pay phone stationed outside of the liquor store but I didn't know if it worked.

"No. Can stay with daughter. She no have car."

"Where is she?" I asked.

"Olive and Hughes."

That was a neighborhood at least ten miles away from where we were at. It would have been a long trek for somebody with a possible concussion.

"I'll take you there," I said. "But no drugs in my car. No guns. No peligro to me, okay?"

"Yes. You look," she handed me the plastic bag she was carrying. It contained clothing and a framed photo. She had on a t-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops.

"Get in," I said, unlocking my passenger side door. She climbed on to the passenger seat, clutching the plastic bag.

I pulled back on to the highway. There was a deafening silence between us and I thought that we should keep speaking. I reasoned that it would help me to determine whether or not I'd made a tragic mistake in allowing a complete stranger to get in to my vehicle in the middle of the night. I also knew from the group home's mandatory first aid training that if somebody has been hit in the head she could go in to shock.

"So I'm Carrie," I offered.

"Olivia," she said.

She asked me about my job and told me about her grandchildren. Then she started to cry again and I didn't know what to say. I told her about the women's shelter in Fresno and that maybe she should call them once she was at her daughter's. I didn't think the shelter would turn Olivia in to INS.

We arrived at a run down apartment complex. I waited in the car while Olivia knocked on the door. A girl my age came out and they hugged. Then Olivia came back to me.

"For the helping. Gracias," she said, grasping one of my hands in both of hers.

"De nada," I replied.

"Not going back!" she said.

"I hope not," I said. "Be safe."

I never saw Olivia again. I don't know if she stayed with her daughter or went back home to her husband. When I told my friends and family about Olivia everybody yelled at me and said I'd used poor judgment in helping her. That was the first and last time I'd helped a stranger in that way. I don't know if I would do it again. I just knew that night, that Olivia was in more danger than I probably was.

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