Two weeks ago, Ryan Hachey ran out of gas on the highway, at night, with no CAA and in the middle of a huge storm.
"I'm going into survival mode," he said, of his mindset at the time.
"I don't know what to think. I'm screwed. I'm basically out of options. I had no options left."
He made it to the General Store, in Little Rapids, over an hour outside of Sault Ste. Marie.
It was closed due to the power outage, so he called the owner at home.
"I answer the phone, this gentleman was on the other end in a bad situation, I could tell he needed help," said Merv Brooks, Little Rapids General Store owner.
What Brooks did next was a bit surprising.
"I asked him, ‘do you see the feed shed door?’ He said ‘yes I do’, so I just said ‘gently push on it because there's just a bag against it at this moment and you'll be able to enter the store’," he explained.
That's right.
He told Hachey, a stranger, to break into his store to get a jerry can; something Hachey doesn't think would happen in a bigger city.
"I'm thinking God bless. Thank God, there's a guy out there that can trust me or that you can trust. Thank God people like this still exist," he said.
"Many times people have helped me over the years," added Brooks.
"You wonder how you can pay them back, so when something like this arises, it's your turn."
Now, two weeks later, Hachey made the trip to Little Rapids to say thank you face-to-face, and to fill up his tank again.
Both had a laugh about the story. A story they think would only take place in a small Northern Ontario town.
