A Serendipitous Encounter

September 1, 2018

“I told her, it’s not you. It’s me. And the time has come for us to part company.”

It was hard. It was sad. After all, she was my first love. That beautiful E class 350 Mercedes Benz silver and black convertible. But after seven years, she got old and so did I. I got tired of crawling out of the front seat. So on Sept 4, 2018, I leased a brand new 2019 Infiniti QX50 SUV, loaded with the latest technology.

After I signed the papers, I went out to the lot and sat down in my beautiful new car. A tall, adorable, young man, with a broad smile, greeted me. His job was to teach me about all the beeps and buzzers, and dingers and ringers and bells and whistles. I liked this kid from the get-go. He looked like my twenty-five-year-old nephew… the beard, the gait, describing cars as if they were women.

“This car,…What a beauty… great set of headlights and a sweet sweet rear bumper.”
I snickered. 

“ By the way,” he said, “I’m Tel.” 
“Bill?” I said, sounding like Mr. Magoo.” 
“No, Tel” he repeated. 
I thought to myself, What kind of name is that?
Pretty funny coming from a girl named Rhory.
“It’s Greek”, he answered, seeming to read my mind.

“ Oh!... OH!... Do you know the Stamos family.? They’re Greek. They live in Westlake. They go to the Greek …” 


I stopped myself.
How stupid of me. I thought, Do I know every Jew in Westlake?

“No, I don’t think I know them,” he said, politely



He went on, 
“ So, there’s a switch on the side. It will take your seat up and down.”

I reached down and pulled the automatic switch up as far as it would go. 

“ Perfect,” I said. I love being high.” He looked at me
We both laughed. 

“And when you push the information button, you can get the news headlines, local weather, and sport’s scores.”

“Sports? .Go Dodgers!” I said.

“Are you a Dodger fan”, he asked.
“Are you kidding? I live and breathe Dodgers. I’m a certified wonk. In the 1980’s, Steve Garvey and Ron Cey were customers at my parent’s bakery in Woodland Hills. They would come into the store on Sundays, go behind the counter and take care of customers.”

“No kidding. That’s sick. I might be old, but I knew what that meant.

Suddenly the technology lesson faded into the background. And there was the connection between the old bohemian and the young brainiac. Tel told me he watched the games over at a local restaurant 
called Islands.

“Maybe I’ll meet you over there sometime,”
I invited my old self. 

We blabbed on about the Dodgers for about twenty-minutes and the more I learned about him, the more he reminded me of my youngest nephew. 

“ Okay he said, So, any questions?” 
“Are you kidding? I don’t remember a thing you said. I’m not nearly “as bright as I look!” 
He handed me a business card. 
“Here’s my cell number .Text me anytime.” And I did.


September 13, 2018 – my first text.

“Hey Tel, Machado is up!” 
Manny Machado was the new Dodger shortstop.
“Here we go!” Tel answered.

And the relationship was then more about them Brooklyn Bums than about the technology in the car. 
We texted back and forth about the Dodgers and also about the car. I would see him at the dealership. He always had a smile and I always had a question. Poor guy.

November 7, 2018, 

I went to Las Vegas to take care of my eighty-nine-year-old aunt. I was staying with my friend in Henderson. This was my first car trip in my new Infiniti. I was still having trouble with the bells and whistles, so while on the road, I figured I would call my service gal.

“Alba, help, too many bells and whistles.”
She said, “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure Tel calls you back tomorrow!”

November 8, 2018

Still in Vegas, hanging out with my friend, I’m shopping on Amazon for my aunt, and she’s listening to the news on her iPhone, filling me in about the Woolsey fires. They had just started. The fires started eighteen hours after the horrific Borderline Massacre in Thousand Oaks, where twelve people were killed. I wasn’t paying attention. I was just trying to get a new phone for my aunt. On the news, the two stories jumped back and forth all day. At some point, my friend put the phone on speaker. We listened together to the warning:

“Mandatory evacuations are in effect in Westlake Village west of the 101 freeway,”  

I had to think about that. We New Yorkers aren’t good with North, South, East and West. We do better with left, right, and straight As I was figuring it out, 
my friend shouted,


“You live west of the 101 freeway!!!”

She showed me the pictures. My neighborhood was on fire. Surreal. Would mine be one of them?
It was like watching a bad video game and way too much to process. She interrupted my thoughts with:

“They just released the names and pictures of the victims of the Borderline Grill shooting.” She flipped through the pictures on her phone of the twelve people who were murdered. The fire now way in the back of my mind.

Sgt Ron Helus
Sean Adler
Telemachus Orfanos 

“Huh? Scroll back, “ I said, “Telemachus Orfanos?” 

That nanno second of recognition, without being quite able to place the face. And then there it was.

“ Oh my God. Tel…Telemachus, my Dodger buddy.”

I couldn’t quite process it. I could hear the sound of my heart beating. My eyes wet from tears. I stared at his smiling picture for minutes. I read the article. I didn’t know that Tel was an Afghanistan Navy vet and that he had survived the Las Vegas massacre on Oct 1, 2017, only to be murdered in the second safest city in America, five minutes from the safety of his home.  

Thoughts and feelings flooded in my head. The fire, the evacuations, the shootings, but most of all, I couldn’t wrap my head around Tel’s death. 

November 10

I returned home from Las Vegas. I went over to the Infiniti dealership. Alba and I hugged. Tears welling. We talked about Tel like people always talk about a tragic death.

“I just saw him the other day. “I texted him about the game.”




“ Alba added, And do you know that my last words to Tel were?” she paused.

“Don’t forget to call Rhory?” she smiled. 

But the irony didn’t go unnoticed. What we both weren’t saying was that we wished we’d have said something loving to the young man we’d never see again.
I walked over to Tel’s office. People had left flowers, notes, and little mementos on his desk. Rob, The finance manager saw me and gave me a big hug. 

“Please come to the memorial service here in the showroom. It’s next Wed. at 3.”


Wednesday, November 16, 2018, 2:45 PM

I jumped in my car ready to go to the service and had a last-minute thought, 

“Oh my God, I need to bring a memento or something.”

I ran back in the house and Mickey Moused a memorial card. Clip art, Dodger cap, clip art Dodger logo. Quick scribble.

Dear Tel, 
I loved being your Dodger buddy.”
Rhory, a thankful customer.


Over 150 people were there. Pictures of Tel, in his signature red plaid shirt, were being viewed on a large TV screen that was normally used to advertise the new QX50’s. I gave my memorial card to Alba, hoping it would make it into Tel’s office, given there was so much going on. People spoke about the young man who had endured so much at such an early age. He was only twenty-seven years old.






January 2019

In late January, there was an official memorial at the Los Robles Golf Course. I was sick that day with the beginnings of a bad flu.I didn’t want to go. I didn’t think I’d be missed. I went to the other service. No one knows me. I won’t know anyone. I had a good excuse for not going. But I just couldn’t stay home.

I pulled up in front of the club. A young man in a red plaid flannel shirt was standing outside the gate. 

I said, “Are you Tel’s brother?”
“Yes.”
“OMG, you look just like him.
Who are you? he asked. 
I’m really nobody, but I knew your brother from Infiniti.”
His face lit up. “Are you his Dodger buddy?“
“I am!” 
“We loved the card you left for him.” 

I was taken back. My silly little, last minute, hand-made card.

Most of the guests were wearing red plaid flannel shirts. I walked over to where Tel’s mom was. I’d seen her on the news.


“Hi, Mrs. Orfanos. You don’t know me. I bought a car at Infiniti and Tel….”
“You’re his Dodger buddy!”
“Yeah!”

She grabbed me and hugged me like we were old friends.

“Thank you,” she said. Please be sure to introduce yourself to my husband, Mark. He would want to meet you.”

We chatted for a bit and then I walked over to his dad. 

“Hi, Mr. Orfanos. I’m the one who made the Dodger card for Tel.”

He smiled and gave me a bear hug.





“Thank you. We were so taken with how widespread the love for Tel was. I hope you don’t mind, but I showed that card to everyone who came to the house.”

“No, please do,” I said.

And then, there was nothing more to say.

I was left so empty, yet a part of me felt so filled up. Empty because there was nothing I could to do with what just happened, and no way to share all the feelings I was experiencing.

Filled, because, through my sneezing and dizziness, I managed to realize that my little homemade card meant so much to this family …and to me…and I almost didn’t go to the memorial. I don’t almost "not go" to things anymore. You never know when you can make a difference in someone’s life or when they will touch yours. Tel touched mine, deeply.

Today is

June 19, 2019

Dodger season is well underway. Even though I hardly knew this young man, I miss him. There is an emptiness. I still want to text him and say, 

“Hey, Tell, did you see that walk-off home run by the rookie Will Smith?” 

So forever, Tel will be the twenty-seven-year-old boy I knew…he was after all just a boy, who I met serendipitously.

-Rhory L.