When the 2008 Kia Optima they were traveling in on March 29 of 2012 went off U.S. 63, careened down an embankment and crashed into the creek bed next to Emmett Kelly Park, it marked the end of the road for two of the three teenage girls inside.
But the second of two fatal accidents that rocked the Houston area that day during a grizzly period of just over six hours also brought about an unlikely beginning.
As a volunteer firefighter with the City of Houston Fire Department, Dustin Blair was among the dozens of emergency responders who hastily attended the scene after the call regarding the second wreck went out over scanners at about 7:30 p.m. that evening. Try as they might, workers struggled to penetrate the mangled wreckage of the car in their attempts to get to its occupants.
Blair finally managed to slither in through the remnants of the back window and was able to free 19-year-old Brandi Kaufman. He stayed by her side until she was securely in the care of personnel at Mercy Hospital in Springfield.
After a lengthy battle with head trauma, Kaufman – now 21 – is well down the road of recovery (although she has somewhat limited use of her right arm), and the former Houston resident is back home where her father lives in St. Peters. The 28-year-old Blair also now resides in St. Peters and works in nearby Eureka.
Because the two plan to marry.
“It’s like a story from one of those books I don’t like to read,” Blair said. “But it’s real.”
Kaufman doesn’t even have the luxury of even recalling her first moments with Blair. On the other hand, those moments are forever etched in the depths of Blair’s mind – not only because of the unfortunate reality he was dealing with, but also due to Kaufman’s behavior.
Following the crash, her conscious took some time off, but her subconscious was hard at work.
“I remember leaving Pizza Hut, and after that, nothing,” Kaufman said. “He was talking about it later, and he told me I cussed him out pretty bad. Apparently I was very upset with him because he put the neck brace on and I wanted him to take it off but he wouldn’t.
“I don’t remember meeting him and I don’t remember looking at him, but I guess I basically told him he was a jerk.”
“She was talking to me, but she wasn’t all there,” Blair said.
Kaufman spent the better part of the next week lying in a hospital bed in a coma. Blair was working in Springfield at the time and came to visit her every day. He was the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes.
“I looked at him and I didn’t know who he was and I asked, ‘Where’s my dad?’” she said. “It was like, ‘I don’t know who you are.’”
Over the next several months, familiarity built between the crash victim and the fireman through ongoing contact on social media. One thing led to another, and with a little prodding from a friend, the two got together when Kaufman came to Houston to visit her mom. The two then realized they felt close – and wanted to stay that way.
“We hung out, and I said, ‘I like you,’” Kaufman said. “He said, ‘I like you, too.’ We got close really fast.”
Kaufman’s survival of the crash meant her mother, Dawn Kaufman (a Houston resident and business owner), didn’t lose both of her daughters that night. Still alive at the accident scene, Brandi’s 18-year-old sister, Stephanie, was transported to Texas County Memorial Hospital. But she didn’t make it.
“For something so good to come from something so bad is just incredible,” Dawn Kaufman said. “Brandi’s never been this close to anyone before, and for it to happen this way is hard to believe.”
While Kaufman knows her affection for Blair is real, she has heard negative comments from some acquaintances.
“They say we’re together only because I idolize him,” she said. “But there were a lot of men at the crash scene that night, and I kind of idolize all of them for what they did. But not enough to build a relationship with them.”
Like any couple, Kaufman and Blair have their moments of difference, but sharing an experience most men and women will never know has helped form a strong bond.
“Marilyn Monroe once said, ‘If you can’t handle me at my worst, you don’t deserve my best,’” Kaufman said. “Well, he’s seen me at my worst and handled it pretty well, so I guess he deserves my best.”
Kaufman said there are times when uneasy thoughts and feelings creep through her with regard to her relationship with her future spouse. But the good side of the situation always outweighs and overcomes the bad.
“I think it’s really cute,” Kaufman said, “and I wouldn’t change it for the world. But it’s strange to think that if I hadn’t been in that car, I probably would never have met him. It’s amazing.”
“I asked them both, ‘Did you ever think you’d meet the love of your life in such a tragic manner?’” Dawn Kaufman said. “They both just laughed. There’s no answer for that.”
“It’s something you read or see in movies, and you never think it would happen to you,” Blair said. “Well, it has.”
It’s something you read or see in movies, and you never think it would happen to you. Well, it has.”