Never take candy from strangers

In Southern California it was a really hot August, and my mum had to stop at the grocery store to pick up some milk.  We were on our way back home after running errands most of the day when she had this realization, she had forgotten to buy milk.  Being a young kid at the time, I hated shopping, it was so boring, and I didn't want to go in the store with her.  Reluctantly she agreed I could wait in the car; she would run in and buy the milk and then run out so we could head home.  In the nineties it was normal and acceptable to do this.  I had all of the windows rolled down in our little car, trying my best not to melt in the middle of the back seat.  These were the windows that you actually had to roll down manually, you couldn't just press a button.  She had only been gone for a few minutes when a beat-up old rusty truck pulled up next to our car.  A middle-aged man and woman stepped out and walked directly up to my wide-open window.  I glanced up to see a peculiar man with a trucker hat on.  The woman stood adjacent to him awkwardly.  He took his hat off and pulled out a lollipop from underneath it and stuck his hand with the lollipop in my window. 

"Do you want some candy?" he asked. 

I just stared at him, and scooted more into the middle, "No thank-you."

My parents had taught me from a young age not only to not talk to strangers, but definitely not to take candy from them. 

He looked at me and said, "Why, do you not like candy?" 

I shook my head and stared defiantly back, "No, thank-you."   

He pleaded with me again, "Are you sure that you don't want it?" 

I shook my head, "No." 

He shrugged his shoulders and finally said, "Okay." 

And with that the man put the lollipop back under his hat and marched back with the woman to their truck and drove away.  When my mum got back to our car, and I told her what had happened, she got really upset with me.  She told me that I should have yelled, honked the horn and done anything to attract attention because she knew that was not normal behavior.  Around this same time frame another little girl that looked similar to me went missing and was later found to be kidnapped, and my mum was convinced it was the same people.  We'll never know for sure, but if they were, I had been in really close proximity to some really evil people.