This thing… This fucking thing is playing with my sanity. Been holed up too long, starving on memories and something’s going to break. Soon…

I hated being out of touch with what’s going on in this town. I need to get a feel for this place so I took to walking at three or four in the morning, just snooping around. Early on I figured there might be something to be had around schools because everything was shut down. “There’s not even any need for custodians”, I thought. You see, the homeless naturally gravitate to spots where people aren’t. For the most part they want to be left alone, un-hassled by cops or any authority figure really, as they drink and fuck (if they’re lucky) and eat and sleep.

I found a school about 15 minutes away that looked promising. There were at least two entrances that I could see that had walls built around them-a perfect place to curl up with a fetid blanket and sleep off the rotgut. I looked for the tell-tale signs-cigarette butts, beer bottles, junk food wrappers but no luck. It didn’t make any sense. But then I walked around to the back and I figured I might have hit the jackpot. A huge parking lot, two baseball fields next to one another and a small forest of pines and elms behind the fields. I realized there was housing behind the forest so no doubt the decades and decades of kids that lived there created paths to get to the school and back home again. Not wishing to press my luck I peeked into the dugout and yes! the signs were all there. I marched home quickly, knowing I wouldn’t be able to sleep that night.

Such anticipation! I waited until mid-morning to do my exploring and followed a trail that ended between two houses but also veered off behind a small three-story apartment complex. There was a rock outcropping with grafitti spray-painted on it so I wandered over. There was the firepit that was most likely used by teenagers on the weekend and some bums during the week, bottles strewn everywhere, of course.

As the sun was setting I crept behind the baseball field closest to the pathway and sat down by the pole on the third base line. I was a bit exposed but was certain that I couldn’t be seen unless someone were specifically looking for me. I waited. After ninety minutes or so a figure, staggering along, walked into the woods. Time for me to shine. I gave him fifteen minutes to take a leak and pass out.

Maybe it was because it had been so long but the night seemed to go silent. The air turned thick and seemed like a weight on my shoulders. No sounds at all but the crunch of pine needles underfoot. I reached the small clearing and saw my guy with his back to me. He wasn’t snoring and that was a bit surprising. I crept closer, step by step, took out my knife, raised it, rolled him over…

He had a knife in his hand and slashed at me! He opened up the side of my bicep just a little (hobos never take proper care of their knives-they’re always dull) as I almost missed entirely but managed to get under his shoulder blade. Panicking, not thinking, I grabbed at his blade as I buried mine just under the top of his jawbone. Fuck, it hurt! I was able to pin his arm to the ground with my knee. I ripped down with my knife and the floodgates opened up. He wasn’t going to hurt me anymore.

Now I was the one that staggered along the path. I was sure that the wound to my arm wasn’t that bad but the area below my thumb was opened up wide. Damn it! I was sweating profusely. There’s no way I could show up at a hospital, I would just have to do some rudimentary stitching myself and I’m not looking forward to the prospect but it has to be done.

The irony that I would have to hole up again for quite some time while the wound healed was not lost on me.

TO THE GAME!

Cowboys/Rams:

Dallas has so much frickin’ talent on O it’s ridiculous. The question then becomes, “How will they end up squandering it?”. Will their dissembled secondary give all those points right back? Don’t look for Amari to be gangbusters tonight, he’s being tailed by a friend to the site, Jalen Ramsey.